Grower Stories #83: Andrew Aamot

A Cup of CBD-Infused Coffee: An Interview With Andrew Aamot of Premium Coffee Brand Strava Craft Coffee

There are few better ways to start your day than a big, hot cup of high-quality coffee. Now imagine if that cup had a dose of relaxing, refreshing CBD in it! That’s where Strava Craft Coffee comes in. That’s why AskGrowers caught up with Andrew Aamot, a co-founder of premium CBD-infused coffee brand Strava Craft Coffee, about their origins, their products, and the challenges of running a CBD brand. #growerstories

---

I was born and raised outside of Washington D.C. I started out working in the defense and contracting business. It was about ten years ago now, I moved out to Colorado for just a better overall quality of life. From there I needed to figure out exactly what I wanted to do with my career, and Strava Coffee turned out to be it!

---

Tia (AskGrowers) : Tell us how you got into the cannabis industry. How did you start the brand?

Andrew Aamot : I had a friend who visited Tanzania and came back super excited about the coffee farms and growers from that area. In late 2015, we teamed up and started Strava with the goal of being just a small, successful roasting company.

Once we got things going, our ambitions took over from there. Being in Colorado, we were surrounded by the newly legal cannabis industry. From there, CBD came to our attention.

We started learning more about it, how it would match up with coffee, and if we could make it work. From there, we developed some CBD-infused coffee. We shared it with our friends and family, everyone loved it and gave great feedback, then we just went from there and were the first brand to bring CBD-infused coffee beans to market. That gave us something really unique to consumers and it’s been a real rollercoaster ever since!

---

---

Tia : What things do you do to maintain sustainability in the company?

Andrew : As a coffee company, sustainability is at the forefront of the industry. Coffee is a global industry but where it’s grown tends to be in the developing world. We consciously work with small farm holders so we always know who we’re working with, what they’re delivering, and so we can have a more profound effect on those farmers.

For our CDB, we source brands that are committed to sustainability with their farming practices. Companies that grow their cannabis outdoors, don’t use pesticides, and all the rest.

We even take that commitment to our own packaging. We’re looking to offer a reusable, “naked” option for our consumers that they can go to instead of the single-use, K-cup style.

For us, sustainability is a key part of our identity.

---

Tia : How can consumers make sure they are purchasing toxin-free products?

Andrew : The main thing customers need to realize is that, unlike a lot of other types of products, there’s not much regulation around the CBD industry yet. It’s still evolving in front of us as we speak. So a lot of CBD is produced with almost zero oversight. Where was the hemp grown, what was the process?

That’s why it’s so important to look for and support companies, like us, that go out of their way to support high-quality CBD from only the best sources.

---

Tia : How do you make your coffee? Tell us more about it!

Andrew : Let’s break that up into two parts. We’ll start with the coffee. We consider ourselves a premium roaster and work with specialty-grade coffee companies only. We want to get the best quality, really good coffee. The second portion is the CBD. We went with a broad-spectrum, THC-free, hemp-derived CBD distillate. We started with the THC-free version because it just makes more sense for a lot of consumers. We have buyers that are commercial drivers, still deal with drug tests, or might just have the lingering thoughts that THC will mess with you.

Our CBD coffee is a nice middle-ground for most consumers to get all the benefits with none of the downsides. It’s a great mix between efficacy and value for buyers.

As we go forward, our plan is to offer an ever-evolving cannabinoid profile. As we better understand the compounds, we can add them into our coffee and enhance the benefits for consumers.

---

---

Tia : Are there any cannabis brands in your state you appreciate and follow? If so, name some of them.

Andrew : I would say that I don’t pay a ton of attention to cannabis brands. But I do admire some hemp brands. Ned is a Denver-based tincture brand that I like that focuses on high-quality products and transparency. They’re more about building trust with their customers than getting into a thousand different stores.

---

Tia : If you could smoke with anyone in this world, who would that be and why?

Andrew : [tooltip title="Sir Richard Charles Nicholas Branson" content="British businessman and author, founder of the Virgin Group."]Richard Branson[/tooltip]. If you’ve read about any of his early life, I think he’s really inspirational. What fun it would be to work on a space project like he is. His charisma is infectious and I’d like a little bit to rub off on me.

---

Tia : What’s the hardest thing about running the CBD business?

Andrew : If I had to pick only one thing, I would say the challenge we struggle most with is the scale of the opportunity. We’re not playing by a fixed set of rules yet, ducking and dodging new regulations both state-level and federally.

While we can operate day-to-day just fine, we get calls all the time about huge chances and opportunities that would have us grow massively as a company. If we’re going to take those opportunities, we need to hire people, grow at scale, and start speaking with the big players in the consumer game like Wal-Mart, Costco, etc.

There’s global interest in hemp, CBD, and our products. But trying to play that giant global game as a small business can be really stressful.

---

---

You can follow Strava Craft Coffee at:

Facebook

Twitter

Instagram

LinkedIn

Thank you so much, Strava Craft Coffee team, for taking the time to do the interview. To learn more about them, head on over to their website.