Obsessively Searching for a Great Cup of Coffee

How Wise Coffee Was Born


   Ryuichi Okabayashi
   Roaster & Founder

   Wise Coffee, Inc.

Wise Coffee’s founder, Ryuichi Okabayashi, has been obsessed with coffee since his childhood in Japan, where they’ve perfected the art of roasting and brewing amazing coffee for over 50 years.  There, coffee is a sensual and satisfying experience, honed by years of Japanese obsession for process and perfection in striving for a perfect cup of coffee that is rich and memorable, honoring all that coffee can be.

But when Ryuichi came to the US in the mid-80’s, he was flabbergasted that he was unable to find a descent cup of coffee.  He expected that America would have great coffee, as drinking coffee was a well-known national obsession in the US.  However, at that time the coffee offerings in Southern California were limited to the old American diner style coffee experience that was a left-over from decades past. “The worst coffee I’ve had to date in the US – anywhere – was at a deli in midtown LA,” he comments. “It was hot and brown, but I wouldn’t call it coffee.  It was very frustrating.”

With the premium coffee trend of the 1990’s brought on by Starbuck’s, Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf and other retail coffee outlets, coffee got more expensive, but not much better.  Ryuichi was still not satisfied.  He was still chasing the great coffee experiences he’d remembered from his life in Japan.  Ryuichi often tells people, “Until you’ve had great coffee, you really don’t know what you’ve been missing.  But once you have an amazing cup of coffee, freshly roasted and respectfully brewed, you’ll never be able to go back to retail coffee again.”

It was this obsession with finding the perfect cup of coffee to enjoy that led him to home roasting his own green beans.  In 2001, Ryuichi purchased some organic green beans from an online shop.  After dozens of tests and experiments with timing and roast levels, Ryuichi had achieved the coffee results he’d been looking for.  And once he found that he could create his own great coffee experience here in the US by roasting his own coffee, Ryuichi’s coffee roasting life had begun.    

Over more than a decade, Ryuichi began giving away his coffee to (very happy) friends and family to sample and enjoy.  Soon there were many who wanted to buy his coffee and have it at home and work, realizing that he was right about not being able to settle for mediocre coffee again after having the high quality experience that his coffee offered.

And Wise Coffee was born!  In 2005, WiseCoffee.com started out as a referral site to online organic coffee sellers.  By 2009, WiseCoffee.com was re-launched to sell our own amazing, micro-roasted organic coffee to our many happy customers (who would never have to go back to drinking retail outlet coffee again). Now in its 7th year, Wise Coffee, Inc. has expanded with a new online shopping site, which includes a blog, YouTube channel, online magazine (“Coffee Talk”) and plans to start the “Wise Coffee Club” in August 2012 to meet the demand for regular orders delivered right to our customers’ doors at reasonable prices.