About the Hayes' Coffee History Tea was not the first drink of choice by either Ireland or England. There were coffee houses in both Ireland and England as long as seven years before tea was even introduced to Ireland and England by the corrupt collusion between the East India Trading Company and the Queen of England. After tea was introduced, an attempt was made to outlaw the consumption of coffee in order to bring up the consumption of tea. More profit, with less hassle, was to be made from tea than coffees. The British used cheap Irish labor to unload the 154 pound sacks of green, unroasted coffee beans from the big trade ships. Since roasting coffee was also hard, hot, tedious, smoke-filled work, it fell on the Irish laborers to also roast the coffee beans. Because of all of this, the roasting of coffees was very much an "ethnic" trade belonging to the Irish. To this very day no formal schools exist for learning the very complicated processing, preparing, evaluating, or roasting of the various types of coffees. In the Hayes family, Roasting is a craft passed down from generation to generation, with each succeeding generation developing more mastery of the art. Today, with the influx into the Gourmet coffee trade by folks who were formally used car salesmen, or computer programmers, or carpenters, or hairdressers, or stock traders, it is difficult to find real masters. Companies manufacturing coffee roasting equipment give the buyers of that equipment a 4 - 5 day "crash" course in the use of the equipment, and right away they call themselves "coffee masters!" Not one knows how to evaluate the moisture content of the various unroasted green coffees they are about to roast, and moisture content dictates the amount of real time needed to perfectly roast an arabica type and exactly how much weight will be lost during the roasting of the arabica. During the past 20 years we have not met one American coffee roaster who has personally processed coffees from "cherry" (the ripened red berry of the coffee bush) to ready-for-the-roaster green coffee beans. But, many call themselves "Masters". Of all the current roasters in the entire USA, (and there are tens of thousands today) perhaps only 2 dozen really know how to "cup" the coffees they roast. "Cupping" coffee is like tasting wine. A master roaster can tell you what kind of bean is in his cup of coffee. An exceptional roaster can tell you the coffees in the blend and their portions. The family tradition of teaching, from generation to generation, is left to only 3 gourmet coffee roasters in the entire United States today. Only 3 companies are left who are still beyond the 3rd generation. Our father himself still encounters problems in roasting coffees on occasion and he has been tasting well over 50 years. With all his experience, if he still encounters problems, what can be, expected from a gourmet coffee roaster, who, a few years ago, was selling paper cups, or used cars, or was a salon hairdresser? Yet all these others are today prominent in the coffee business. Today, all you need to become a "coffee master" is to buy a coffee roaster! We have been roasting and preparing coffees since 1787 seven continuous generations of premium coffee roasters. It is in our blood. Almost 206 continuous years preparing, blending, roasting arabica coffees. Every single batch is roasted with the knowledge that our reputation and our family name rests with the quality of that roast. We will never sacrifice quality for price. We prefer to sell less but sell the very best.