Coffee Roaster Helping Transform Portland (Maine) Neighborhood

A new coffee roaster is being credited with helping transform the East Bayside port neighborhood in Portland, Maine, into a kind of fermentation destination.

Tandem Coffee Roasters opened in an historic brick building at 122 Anderson Street in August, as one of several new and soon-to-be businesses — including breweries, a cider and kombucha maker, a distillery, and artisan food shops — helping to reinvigorate the neighborhood.

Noting the neighborhood’s emerging nickname “Yeast Bayside,” reporter William Hall chatted with Tandem co-owner Will Pratt about the mini renaissance for The Forecaster:

Another recent arrival in the neighborhood, Tandem Coffee Roasters, also was attracted to a unique space. In August, the company set up in a tiny brick building at 122 Anderson St., next to Bunker Brewing.

“We didn’t know anything about the neighborhood, but we knew we wanted to work in this building,” said Will Pratt, part of another husband-and-wife business team.

“We’d just come from New York, and so the idea of having a freestanding building that we could afford was just amazing,” he said. “We looked at it for like two seconds before deciding to take it.

“We felt very lucky. But it was only after the build-out and moving in that we realized how fortunate we really are.”

Pratt said that the neighborhood fermenters are now “good friends” – and pointed out that coffee is a fermented product. Tandem and Bunker even collaborated recently to produce a coffee-flavored ale.

For more: The Forecaster