Sabine Walter in conversation with ...

Reiner Leonhardt, owner of the Andechs coffee roastery

Mr Leonhardt, what do you love about your job?

The Independence and the Contact with people. Being an entrepreneur gives me the freedom to create. A freedom that an employee does not have to the same extent. Of course, as an entrepreneur I also have risks, but the fact that I can implement what I think is good outweighs the risks.

I have already built up and managed various companies. My will to create, creativity and contact with people run through all stations.

The path to coffee roasting led via the opening of a coffee shop in 2007. At that time we have the Coffee beans purchased from a coffee roaster on Lake Constance and sold to our customers alongside other coffee-related products.

And since I find it even more exciting to trade products that I make myself, over time I really wanted to do my own roasting. In the summer of 2014, I opened the Andechs coffee roasting house in Andechs-Erling.

Andechser Kaffeerösterei: Honest, good coffee without frills

The fact that we roast ourselves not only gives us the opportunity to control the quality and taste, but above all to authentically build our own brand.

The exciting part of the process was to find the own identity and the typical taste for the Andechs coffee roasting company.

What parallels are there to what we do, personality development?

I think a parallel is finding one's identity. Who am I? What makes me me? We are all about coffee. And therefore about taste. Taste is difficult to measure. That's why, when we were building our identity and brand, the focus was not on what tastes good to us, but on what tastes good to our customers. We look people in the mouth.

To meet the taste of each individual depends on many parameters. That's why I ask my customers a lot of questions. What do they associate with coffee? Which coffee do they generally like? Strong? Fruity? When do they drink it? With whom? How do they prepare it?

The preparation of the coffee is at least as important as the roasting. I can mess up the best roasted coffee in any machine, if the parameters are not correct.

That's why I listen very carefully to my customers. And if someone doesn't order via the online shop, but comes directly to the roastery, in addition to the Listen my Intuition, um to recommend exactly the coffee that people like.

I am convinced that people always buy a piece of lifestyle with coffee and here in our roastery also a story. The normal shopping process: "Good afternoon, what would you like? I'd like a kilo of that coffee. (...) Here you go. Goodbye.", we don't have that. I find the people who come to us far too exciting for that. Shopping with us is an experience. Very often conversations arise - not only between me and the clients, but between the clients. Many regular customers know each other. They talk to each other, laugh, enjoy the moment.

Holidaymakers who stop by in the summertime and take coffee home also very often come back or order online, because something happened during the time they were with us in the roastery. A relationship has developed.

When do you get the best ideas?

When the head is free.

What will your profession look like in 2050?

In 2050, there will be machines that can roast coffee in a wide variety of directions based on an extremely large amount of data. But, what I do, making connections, listening and selling good coffee in the process, will still be there in 2050. Even then, people will still earn money and spend money - also on coffee. After all, coffee is an ancient product that has hardly changed in the last centuries. And coffee is emotional. Coffee is an attitude to life.

Therefore: Making good coffee, selling it and having good customer loyalty will be even more important in 2050 than they are today. I am convinced of that.

Reiner Leonhardt is an entrepreneur and owner of the Andechs coffee roasting company. He says: "Everyone should drink the coffee they like". In his roastery on Lake Ammersee, he roasts, grinds and sells different types of coffee. All the coffee beans come exclusively from small fincas, spread throughout the (high) countries of the world. And if you want to linger, you can of course taste the coffee in the roastery.