Conservative Coffee Companies Bite The Bullet

November 30, 2017|Russell Volz|Politics & Religion

I recently received a call from a news reporter doing an article on Conservative Coffee Companies. Actually, this didn’t surprise me.

Conservative Coffee Companies

I make it a habit to get to know each and everyone of our customers. At least once a month, a new customer tells me that they found Lake City Coffee by searching the internet for “Conservative Coffee”. Or they read about us in an article, or just old fashioned word-of-mouth. People are obviously attracted to our unabashed traditional values. So, it wasn’t a big surprise when a left leaning news outlet gave us a call.

During the interview for the article “The Rise of the Conservative Coffee Shop“, the reporter said that her employer just couldn’t understand why anyone would seek out conservative coffee companies, or any conservative business. Why would a consumer care about a business’s politics?

Business Politics

I just about laughed into her face. I told her that she’s right. Well, that she used to be right. People didn’t care about a business’ politics, up until the businesses started vilifying their own customers because they didn’t agree with the company’s politics.

Case in point; Bill Penzie, CEO of the online Penzie’s Spice Company, sent an email to thousands of his customers telling them that if they voted for Trump, that they should be, and I quote “punished”. Guess what that one stupid self-flagellating email did? It lost Bill thousands of customers.

Case two; George Schultz, CEO of Starbucks, told the world that if we didn’t agree with same sex marriage, then we could take our money somewhere else. And guess what? They did. In droves.

All’s Fair In Love and War

The reporter then asked me how I felt about liberals buying my coffee. I told her that I didn’t care. In fact our most loyal and favorite customer is a died-in-the-wool liberal. Patti and I disagree on just about every political issue. We respectfully agree to disagree. But, where Patti and I are 100% on the same page is when it comes to great food, fine wine, and wonderfully soul satisfyingly good coffee. So, Patti and I focus on what we have in common.

Agree To Disagree

I think that’s the point that I tried to make to this reporter. Up until recently, Americans could agree to disagree and still enjoy a cup of coffee together. All too often that is no longer true. Instead of being American’s first and liberal or conservative second, far too many people hate anyone that disagrees with them.

To these people I have only one thing to say. Sit down, take a deep breath, think about all of our blessings, and take one more sip of that soul satisfyingly smooth cup of coffee.