Blanchard's Coffee Roasting Co. has been open almost 15 years, has two cafe locations on the way and will host the U.S. Coffee Championship preliminaries for the first time this September. (Photo by Cameron Charles Lewis)
Richmond's Blanchard’s Coffee Roasting Co. is set to host the 2019 U.S. Coffee Championships preliminaries from Sept. 6-8, bringing a variety of premier coffee producers to the city for one of coffee’s biggest annual events. The three-day affair is expected to be attended by 600 to 700 people.
Since debuting in 2002, the annual Coffee Championships have become an increasingly popular tradition in the United States, with competitors lining up to prove that their coffee stacks up against some of the best in the world. According to Blanchard’s head of sales Stephen Robertson, Blanchard’s has bid to host the preliminaries on “several” occasions in the past, but this year they finally got the nod.
Robertson says the coffee community in Richmond, “not just us, but a variety of shops and roasters," has grown tremendously in recent years. "We’ve been acknowledged on the national scene multiple times,” he says. “We’re a top-five coffee producer in Virginia, and we got the Elbys [award] last year for best roaster.”
The U.S. Coffee Championships preliminaries will include nearly 70 competitors in three different categories, Robertson says, featuring Barista competitors, 24 Brewers Cup competitors and 12 Coffee in Good Spirits competitors, who create beverages with coffee and liquor.
Competitors are judged within their categories by an assortment of coffee professionals and trained volunteers. There are roughly a dozen judges assigned per category, plus a large number of volunteers who first attend a five-hour training course that provides guidelines on how to judge their specific category. The course is held on the first day of the competition and allows volunteers to get calibrated with their fellow judges and ensure that everyone evaluates consistently.
Preliminaries have already been held in cities including Honolulu; Seattle; Durham, North Carolina; Atlanta; and Denver. Other preliminaries will take place in Portland, Oregon; Austin and Houston, Texas; Rancho Cucamonga, California; and Rogers, Arkansas.
Following preliminaries are the U.S. Coffee Championships qualifying events and then the U.S. Coffee Championships finals. The U.S. Coffee Champions will then attend the World Coffee Championships in Boston or Berlin later this year.
With a rise in coffee producers, and roasters vying to prove that their product stands out, the competition aspect of the coffee championship preliminaries holds a certain excitement, but Blanchard’s views the opportunity to host the event as a testament to its growth since opening in 2005.
Two new cafe locations on the way could pay huge dividends for the increasingly popular coffee company. Blanchard’s is expected to open its first cafe at 3121 W. Broad St. by early September. The second cafe — expected to open sometime next summer — is part of The Hill Standard, the forthcoming South Side shopping center anchored by The Veil Brewing Co. that will include Pepe’s restaurant, Charm School ice cream parlor and Stella’s Grocery.
“Our growth model has always been trying to be steady and get stronger,” Robertson says. In the midst of such growth, the company is also focused on sharing the burgeoning coffee industry in Virginia’s capital city with the world via the coffee championship. “We’re pumped to bring a national coffee audience to Richmond.”
The U.S. Coffee Championships preliminaries in Richmond take place Sept. 6-8 at Blanchard's Coffee Roasting Co. and Studio Two Three and are free to attend.
