Archer & Co. Aims for the Hearts of Northern Kentucky Coffee Drinkers

The founders of Archer & Co. Roasters at their recent ribbon cutting in Hebron, Kentucky. Images courtesy of Archer & Co.

A trio of women in Hebron, Kentucky, decided to shoot their shot with the launch of Archer & Co. Roasters, a new small-batch direct-to-consumer and wholesale roasting company. 

Launched last year by chief roaster Wendy Tobergte, her sister Mary Beimesch and Beimesch’s daughter, Liz Elleman, the family business drew its name from Elleman’s son, Archer. 

The “& Co.” tag-on represents their growing surrounding community, including Tobergte’s nine grandchildren in the expanding family tree. 

“Our brand is really just about family and helping one another out,” Elleman recently told Daily Coffee News. “We have a large extended family and having grown up in this area, many customers remember us from years ago.”

With close community ties, the company is leaning into its Brewing Impact wholesale program, for fundraiser coffees. Thus far, the platform has helped generate funds for a business leadership program for a local high school and a nonprofit foundation supporting international development in Kenya. 

“Mary is a retired pharmacist and a serial entrepreneur. Wendy’s background is education and [I have] business experience having been a payroll manager,” Elleman said. “We chose coffee because we enjoy it. Coffee brings people together, creates a community feeling and it is growing in popularity.”

As of this writing, Archer & Co. is the first known commercial coffee roaster operating in Boone County, with Hebron about 30 minutes outside of downtown Cincinnati. The women began pursuing the business in earnest in 2023 before formally launching with a ribbon cutting in late 2024. 

“One of the main reasons we decided to open a roastery instead of a coffee shop was the flexibility that we could have with our working hours,” said Elleman. “By approaching the business with our families in mind, we have set our hours to work around the needs of our families.”

Inside their approximately 1,500-square-foot production roastery in Hebron, the women oversee a 3-kilo-capacity Mill City Roasters machine, with green coffees primarily coming from Minneapolis-based Cafe Imports and its small-bag sibling brand, La Bodega. 

“They have excellent standards of sourcing green coffee,” said Elleman. “This allows us to purchase reputable coffee from FTO and women producers and small farms while having Cafe Imports verifying the sources and all the importing documentation.”

The Archer roastery also includes dedicated areas for pallet storage, a packing area, desk areas and a retail sales wall. Said Elleman, “Workflow was important when we were designing our setup.”

As Archer expands its direct sales and fundraising platform, the company is also targeting new wholesale clients. 

“We do have several offices that serve our coffee in their breakroom and they are just wild about our coffee,” said Elleman. “As always, we would love to find additional offices, restaurants [and] cafes that would like to serve our coffee.”

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