Flying Kite Coffee: Roasting Dreams

flying kite coffee roasters

Coffee Roaster Families, the Fetters and Goncalves, connected over their love of food, people, and coffee. Now, they’ve turned a shared passion into a shared venture with Flying Kite Coffee Roasters.

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Flying Kite Coffee: Roasting Dreams

Zack and Madeline Fetters and Isaac and Danielle Goncalves first became friends when they met in Williamsburg in 2017. Fast forward to 2020, when navigating first-time parenthood and pandemic obstacles deepened their friendship.  During months of quarantine outdoor walks with baby sons Arlo and Duke, the Flying Kite Coffee Roaster dream was born.

Flying Kite Coffee Story

Starting a coffee-related venture has always been somewhat of a “long shot” dream for both of our families.  In the past few years, we would discuss the idea of roasting coffee in the community. It was something that intrigued and excited people.

Our two families started dreaming of this idea becoming a reality this past summer during quarantine. We had a lot of questions about where to begin.  We’ve been fortunate enough to be able to learn from someone who started his own coffee roasting company in Brooklyn, NY, not too long ago.  We have been able to seek advice and bounce ideas off of him. He has been an extremely supportive mentor to us through this craziness of getting the business off the ground and running.

Flying Kite Coffee Name Game

We each individually came with some names that we thought would capture something about our journey. Then we put them in a tournament-style elimination vote. Each round, we would eliminate choices.

When Danielle was coming up with her name options, Arlo was reading a book that had a kite in it. She loved the feeling she had when thinking about flying a kite on a beach. During the name tournament, the name “Flying Kite” kept moving on to the next round unanimously.

We realized through this process that we all wanted something that would capture the essence and joy of childhood. Both of our families have little ones that we hope will enter into this coffee journey with us when they are older.

We also wanted a symbol that would remind us of warm summer days on the beach when a nice breeze brushes past your face. We love the freedom that a kite represents and the idea that we can all be connected to something higher than ourselves.

Coffee Roaster Family Team

From the start, it really has been a team effort. We share most of the responsibilities and roles because of our day-to-day work and lives with little ones. Generally speaking, Danielle and Madeline have been more of the creative team. Isaac and Zack have focused more on roasting the coffee. We each are able to use our gifts and passions (along with our availability) to work towards our common goal.

Flying Kite Coffee Launch

The launch, over the past month,  has been incredibly humbling. We were met with so much excitement and support from friends, family, and the community – and they were very quick to spread the word!

On our opening weekend, we sold about twice as much as we had anticipated, and orders keep coming in. We could not be more thankful for each person who was willing to give us a shot to be a part of their morning (and sometimes later) routine!

Flying Kite Coffee Challenges

Time has been one of the challenges with little ones, full-time jobs, and some of us also being in school. We have had to be transparent and open with each other about what is going on outside of the coffee roasting to work as a team and help each other as needed.

Family Coffee Roaster Hopes

We would love to release more delicious coffees while cultivating meaningful relationships with different people and businesses in our community. We hope to spread the word in our community that we are a local roasting company that strives to serve good coffee while using our resources to do great things!

Family Coffee Roaster Rest

We make it a point to protect our family “hang out” time where we can step away from talking about the business and just spend time together.

Together, we enjoy spending time outside (there is usually a soccer ball involved!), taking small trips, walking around Williamsburg, enjoying good music, and playing Skyjo. We also have a long-standing tradition of getting together to share a meal once a week – we are all foodies.

Flying Kite Coffee Mission

We are committed to improving the lives of the coffee producers as well as the coffee consumers. We only sell Fair Trade coffees and want each person drinking our coffee to feel connected to the farm from where it came.

You can purchase your Flying Kite Coffee by the pound, or order a subscription through their site, and follow the journey on Instagram and FB @flyingkitecoffee

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