Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Alex LeBlanc. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Alex, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. What’s the best or worst investment you’ve made?

The best investment I’ve made in my life and business is in myself.

I began my career as a mechanical engineer working throughout the gulf coast in refineries and chemical plants. It can be a little unsettling, when getting thrown into such an intense environment right out of college. You have to imagine being surrounded by large, loud, hot, and dangerous equipment that you know very little about.

You are expected to learn everything about the equipment from a fundamental level to the equipment’s past history and current operating environment. And then you have to make decisions that can have a high dollar impact and also a safety impact to those running and maintaining the equipment.

You learn to take in large amounts of information and stories from various individuals and sort through the data to make the best decisions possible. I taught myself somewhat early on that I could “start-over” again and again when changing disciplines in this fast paced environement. It can be hard to start from scratch when beginning new roles, but you learn to be resilient.

When I had the opportunity to open my coffee roasting business, it was no different. I know that anything I need to figure out, I can and will. I have been a doer and maker my whole career and life, so learning the business and soft skills are some of my newer challanges.

Alex, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

I have always been a tinkerer and creator with way too many hobbies. From fishing, fine woodworking, team sports, to beer brewing, distilling, and coffee roasting. I also do not quit many things that I start. This probably stems from the various activities I did as a kid, and I was never allowed to quit.

I got into coffee roasting 10+ years ago. I went from almost burning down my house to building my own roaster that I continuously modified over a decade. Coffee was always one of the more difficult hobbies because of the fickle nature of coffee roasting. I had dreams to start my own roastery and when I had the opportunity in 2022, I made the leap.

I don’t want people to think that I took a big risk starting this business. I worked 14 years as a mechanical engineer and during that time my wife, an accountant with a disdain for the corporate world, started her own business offering financial resources to e-commerce sellers and found herself in a very niche market that worked out well for her business. This created one of the first windows for me. In 2018, we decided we could live a life on our terms if we invested in my wife’s business, so I quit my job in Houston, TX so we could travel and find our current home in Greenville, SC. It was a big leap for us with two young kids, but we have always dreamed of a life with more freedom, which of course comes with its own cost.

In 2022, my youngest was starting school full-time and that was my next window to kick my new career into gear, at the age of 37. I knew going into it, I was the fool at the bottom of the hill, and even with all my “experience” roasting coffee, I knew I wouldn’t really know about coffee and coffee roasting until I started my business. Long story shot, Calibration Coffee Lab, a currently one-man commercial roasting business was born.

I provide high quality coffee with a focus on the home coffee enthusiast. Many of my customers are people that don’t care to geek out on where the coffee is from or how it was processed, but just want a well-balanced, delicious cup. I offer a range from well-crafted chocolatey roasts to light, floral, nuanced roasts, but always sweet and balanced. I also supply coffee to co-working spaces around the country and to coffee shops. That was a big factor in sizing my roaster.

My first year in business, was spent on refining consistent commercial roasts and developing an offering philosophy, and now my focus is on learning the business and growing this business so I can serve more people. I truly enjoy brightening people’s days through my craft.

Since I am the person choosing the coffees, roasting them, and selling them, I have an immense sense of pride and responsibility in what I do. It can be difficult to put myself out there when I sometimes feel like an imposter, being new to this industry and new to my local scene, but at the end of the day I get to uplift more people when I do, so in a way it’s challenging me to offer my true self to my customers.

We’d really appreciate if you could talk to us about how you figured out the manufacturing process.

I always wanted to make a physical product with my hands. There is something extremely satisfying about building and creating something. I’ve been cooking since I was 10 years old, so culinary/sensory related hobbies have always appealed to me, like beer brewing, cooking, distilling, and coffee roasting.

Coffee roasting is great blend of correlating roasting data to a flavor. As I mentioned before, I had roasted coffee off and on for 10+ years before starting a commercial roastery, but little did I know how difficult it would be to produce a solid and consistent product. In the early days, I roasted through a full 50 lb sack trying to learn a lesson and throwing it all away.

The coffee is off course something I manufacture, in addition to creating all of my bag labels, and various tools that help with assessing quality, like the color meter I built to aid in nailing consistent roasts.

My biggest lesson is to never rush a new coffee release. I take my time these days and roast a couple of batches and taste them over a month, sometimes longer, and brew them in a variety of methods, and then land on a profile. This allows me to not question the quality once I release, I know that I have done my best to get everything out of that bean that it has to offer. I have been burned before, making decisions on a roast after 1 week, only to have the coffee change after that period into something less desirable.

Where do you think you get most of your clients from?

This is something I hope to have more to offer in the future, as I still struggle pulling in cold traffic, but in-person events has been the best source of new clients. I don’t think there is a way to avoid this portion of a business like mine. In person events, like tastings or farmers markets, offer invaluable feedback on what your local market and what the majority of people are looking for. It also hones your selling skills.

This is also a great time to capture leads that can lead to future email marketing. You also never know who you will meet at these events. I have met grocery buyers that led to me selling in a store, other business owners that may need coffee for their office, and created loyal followers. This can also lead to future opportunities with this new self-created network.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://calibrationcoffeelab.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/calibrationcoffeelab/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/calibrationcoffeelab
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/alex-leblanc-639a7622/