The Hunter Valley's boutique coffee roaster
“The year 2000; a great year for coffee!”
PeaBerrys Gourmet Coffee is the Hunter Valleys original boutique speciality coffee roaster. Locally owned and operated by Adrian and Debbie Rigon; trading began at the Honeysuckle growers markets in 2000 where fresh roasted beans and espresso were sold to local coffee aficionados. Adrian’s love of coffee began whilst working with his father Elio, an established Newcastle coffee distributer.
One day, Adrian had an epiphany; “there is more to be explored within this seed!” so was born PeaBerrys Gourmet Coffee; a roaster that would offer a point of difference to the import dominate market & to provide locally roasted coffee to the community. In the early days Adrian would travel weekly to Sydney working from a friends roastery (generously on loan) to fill his customers orders for the week ahead. As demand increased the need to establish a local wholesale and retail base eventuated in moving from his fathers shared warehouse in Carrington to New Lambton,where a 1970s retro butchery was reinvented into a small shop roastery & espresso bar. This small shop played a key role in establishing PeaBerrys as a recognised brand. To this day it is a place where the public can interact with staff to develop an understanding and appreciation of all things coffee.
In 2006 the Shop, becoming too small to house wholesale and retail combined became the catalyst for yet another move. The roastery and wholesale operation shifted to a spacious warehouse in the leafy suburb of Tighes Hill. Never doing things by halves, The Shops humble roaster affectionately named “Little Red Rocket” was bid farewell and upgraded to a larger batch roaster “Big Blue”.
The story doesn’t end here! Restless and outgrowing the settings of the industrial estate, in 2011 the PeaBerrys crew began hunting for new digs. Now it could be said to a certain degree that the company has drawn a full circle back to its original beginnings with the newest dream move to a preloved rustic warehouse in Islington. Retaining the preloved charm and updating with aspects of the modern, the new site is the ideal coffee haven combining roastery, espresso bar, cupping laboratory, barista training and general fun place for customers to join the PeaBerrys team as they go about their work. The Islington roastery in keeping with the evolution of the new has been upgraded once more to accommodate a modern, state of the art roaster, the “Mac Daddy!”.
This story is only warming up; with something always on the horizon it pays to stay in touch. For regular updates from the PeaBerrys crew check our notice board in News and Events, join our news letter or Join our Face Book page.
“We take this opportunity to say thank you for your loyalty, after all what is coffee with out a friend to share it with?” AR
