Are you a coffee lover?  Welcome!  I believe you will find the Double Eagle coffee is second to none in our area.  We have chosen the St Henri Blend of caffeinated coffee from Seattle’s Best, an offshoot of Starbucks.  We had a wonderful special blend through our previous supplier.  Made just for us and a real fool-proof standard procedure for brewing.  But, in the spring of 2006, mergers and acquisitions was an active beast roaming the business grounds hunting for  the weak and the easy and they found our supplier.  Easy coffee was over….or so we thought.

 We started spreading the word: Double Eagle is looking for a new coffee.  And salesmen started circling us, swooping lower and lower with each turn, if you get my drift.  Salesmen are so hard to deal with…because of the basic lie involved:  I am here to help you.   What they really are saying is:  I am here to help you but my only objective is to sell something to you.  Sorting through the BS is hard.

 Several coffee tasting’s later and a clear winner began to emerge.  The flavor profile of the Seattle’s Best coffee’s far exceeded the other competitors.  And, so far, we had not discussed price.  We talked service and flavor.  “If something breaks, how long before I get a serviceman to fix it?” is pretty darn important if your business does its best sales on days their business is closed. (Saturday and Sunday).

 Well, we finally got down to talking money.  And the Seattle’s Best was, of course, the most expensive and outside our budget guidelines.  Always.  You can just book it.  I never pick the cheap stuff….darn it!  Now, came the decision.   I had to raise prices on coffee or pick another brand.  I chose to raise prices and buy the good stuff.  You just don’t know the pressure to maintain prices.   People say they’d rather have a smaller portion than pay a higher price. Every price increase is almost always met with fewer customers.

 But, I thought I had some things going for me.  #1 When was the last time you walked into a restaurant and asked how much the coffee cost before you ordered coffee?  I can tell you – never.  You have never walked into a restaurant and asked the price of a cup of joe.  #2 The taste of the coffee was excellent.  When was the last time you were served something wonderful and complained about the price?  This time I say the answer is “Probably never” because a few names pop into mind who could, would and probably have….

 So, we committed to the new blend, got new brewing equipment and thermal carafes rather than hot pots and have been very pleased with the result. And, not one person said a word about the $ .20 price change.  We didn’t hide it but we didn’t broadcast it either.

We did get a number of comments – compliments – about the new coffee.  Many people noticed and were happy with the change.  And, we thought our ‘old’ coffee choice was good!!  

 Have a cup with dessert or perhaps a shot of B & B after dinner.  Believe me – it’s worth the extra $ .20!!