I am not sure what happened, but it seemed to have started after the massive hailstorm a couple of weeks back. The coffee beans in my stockpile started to age really quickly it seemed. I know it sounds crazy, but my family have been in the coffee business for generations and I know a thing or two about coffee beans. And this is not how quickly they start to lose flavor.
I just didn't know how to sell these that were already in stock. By the end of the month I was starting to get desperate and decided to hire a marketing expert. There was this new kid in town, called Mr. Canephora Reynolds. He had just started his own startup marketing company and quickly made a name for himself for being able to sell almost anything.
I wasn't sure I could get his appointment soon, but as soon as he heard it was something about coffee, he seemed to drop everything and agreed to meet me in an hour. A bit strange but I'd take that!
Mr. Reynold's POV.....
I was given some samples of coffee beans from the local coffee supplier. Their coffee used to be high in demand, but it is quite strange to see their coffee taste deteriorating. So Mr. Hessington is not being able to sell and his business is taking a hit every passing day.
I tried brewing the beans in many different ways over the next few days. The classical espresso, americano, drip, cold brew....I tried a few innovative stuff like trying to "cook" it like tea, tried adding different spice combinations with the brew. Nothing seemed to work. The coffee just tasted bad.
I know Mr. Hessington hired me with selling the beans as coffee in mind, but I was pretty sure by now there was no way these beans could be drunk without magic. And let's be honest, there's no such thing as magic. So I started thinking out of the box. How else can I sell these coffee beans, how else can I appeal to the buyers to still buy these beans, knowing that the coffee isn't going to taste good?
I had a small indoor plant lying in a small tub beside my coffee table. It was decorated with white pebbles over the soil. it looked gorgeous. And then it suddenly hit me! What if we replaced those pebbles with coffee beans! What a crazy idea! But nothing innovative gets done without one crazy person thinking of one crazy idea! I immediately replaced the pebbles with coffee beans and my word it looked gorgeous!
And then I came with another moment of brilliance! What if the plant tubs were made in the shape to look like coffee mugs to go with the coffee bean decor! My heart was racing as these ideas kept jolting through my head. I quickly took a piece of paper and started drawing out a rough of what I had in mind.
Now that's a decor I would kill to have in my living room and I am sure most coffee freaks would too! I wasn't sure how Mr. Hessington was going to take it but I decided to pitch this idea to him anyways next evening after I got a few more things sorted out.
By the time I was done with the meeting next evening, Mr. Hessington not only loved my idea - I closed the best deal of my career so far! Mr. Hessington got a pottery company to agree to produce plant tubs in the exact shape we were thinking. The final plan was by next week, a small shop would be set up outside the Hessington Coffees main yard to sell the newly designed coffee pots decorated with coffee beans - exclusively for Coffee Freaks!
I walked out of the meeting pretty impressed with myself. Huh! Who needs magic when you have a brain like me!
I rubbed my hands together to ail the chill of the evening and was craving a hot cup of coffee as I waited for the bus back home. Right that instant a strong, rich aroma of coffee created a sillage that mesmerized......
What happened to Mr. Canephora Reynolds that evening - Read Part 3 of "The Canephora Chronicles" to find out.