Now Roasting in Rochester, Minnesota: Colorway Coffee Roasters

Colorway Coffee Roasters Co-Owner Will Forsman. All images courtesy of Colorway Coffee Roasters.

A rainbow of flavor is now arching over Rochester, Minnesota, where the owners of the Cafe Steam coffee shops have launched Colorway Coffee Roasters.

The roasting company follows the Cafe Steam ownership’s acquisition of Rochester’s Narrow Road Coffee in January of this year. The acquisition included a 1,100-square-foot roasting facility with space for green coffee storage, offices, a sensory analysis room, various brewing and packaging equipment and a Diedrich IR-7 roaster.

Carefully sourced and profiled single-origin coffees and blends now fill the hoppers at 5-year-old Cafe Steam’s three retail coffee shops as well as colorfully labeled 8- and 12-ounce retails bags for sale online and in cafes.

“The branding of Colorway Coffee Roasters was to allow us greater flexibility in working with wholesale clients and offering retail bagging in stores,” Cafe Steam and Colorway Coffee Roasters Co-Owner Will Forsman told Daily Coffee News. “The regional name recognition limited Cafe Steam to being associated as a coffee shop only, and by creating a separate brand for roasting we are able to ensure greater scalability with a brand that is disconnected from our original locations.”

The original Cafe Steam location opened in 2015, followed by two more locations in 2018 and 2019. The first products by Colorway debuted on Cafe Steam counters in April of this year.

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Said Forsman, “This allowed us to train ourselves and develop a quality product prior to releasing retail bags.”

Heading the new roasting operation for Colorway is Austin Power, whose career in coffee began at Second State Coffee in Charleston, South Carolina. More recently he was roasting with Charleston Coffee Roasters.

Green coffees have come primarily through importers Cafe Imports and Trabocca, while Forsman said the business is exploring additional smaller import companies and potentially some more direct connections with producers.

Colorway Coffee Roasters Roaster Austin Power.

Said Forsman. “As with any young coffee roaster, our goal [for Colorway] is to build relationships with retailers and online clients and continue to expand wholesale accounts.”

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