We speak to Andy Joyce and Mark Quilty, the co-founders of Groundstate Roastery.
You have a lovely café space here, when did you decide to start roasting coffee here too?
So, during the pandemic with government restrictions, we were unable to have people sitting inside for a large chunk of the past two years. Instead, we decided to turn this into an opportunity to try a new direction with our space and our business. Roasting is something we always had considered moving towards, and of course we had Diego working for us as barista with plenty of roasting experience and passion, so all these factors combined to arrive at the decision.
Has the pandemic been difficult?
The pandemic has been difficult for everyone in the country, it’s clear, but we do find ourselves quite lucky given the industry we are in. I think, for the public, without pubs, coffee and food became a distraction from the monotony of lockdowns over the past two years. We did close for around 5 weeks at the start of the pandemic and then opened back up doing coffee, cakes, and sandwiches through a hatch. Our new sandwich menu had a good response from our customers and it has evolved from there. Ever changing government rules and constantly not being able to hear orders with masks has been tricky. But we put the head down and worked through it with the help of our wonderful team. We know there are plenty of other industries that have suffered more than us.
How did you guys meet?
We are from the same town, Tramore in Co. Waterford. We knew each other as teenagers but it was travel that brought us together as friends, our many years spent in London was where we really became mates and hatched a plan to open Groundstate.
Who roasts the coffee at Groundstate?
Diego Duarte is our head roaster. There’s a lot of coffee experience in the business and Diego is no different with at least 6 years barista experience, and a couple years’ experience roasting on a traditional gas roasting machine.
He’s getting fantastic results and we have started taking orders to supply other cafes around the country with our coffee.
How would you describe your style of roasting?
Our coffee roaster is an electric fluid bed coffee roaster, a different roasting concept that subtly roasts the coffee through hot air flowing through the bed of coffee beans. This type of roaster results in coffee that tastes brighter, more mellow and is plenty sweet. We are roasting our coffee pretty light in colour too, which highlights the unique attributes and flavours of the coffee’s origin.
I see that you guys are interested in sustainability…..
Yes, definitely, I think growing up in a small seaside town has given us an awareness of our environment, and we are living in an age when our planet is going through a climate emergency, so we wanted to do our bit to limit the impact our business has on the environment. That’s why we took a decision to offset our carbon produced in transporting our green coffee from its country of origin, like Brazil or Ethiopia for example, by planting native Irish trees in collaboration with Hometree Charity.
We have also decided to donate 1% of our annual sales to Clean Coasts, an Irish organisation that organises beach and waterway cleanups around our beautiful Island, a worthy cause close to our hearts. There’s a lot of plastic in our oceans and anything we can do to fight this no matter how small, we want to contribute. It goes without saying that all our packaging is recyclable or compostable, and our roaster is powered by clean energy as our electricity supplier uses 100% renewable energy.
Tell us about your coffee bag design?
We used a friend from our hometown Tramore, Sam Miles, to design our coffee bags inspired by native Irish trees. The bag design is minimal, but striking and beautiful and we think he’s done a pro job.
Image Credits: Aleksandar Čokorac
48 – 50 James’s Street, Dublin 8
Monday – Friday, 8.30am – 3.30pm; Saturday – Sunday, 10am – 3.30pm
