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Name: Rob Curran – Five Oh Coffee Co.
Telephone: (855)-575-1261
On 4-24-17, Detective L-O interviewed subject Rob Curran of Five Oh Coffee Co. Following are the results of this Detective’s investigation.
Q: What department do/did you work for and for how long? Also list partners and their info.
A: Myself and my partner Denis Donovan, work for an agency in SE Massachusetts in Bristol County. I have been with that department for over ten years and Denis has been there over 25. Our third partner, James Wise, works for an agency in the metropolitan Boston area and has been there for just over two years.
Q: What made you choose police work?
A: After High School I enlisted in the Marine Corps and served between 2001 and 2005. I loved my time in the Corps but it was time to move on after my enlistment and decided that being a cop sounded pretty cool. As they say… the rest is what it is. All kidding aside I did want to continue to serve my country and community but closer to home. I was fortunate enough to get hired in my hometown and have enjoyed the work thoroughly.
Denis is a US Army veteran of Desert Storm, and worked in the MA Department of Corrections. He was a MP in the Army and gravitated to Law Enforcement so he took the test and was hired by our department.
James is also an Army veteran of Operation Iraqi Freedom and was also a MP. The transition from military law enforcement to civilian law enforcement was easy for him to make and he decided to take the test and was picked up by an agency in the metro Boston area.
Q: Any family or close friends in law enforcement that inspired you?
A: Nope. I am the only cop in my family. Same goes for Denis and James.
Q: Why did you choose coffee? Why not donuts?
A: Coffee tends to ship a bit easier than donuts. That and we wanted a way to get great coffee on a regular basis. Plus donuts make you fat.
Q: What is your background with coffee?
A: The first 9 years of my career were spent on the overnight shift so coffee and I have become close friends over the years, and I have been in a constant search for a damn fine cup. In fact, one of my unwritten personal rules was that if a call came in prior to me getting my start of shift cup, someone was getting arrested if any arrestable charges are applicable.
I have always loved coffee personally and was tired of getting cups of coffee from the drive through places that just plain sucked.
That being said Denis and I have always enjoyed a start of shift cup of coffee to talk business or vent about the daily BS and often we had to resort to gas station blends which we found to be subpar. Hence… the idea for the coffee company was born. We knew that there had to be a better way.
Q: How did you get started in the business? (home brewing kit? worked for a friend? worked at Dunkin? etc..)
A: Denis, James, and I run a firearms training company called Tactical Dynamics (www.tacdynamics.com) and have been in business together since 2011. While that venture has been successful, we were looking in to ways that we could diversify our business. Given the fact that coffee is the second most traded commodity in the world… second only to oil, we figured that it would be a good idea to explore the opportunity as we were also looking for a way we could effectively support the law enforcement community in a charitable way.
We saw the success of companies like Black Rifle Coffee and we wanted to focus our efforts on our brother and sister officers. We tossed the idea around with some of our peers and the feedback was along the lines of “when can I buy it” and “Shut up and take my money”…
So… Five-Oh Coffee was born with the mission of serving the finest coffee to America’s finest. We found a roaster willing to take on the project and developed our blends with him until we were satisfied with the flavor profiles. Once we got the logistics squared away we launched fiveohcoffeeco.com and within hours made our first sale.
Q: What are some of the names of your blends and describe them? Just beans or pods as well?
A: We have four main blends: Day Shift Light Roast, Evening Shift Medium Roast, Midnight Shift Dark Roast, and Double Shift Espresso Blend. All of our coffees are 100% Fair Trade certified, are shade grown at high altitudes, are hand picked, and as organic as we can get them. The coffees originate in Bolivia, Columbia, Guatemala, Africa, and Ethiopia. These coffees are available in whole bean, ground, and single serve pod.
We don’t over-roast the beans like some of the more high brow coffee retailers do so you won’t see that oily sheen on the surface of your coffee. As a result the acid levels are lower than a lot of coffees out there. A lot of our customers tell us that they used to never be able to drink their coffee black but can with ours. I can personally attest to that fact as I was always a cream and sugar kind of guy but now I’ve switched over to straight from the pot.
We small batch roast the coffees as the orders come in so the customer places the order, and the next day the coffee is roasted, packed, and shipped. Our average turn around time is the customer has the coffee in hand in less than four days after order, depending on when they order it.
Q: How has the law enforcement response been to your venture?
A: We market our coffee directly on social media to law enforcement officers and supporters of LE and the response has been great. We took the lessons learned from the firearms training business and we have been able to scale the coffee venture to positive revenue in less than six months. While we certainly will not retire early doing this just yet we have found that we are getting great enjoyment in serving our niche a damn fine cup. We have heard back from officers all over that our coffee is simply amazing and our ratings on Facebook are consistently five-star.
Q: Any blowback from the job?
A: None at all. Our command staff has been great about our side ventures as with the training business we bring our knowledge and experience which we pass on to our troops. As a result we have increased the intensity and quality of our department’s training well beyond the standard qualification courses that we do annually.
Now they have quality coffee in the break room…. so yet again… zero blowback other than “can you get us some more?”
Q: Do you have any other hobbies?
A: I’m a family man so my free time is spent with my wife and kids but other than that I love hunting, fishing, and hitting the range. Thankfully the nature of this business allows me to make a little extra cash without playing “traffic cone with a gun” too much.
Q: What are your hopes going forward?
A: We want to scale this business over the next year and at least double it in size. We are working on getting the coffee in to police supply stores, specialty coffee shops, and gun shops in our area. While we don’t intend on being the next Folgers or Maxwell House, we want our name known throughout the LE community as the go to cup for cops.
Q: Where do you see yourself in the future?
A: I plan on continuing my career in LE until its time to retire or it just makes too much sense to take a bow and work on the business ventures. Denis will be retiring in a few years and will be taking on a greater role.
Either way… we will be selling our coffee so I have that to count on!
Q: Is the company involved in any charitable work?
A: From the start we set out to donate a portion of our proceeds from the coffee sales to LE causes. The way things have been going the past couple of years have driven us to launch our Thin Blue Line blend which we donate 100% of the proceeds from to a specific LE Cause such as a Line of Duty death or injury, or if a LEO family needs support.
When Officer Luis Santos of the Auburn, MA police was struck by a suspect fleeing a house break while Luis deployed stop sticks in February, we launched the Thin Blue Line blend and within two weeks we donated $2000 directly to Luis and his family. It was one of the proudest moments in my life to be able to directly support a brother officer in a time of need. We cops are a proud bunch and Luis did not want to seem like his hand was out but I told him that I would much rather hand him a check than hand his wife a flag…
Unfortunately one of Denis and my department’s officers dropped some bad news on us as well when we found out that his wife was diagnosed with some pretty aggressive breast cancer and has a long road ahead to recovery. We decided to put the full force of our Thin Blue Line blend to support Kevin and his wife Shannon and will be donating the profits from the sales of that blend directly to them as they fight this.
(855) 575-1261
If you use the code LAWOFFICER at checkout you will receive 15% off your order as well since we are cool like that.
Evidence photos on file….
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