Project Made Possible: Barren Ground Coffee

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January 24, 2018

The temperature was dipping down to -35 Celsius when Barren Ground Coffee’s shipment of beans arrived in the NWT.

While the pellet stove warmed the roasting room, the company’s founders, with their staff of family and friends, bundled up and headed out to the waiting truck - each grabbing a toboggan as they went.  Together they loaded the sleighs with bags of coffee beans, weighing between 130 – 150 pounds before trekking them inside.

Between the physical labour, the excitement of a new business venture and the freshly roasted, ground and brewed beans, it’s safe to say their first official cup of Barren Ground Coffee was the best they ever had.

Eric Binion is one of the minds behind the family-run company and began roasting coffee beans out of his house as a hobby six years ago. With the emerging trend of craft coffee roasters popping up around the world, Binion decided to take his hobby to the next level.  

With the help of the Department of Industry, Tourism and Investment’s Support for Entrepreneurs and Economic Development (SEED) program, Barren Ground Coffee was able to purchase their roaster.

“When you’re starting a new business, there is risk and its capital intensive,” Binion explains. “It can be intimidating to throw down a great sum of money when there’s no guarantee that the business will work out. Receiving funding through SEED helped to cushion some of those startup costs and relieve some of the stress.”

(Photos via Barren Ground Coffee)

Barren Ground Coffee formally opened the doors to their location in Old Town, Yellowknife in October 2017 and welcomed patrons in to purchase the freshly roasted beans and pour-over coffee. The high level of local interest helped them reach their primary goal: to sell wholesale.

Today, Barren Ground coffee stocks the shelves of Yellowknife’s Co-op, Fat Fox Café and Blachford Lake Lodge; Norman Wells’ Rampart Rentals; and Hay River’s She Takes the Cake café. The team hopes to have their coffee available in Inuvik and Fort Smith in the coming weeks.

Binion says the response from the community has been positive. “Because our single origin coffee is organic and fair-trade, our price point is higher. Our focus is to create a high-quality coffee so obviously we can’t compete with the prices of Folgers or Maxwell House, but we’ve found that local companies are willing to find innovative ways to collaborate. For example, the Woodyard Brew Pub created a new breakfast milk coffee stout that uses our beans.” 

Binion has high expectations for Barren Ground Coffee and hopes to eventually increase their order sizes and work directly with distributors in Kenya, India and Costa Rica. In the meantime, the group is proud to be caffeinating the NWT, one bean at a time.