Written by Jordan Michelman.
Seasonality has broad consensus rhythms; the falling of leaves, a cool breeze in the air, those universal experiences that evoke “fall” no matter where you live (even if it’s hot and humid all the time). But there are also more personal experiences of fall, ones tethered the particular place one calls home. And for me, living in the city of Portland, Oregon, I’ve come to really enjoy leaning into a couple of local coffee bars that just seem to get seasonal drinks *right*.
Chief among these is Good Coffee, a 12-year-strong local mini-chain independently owned and operated by brothers Nick and Sam Purvis. I’m a Good Coffee fan, it must be said: their Buckman location is five minutes from my house, and I try to always get a shot at their excellent PDX Airport cafe coming to or from the city (as long as I’m not running late). Seasonal signature drinks have always been a part of the story at Good Coffee, alongside a day-one relationship with La Marzocco. The brothers Purvis make one of the best PSL’s I’ve ever had, full stop. I simply had to learn more, so I chatted with Nick Purvis in advance of launching this fall’s seasonal menu.
Hey Nick—thanks so much for talking with us. Give us a little state of play right now for Good Coffee, now in its 12th year. How many locations do you guys have these days? What’s the scope of the company?
Nick Purvis: Right now, we have 7 shops, including our airport cafe, which is a little unique because it’s a licensed concept. We make sure our standards are being met there, and we actually have a Linea PB with scales in that cafe to help make sure of all that.
The company has around 50 employees as of right now. Every location uses a slightly different mix of gear, but all our grinders are from Mahlkonig and all our espresso machines are from La Marzocco. This includes another Linea PB at our cafe in Beaverton and several Linea Classics.
Congrats on all that—it’s been awesome to watch you guys grow. Talk to me a little about your signature drink program these days. Around how many drinks do you typically feature at a time? What does the development process look like for those?
For starters, we feature the same menu at every shop across our portfolio. This gives us the efficiency and the ability to manage SKUS and do it in a way that allows our managers to rely on that consistency.
As far as drink development, I’m still honestly the one doing it for seasonal menus. But over the last couple of years, we’ve had more and more input from our team. I love hearing our ideas, and a number of team members have thrown out ideas or submitted ideas that have made it on the menu. It’s become really collaborative.
The total number of drinks fluctuates a bit. We run two big seasonal menus each year—a spring/summer menu and a fall/winter menus—and in the fall we’re able to sub out certain drinks based on a two month cycle. We can have as many as 8 signature drinks on the menu at a time, which would be around 4 coffee drinks and 4 matcha drinks.
Tell me more about that two-month substitution strategy.
Yeah, so last year, we decided to try this method, and it really worked. What I noticed was that while the PSL sold really well for the first couple of months of fall, it then completely dropped off. I mean, who is drinking a PSL in March? It’s not going to be a lot of people. And so we instead gave the PSL a 2-month position on the menu, and then swapped that for a peppermint mocha over December, and then swapped it again for a marionberry chili cacao mocha in January. This was a really successful rotation for us.
Alright, let’s talk about the PSL of it all. When did you start serving these drinks? And are you trying to mess with the format at all, or going pretty straight up?
Over the years, it’s really become a matter of changing philosophy, and I have honestly changed my tune when it comes to seasonal beverages. I think you are really trying to reach a certain kind of coffee drinker with a drink like the pSL. You are trying to make a certain kind of coffee drinker happy, and allow them to shop local instead of not local with their PSL choice. And for this reason, we serve one that is very much like PSL without a ton of tweaking.
First and foremost, I want to shout out The Commissary, which is a local perishable syrups company here in Portland that was founded by one of the founders of Teardrop Lounge, our great classic cocktail bar here in town. They make syrups for us from scratch, delivered weekly, and they’re outstanding. A few years ago, we went to them and asked them to make a PSL syrup for us, and they developed something that’s just the real deal: pumpkin puree, molasses, all the baking spices. I said I wanted it to be the best PSL ever, and they really delivered. Probably the only riffing we do is that, on the menu, we call it a “Spice Pumpkin Latte” just to tweak the name a bit. But otherwise you’re getting a PSL that’s really, really good.
Why did you resist doing it for 8 years?
I used to want every signature drink we served to be super unique and almost weird. I wanted drinks on our menu that were so unique they sparked a conversation, and our baristas would have to sell you on them. But over time, maybe it’s a change of tune, maybe it’s a business decision, but I wanted to start developing drinks that people wouldn’t have to work so hard to wrap their minds around. I wanted to be able to just pleasantly surprise our customers. Maybe it’s about maturing as a coffee shop owner, or not feeling like I had to go so hard against the grain. And now I get to do something that will move drinks and make people happy.
Good Coffee is located in Portland. Visit their official website and follow them on Instagram for more information.
