Choosing a coffee supplier in Northern Ireland: a guide for cafés, hotels and restaurants

The coffee you serve says a lot about your business. For a café it's often the main reason people come back. For a hotel or restaurant it's the last thing a guest tastes at breakfast or after dinner. So choosing a coffee supplier is worth more than a quick price comparison.

This guide is for owners and managers of cafés, hotels and restaurants in Northern Ireland, and across the UK and Ireland, who are choosing a supplier for the first time or thinking of switching. It covers what to look for, the questions to ask, and how to test a coffee before you commit.

Buying direct from a roaster or through a distributor

There are two main ways to buy coffee for a business. You can buy direct from the roaster, or through a distributor or wholesaler who carries several brands.

A distributor can be convenient if you already buy food and drink from them, and they may offer a wide range under one account. Buying direct from a roaster has different advantages:

• Fewer links in the chain. You deal with the people who roast and pack your coffee, so questions about taste, roast or supply go straight to the source.
• Knowledge. A roaster can tell you exactly what's in a blend, how it's roasted and how to get the best from it.
• Flexibility. A roaster can help you find the right coffee, adjust a blend or even put your own name on the bag.

Whichever route you choose, the questions below will help you compare suppliers fairly.

Freshness: ask about roast dates

Roasted coffee is at its best within weeks rather than months, so freshness matters. When you compare suppliers, ask:

• Is there a roast date or best-before date on every bag, and how is it shown?
• How is the coffee packed to protect it? Look for sealed bags with one-way valves for whole bean coffee.
• How much stock should you hold so it's always fresh, without running out?

Store opened coffee in a cool, dry place, away from light and strong smells, and buy in amounts you'll use reasonably quickly.

Consistency: the same taste every delivery

Your regulars expect their flat white to taste the same this month as last month. That depends on your supplier roasting each batch the same way.

Ask how a supplier keeps their coffee consistent. At Pure Roast we roast on twin Loring S70 convection roasters. Instead of tumbling beans in a hot drum, a Loring roasts them evenly in moving hot air. We save every roast profile and repeat it, so your coffee tastes the same batch after batch.

Consistency matters even more if you run more than one site. A single, repeatable house coffee means every café, hotel or restaurant in your group serves the same cup.

Formats: beans, ground, pods or coffee bags

Most businesses need more than one format, especially hotels. Think about every place coffee is served:

• Whole bean for espresso machines and bean-to-cup machines in cafés, bars and restaurants.
• Roast and ground for filter coffee at breakfast, cafetières at the table, and espresso.
• ESE espresso pods for rooms, meeting spaces and smaller sites with a pod machine. We're Ireland's only ESE pod producer.
• Senseo®-compatible soft pods for compatible machines.
• String-and-tag coffee bags that brew like a tea bag. They're a simple way to put good coffee in hotel rooms without a machine.

A supplier who makes all of these can give you one coffee style across your whole business, from the restaurant to the bedrooms. Formats come in retail, wholesale or foodservice packs.

Food safety and certifications

Coffee is a food product, so check your supplier's food safety standards. A recognised certification gives you confidence, and it makes life easier if your own customers or auditors ask.

Our roastery in Lisburn holds a BRC AA grade. BRC AA is the food safety grade that big buyers look for, and every bag we roast and pack is made to it.

Also ask about certified and responsibly sourced coffee. Some guests look for it on menus. We offer Organic, Fairtrade and Rainforest Alliance coffee, and all our coffee is EUDR compliant.

Sustainability and packaging

More customers, and more businesses, want to know that their coffee is produced responsibly. Questions worth asking:

• What is the packaging made of? We offer fully recyclable and fully compostable packaging options.
• How is the coffee roasted? Loring says its S70 roaster gives up to 80% fuel savings and reduction of greenhouse gases in every roast, compared to conventional roasters.
• Is certified coffee available? See above.

These are useful facts to share with your own guests, on menus or table cards.

Support and delivery

Good coffee is only half of it. You also need a supplier who is easy to deal with. Before you sign up, ask:

• Who do I contact when I need to reorder or have a question?
• Where and how do you deliver, and what happens if I need stock urgently?
• What support do you offer with brewing and getting the best from the coffee?
• Can you deliver to more than one site?

We deliver to your sites or warehouse, with a named contact for every reorder. Ask us about support and delivery for your area when you get in touch.

Taste before you commit: samples and blend matching

Never choose a coffee on a description alone. Ask for samples, and taste them the way your customers will: as espresso, with milk, and as filter if you serve it.

If you're happy with the coffee you serve now but want to compare suppliers, our blend matching service makes it easy:

• Send us a bag of your current coffee, or its spec.
• Our quality and coffee experts profile it and sample-roast a match.
• You get a free sample, usually within a matter of days, with a price comparison.

Taste them side by side, then decide. Minimum orders can be discussed.

You can also explore our own blends, including Valentia, a 3-star Great Taste winner in 2024, in our coffee range.

Your own house blend, or your name on the bag

Some businesses want more than a supplier's standard coffee. You might want a house blend developed for your menu. Or you might want to sell retail bags with your own branding at the counter or in your shop. We do both, through our private label service. If you're thinking of launching a retail coffee under your own name, read our guide on how to start your own coffee brand.

About Pure Roast

We're the largest coffee roaster in Northern Ireland: a family business in Lisburn, roasting since 2006 and now in its third generation, with 3,500 tonnes a year of roasting capacity. Most of the coffee we roast carries someone else's name. Retailers, airlines, coffee chains and hotels rely on us to get it right, batch after batch. Find out more about us.

Talk to us about coffee for your business

Tell us about your café, hotel or restaurant: what you serve, how much you use and what matters most to you. We'll recommend coffees to try and send samples.

Ask for samples or a quote, or contact us.