White label coffee from an Irish roastery

Starting a coffee brand is a lot to take on. Roasting equipment, green coffee sourcing, packaging design and food labelling all have to work before the first bag is sold. White label coffee gives you a shorter route, where a roaster produces the coffee and you build the brand around it.

If you have been asking us about it, this is how it works and how we approach it at Boardwalk.

What white label coffee means

In a white label arrangement, a roaster produces coffee that is sold under your brand name instead of theirs. The roaster usually handles the sourcing, the roasting and often the packaging, while you look after the brand, the marketing and the sales. It differs from toll roasting, where you buy the green coffee yourself and the roaster only roasts it.

People use it in different ways. Cafés add a retail bag to their counter, online shops launch a first coffee, and hotels, restaurants and gift companies put their name on a house coffee. Subscription brands use it too, because a regular delivery gives a customer a reason to come back each month.

Who we are, and where the coffee is roasted

Boardwalk Coffee is an Irish specialty roaster in Youghal, Co. Cork. Our name comes from Youghal's boardwalk, the longest coastal boardwalk in Ireland, and our coffee is roasted a short walk from the Atlantic. We have recently expanded our roastery and we are looking for partners across Europe.

Our roastery and our cafés are separate. The roastery is where the coffee is roasted, tested and packed, and the cafés in Youghal are where people drink it. White label work happens at the roastery.

What the roastery brings to a partnership

• Single origins, roasted light to medium. Each coffee is roasted so its own flavours come through.
• Fresh roasting every week. Each batch is roasted, tested and packed at its freshest.
• Printing and design in house. We have our own printing company and a design team of five, so your labels are designed and applied by people who work next door to the roasters.
• Flexible order sizes. We are flexible on minimum order quantities, because we know a new brand starts small.
• No volume commitments. We want your business to grow, and we grow with you.
• Delivery we stand behind. If something goes wrong in delivery, we put it right.

Choosing your coffee and your price

You choose the coffee from our range, and we agree your wholesale price once you have picked the coffee and the order size. Our aim is a price that leaves you a reasonable working margin. The price you are quoted covers every cost in the finished pack, so there are no extras to add up afterwards. Payment is made in advance for each order.

Why freshness matters to your customers

Freshly roasted coffee releases gas for days after roasting, and the flavour improves as that settles. Guides to resting coffee often give a window of between five and fourteen days, and the right length depends on the roast and how it is brewed. At Boardwalk, we allow a degassing period of ten to fourteen days, and we find the best flavours come in the first three months after that.

This is why roasting every week matters for a brand with its own name on the bag. Your customer opens the coffee at the point where it tastes its best, and that is what brings them back.

What has to be on the label

Coffee sold in the EU has to carry certain information, including the name of the food, the net quantity, a best before date, any storage conditions, and the name and address of the food business operator. We go through the labelling details with every partner on the first call, so your bags are right before they are printed.

The first step

Tell us what you are building, whether that is a café retail range, an online shop or a subscription, and we will take it from there.

Email us at sales@boardwalkcoffee.ie

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