Imagine a typical Singaporean uncle, let’s call him Uncle Tan.
Every single day, you see him reading his newspapers, with his glasses at the tip of his nose, a strong cup of traditional kopi on the table beside him.
One thing to remember. Don’t ever mention specialty coffee to him. Just, don’t.
We have an Uncle Tan as one of our regulars. Of course, that’s not his real name. What’s real though, is that he used to be wildly against specialty coffee. But nowadays, it’s not unusual to see him having a kopi in the morning, and then ordering a latte for lunch.
Wait what? Uncle Tan ordering a LATTE??
How did that even happen? Well, buckle up, because today we’re letting you in on a story. A story that’ll bring us all down memory lane.
This is Generation Coffee, and this is how we came to be.
The Early Days
We started out as PORE Coffee, a multi-roaster subscription platform for home brewers. If you’re a home brewer who likes to experiment with different beans from different roasters, PORE would have been perfect for you. We even helped curate your coffee based on your own personality and preferences.
Alas, our first venture into coffee was cut short by the circuit breaker in 2020. Despite having a very fruitful journey, we had to say goodbye to our favourite home brewers. It wasn’t entirely a sad ending though, because a few of these amazing home brewers are now happy subscribers of Generation Coffee beans! (If this is you, we thank you from the bottom of our heart for your support, truly!)
With a backpack full of lessons we learnt during our time as PORE Coffee, we carried these nuggets over to the next stop in our coffee journey, AhBoy Beverages! ABB for short, we love our acronyms here 😄
As a small home-based business selling cold brew, ABB got its footing by first serving our lovely neighbours.
Can you believe that?
Our neighbours would send us a text, “order” a coffee, and then come by to pick it up. (Don’t worry, we observed proper social distancing measures.) It’s pretty special, come to think of it. But hey, I don’t blame them. Who can resist the aroma of freshly brewed coffee wafting out of our homes, eh?
In time, Singapore started to heal from the pandemic and slowly opened up again. Our coffee noses started twitching, as we could smell the opportunity of setting up a physical store, in order to serve more coffee lovers. Hey, that’s probably you!
So, we scouted around for a suitable location. A place where our brand would soon call home. Where we could finally share our passion for coffee with the world.
And, thankfully, we found this place in Tekka Centre, a foodie’s paradise nestled in the heart of Little India.
Generation Coffee was born!
Launched in November 2020, we were ready to embark on another amazing journey as Generation Coffee.
Setting up shop at a hawker centre was truly a spark of genius, and a timely one too. This way, we can reach out to more people from all walks of life, and introduce specialty coffee to different generations of society.
And that’s not all, we decided to also include traditional kopi in our simple but comprehensive menu.
Why traditional kopi, you ask? Great question!
One which requires a twofold answer.
First, if we never try, we’ll never know.
We discovered a way to serve consistent high quality kopi, ensuring that we’re serving you the best, in every single cup. But will it work, in a menu where specialty coffee also exists?
Well, we’ll never find out if we didn’t take the chance. So try we will, and we courageously included kopi as part of our beverages.
Second, we know there’s a special place in our hearts for traditional kopi. Some of us, if not most, grew up drinking traditional kopi. Hence, at Generation Coffee, we wanted to honour that.
To bridge the gap between traditional and specialty coffee. This became our mission.
We want to offer you the best of both worlds, so you don’t have to choose between this or that. It doesn’t matter if you’re craving for an Americano, or a kopi O kosong. Just say the word, and you’ll have your preferred cuppa in your hands.
This is the sweet spot we want to achieve. Elevating the experience of coffee-drinking, at an affordable price, and bonding generations together at the same time.
Through coffee education and embracing the diverse love for all kinds of coffee, we aim to foster a community of togetherness. A family of multiple generations, sitting around a table, sipping coffee together, each enjoying their own preferred beverage.
For us, there’s no wall between traditional and specialty coffee. There is, however, a moat, like in Chinese chess. And we’re the bridge that connects both opposing camps.
Having said all that, it’s not all a walk in the park though. We had to overcome crushing self doubt and comments from critical onlookers. Nevertheless, we took the leap of faith, and committed fully to our vision.
Here we are today
Today, we are proud to serve delectable specialty coffee, alongside nostalgic traditional kopi. Have a latte in the morning, then come back for a kopi C siew dai after lunch. Whichever way you choose to indulge in your caffeine fix, we 100% approve!
Come visit us, if you want to witness how new meets old, and experience where traditional meets specialty. One thing’s for sure, though.
No matter the generation, coffee is the solution.
Well, at least for us coffee lovers, anyway.
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Thanks for following along on our journey to becoming Generation Coffee!
This is part of a 5-post blog series on The Story of Generation Coffee. Subscribe to our newsletter, so you won’t miss out when the next post is launched. We hope you enjoy reading our story!