Monmouth Coffee Company

Monmouth Coffee is a coffee roaster, retailer and wholesaler in London, which was founded in 1978. It was one of the foundations for the third wave of coffee in London.

History

Monmouth Coffee Company was founded in 1978 by Nick Saunders and Anita Leroy. Leroy later took over the business.[1] Together with Neal's Yard Dairy and Saunders' other businesses, Monmouth Coffee transformed the run down area around Neal's Yard in Covent Garden, central London.[1] The basement of the original shop at 27 Monmouth Street was used to roast coffee and the ground floor as a tasting room.[2] Leroy wanted to buy coffee from individual farmers, but that was not possible until 1996, when a new coffee importer, Mercanta, opened. Monmouth Coffee was one of their first customers.[3] Monmouth Coffee and Mercanta were a foundation for the third wave of artisan coffee shops in London and several Monmouth Coffee baristas went on to found their own coffee businesses.[4][5]

Monmouth Coffee has expanded gradually: a coffee stall was opened in Borough Market in 1999,[6] followed by a second shop in the market in 2001.[4] In 2007 the roastery was moved to three railway arches in Maltby Street, Bermondsey.[7] In 2009 an arch was opened to sell coffee on Saturdays and other local traders followed suit, forming Maltby Street Market.[8] In 2018 the company headquarters moved into five railway arches at Spa Terminus in Bermondsey,[9] where Monmouth Coffee, Neal's Yard Dairy and a property company had taken a lease on a stretch of railway arches around the former Spa Road railway station to provide accommodation for food manufacturers and wholesalers.[10]

References
  1. Fort, Matthew (12 January 2008). "Around Britain with a fork". Guardian. Retrieved 9 December 2021.
  2. Forshaw, Alec (15 February 2011). 1970s London Discovering the Capital. History Press. ISBN 9780750956468. Retrieved 9 December 2021.
  3. Eldridge, Cory (6 April 2015). "London: The Once and Future Coffee Capital". Fresh Cup Magazine. Retrieved 9 December 2021.
  4. Wain, Phil (10 November 2018). "A History of London Coffee —– Part One: Setting the Scene". Phil Wain. Retrieved 9 December 2021.
  5. Buranyi, Stephen (20 June 2020). "How London became a city of flat-white drinkers". Financial Times. Retrieved 14 December 2021.
  6. Smith, Ed (4 October 2018). The Borough Market Cookbook: Recipes and Stories from a Year at the Market. Hodder & Stoughton. ISBN 9781473678699.
  7. Coles, Benjamin (3 May 2021). Making Markets Making Place: Geography, Topo/graphy and the Reproduction of an Urban Marketplace. Springer International Publishing. p. 92. ISBN 9783030728649.
  8. "Rogue traders: How Maltby Street took on Borough Market". Evening Standard. 21 July 2011. Retrieved 15 January 2019.
  9. Coghlan, Adam (2 October 2018). "Pioneering London Coffee Company's Roastery Makes Way for New Restaurants". Eater London. Retrieved 11 December 2021.
  10. Fernández-Esquinas, Hugo; van Oostrom, Madelon; Pinto, Manuel (7 December 2018). Innovation in SMEs and Micro Firms: Culture, Entrepreneurial Dynamics and Regional Development. Taylor & Francis. p. 196. ISBN 9781351016148.
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