It is our belief that staff are fundamental to any business yet in today’s world many businesses appear to have leaned into the theory of more profits for the least amount of pay possible. We wish to be the opposite of this and so:

• All of our staff are paid well above industry rates
• All of our part timers are paid above the living wage
• All of our full time staff are part of a company pension scheme
• All of our full time staff receive full sick pay
• 1% of all our annual revenue is shared with staff on top of their salary/bonus

Many organisations in Ireland are doing incredible work for the most vulnerable in society. Since the day we first started to roast coffee we decided to give our support to Women’s Aid. We have done this by giving them a minimum of 1% of all the revenue we earn every year.

A year after we began roasting we looked to see what we could do in addition to the 1% of all revenue we donate to Women’s Aid. We had a meeting at the roastery with Howard Barwick of Covoya. Covoya act as an exporter for our biggest supplier of coffee at the roastery which is the ASOPEP co-op in Colombia.

I’ve known Howard for a long time. He was a former competition barista, coffee roaster and all round very very decent human being. I asked him if there was anything we could do for the people of ASOPEP and he said yes there was. This is how our bridge building started and we’ve now completed four of them.

Monika, our Head of Quality took the opportunity to visit ASOPEP where she met with some amazing people and saw first hand some of the bridges we’ve funded. She came back with stories of the tangible benefits these structures have helped to bring such as making journeys to school for the children of the co-op safer along with easing the burden of coffee transportation. Below are some photos of before where one of our bridges was built and a video after its completion.

In 2024 we decided in addition to the 2% of all revenue we give to good causes and the 1% to staff, that we’d add an additional .5% (or a little more…). We’ve done this through a series of 4 x €2,500 grants. These went to Barretstown through an event called “No suits, No Scales”, Women’s Aid, The Solas Project in Dublin 8 and to the gym next door, “Capital Strength” to help pay expenses for athletes representing Ireland at the junior European Championships.

We’re based in Dublin 8 and St. James’s is our local hospital within a short walk of the roastery. A number of staff at James’s have supported us since we began through buying our coffee. When Covid hit we decided to donate coffee to them on a weekly basis. It was a very small way to say thank you for all they do and we’ve done it every week since. In 2022 we added Crumlin Children’s Hospital to our weekly drop and now in 2023 we’ve also added The Coombe. This year we will donate three quarters of a tonne in total between the three.

As participants in the WCR Checkoff Program, we at Imbibe are proud that a portion of every green coffee purchase we make goes towards supporting advanced science for the future of coffee.

Una Mullaly of The Irish Times asked Gary to join her on The United Ireland podcast to talk about how you can run a coffee company ethically. This interview gives insight into how and why Imbibe is run the way it is.

Listen here>