Man I miss Simple. I'm honestly shocked and saddened that nothing took its place, though they were a major pain about getting my wife an account so we could join finances and then they closed a few months after I switched away.
Thank you! I'm not self-roasting (not by choice), but working with a roaster to help with roasting and logistics. I got the idea from actually wanting to self-roast when I heard of a friend using a shared roasting space in San Diego to source green beans and do his own roasting without the upfront cost of buying equipment. Unfortunately nothing like that exists in my area of Tennessee but having a private relationship with a family owned roaster is the next best thing.
I went through a few iterations of trying roasters and let me tell you, some were downright bad. I'm happy to have found a partner that I actually enjoy the product of, even if it means slimmer margins.
The mention of the IR port brought me back. As a kid I'd get hand-me-down palm pilots and find programmable remote apps to control the TV and other things with.
Hey HN, I'm publicly launching a side project I've been working on for a bit and would love your feedback and support. Hacker Brews offers coffee beans that are high quality, ethically sourced, and shipped right to your door with free US shipping. We've got fun tech-related names such as "Untitled Project", "Artificial Attentiveness", and "Beanchain Technology".
Get 5% off your order with code "HN5" today only, including your first subscription.
I've started this with the intent to launch a MVP and improve from here, so feedback and constructive criticism is welcome. Also, if you have creative naming ideas I'm open to consideration for future coffee offerings. If I use your name I'll ship you a bag of that coffee for free once offered.
Cute idea, but my feedback here is going to be pretty harsh. Although it might be a valid effort, it feels like a pretty cheap money grab by rebranding some random coffee we know nothing about.
My suggestions would be:
- have some actual shots of the bags/coffee rather than a dynamic image. It might not add actual authenticity to the coffee, but it makes it feel less fake.
- Add more information about where the coffee is coming from. I see that some descriptions have the farm of origin, but honestly, you could write whatever. How do you know it's sourced ethically? How do you know it comes from those farms? Again, you can't sell guarantees, probably, but how you present yourself makes a big difference.
- Ultimately, for all I know, you are just reselling 5$ coffee for 20$ with a new "hacker" label. If you want to incentivize me to buy, your job is to somehow show me this is not the case.
Those are totally valid concerns, and I appreciate the feedback!
> have some actual shots of the bags/coffee rather than a dynamic image. It might not add actual authenticity to the coffee, but it makes it feel less fake.
I completely agree. The images right now are a stop-gap to get running and I plan to take actual photos within the coming week. In part, I wanted to keep a low barrier to entry for starting this and grow it as I get customers, so I started with the cheapest option.
> Add more information about where the coffee is coming from. I see that some descriptions have the farm of origin, but honestly, you could write whatever. How do you know it's sourced ethically? How do you know it comes from those farms? Again, you can't sell guarantees, probably, but how you present yourself makes a big difference.
Great input. I'm planning a site re-design soon that will allow me to have a few tab options within the product to detail more information in a clean way, and I'll plan to have more of that in too. For the purpose of this comment here and now, green beans are hand-selected directly from each farm after traveling there to sample and source.
> Ultimately, for all I know, you are just reselling 5$ coffee for 20$ with a new "hacker" label. If you want to incentivize me to buy, your job is to somehow show me this is not the case.
Aside from the mentions you've made, do you have other suggestions on gaining trust? When I think of other major roasters, most of the time I've heard from them through word of mouth and I don't particularly think twice about fact-checking, but I'm also a sample size of one. Hearing the process of how others choose their coffee to buy would help.
> green beans are hand-selected directly from each farm after traveling there to sample and source
This is a major, major point that you should absolutely highlight! We are hackers, we love the behind the scenes. You should try to show what this process of selection works.
You are right that word of mouth is important, but if I were to see something advertised (e.g. this post) how do I get to the step of believing that you are a legit seller? Show don't tell. Show me how you chose the coffee, how you roast it, how you brew it etc...
Alternatively, I think there is absolutely value is selling coffee with novelty bags, but the price-point needs to reflect that and there is no need for (possibly very expensive) claims.
Not much "show" yet but at least some more detail.
> Alternatively, I think there is absolutely value is selling coffee with novelty bags, but the price-point needs to reflect that and there is no need for (possibly very expensive) claims.
Can you explain the "possible very expensive claims"? I'm somewhat toeing the line of novelty bags but also at the same time delivering actually good coffee (I understand I need to figure out how to explain that better). The price point is because the cost of the coffee (and shipping) is high, I'm not making a super margin on this. That's not exactly something you just advertise out, so I need to learn ways to instill confidence in the quality/price.
I think that if you claim you are ethically sourced and high quality, you need to back it up, and that can be expensive. E.G. trips to farms, process to check on them, constant quality control etc... But if you are upfront and just say "this is a random coffee we slapped a funny sticker on lol" then, you could do without all those--but the price should reflect that.
> For the purpose of this comment here and now, green beans are hand-selected directly from each farm after traveling there to sample and source.
This is critical value add. I looked for an “about” section or a blog to describe the selection process. I realize “About Us” or “blog” pages are too often drafted mostly for SEO, but I use them a lot to make buying decisions. I’m not in a position to visit coffee farms - lucky you! - but for $16+ a pound I’m buying the story and the selection and roasting process, not just the (really nicely executed) nerd dad jokes. That said, I’ve still bookmarked this for holiday stocking stuffers for my programming friends…
Great point, I overlook(ed) an about section because I am in the same boat in thinking it's mostly just SEO, but it's a good data point that people actually do look at it, especially when choosing to buy.
I recently started to figure out what coffee I want to use as my "go to beans". Most local roaster around here tell me something about them on their websites.
I'm looking at one right now, and they have some photos of their operations and how they work. They even have some info on how they travel to their producers (not that I read all that, but nice).
And that's what I'm missing from your site. I mean, I will not read that epic 10 page story of how you discovered your spiritual calling but actually tells me little to nothing about your operation. But how about having some hard facts: Where do you ship from? Can I buy the coffee at a local shop? How is the coffee roasted? Do you roast yourself or are you a reseller? What's your roasting process? You already differentiate the different kinds of roast, why not add some info like time and temperature? We are hackers, we love that hard data that would confuse "mere mortals".
Judging from your website, you might have the orders dropshipped from somewhere in SEA or you could be a manufactory somewhere in the US with a dedicated team of coffee experts and an incredible roasting process with every order freshly roasted. It's impossible to say.
Also, my preferred supplier offers various trial packages of 4x9oz (and a bigger 8x9oz) with some discount applied. So I can order that, see which roasts I like most and then get those in their bigger 35oz packages. At the previous job, they would regularly deliver us 20 of the big packages; though I am not sure if that was a fixed arrangement or someone was tasked with ordering the big load of coffee on demand. Either offering might be something for you.
All great points, I've taken that and gotten a rough start (definitely not final, going to do some competitor research) at an About Us page. https://hackerbrews.com/pages/about-us
Also, love the name. I'll add it to the ideas list and keep your attribution noted if it ends up on a coffee.
