As some of you know, I work with a group of people called The Matchbook Coffee Project. Every month, we team up with a roaster and give them complete creative control over a coffee—they choose how they want to roast their coffee, what the bag label looks like, and a unique piece of swag meant to represent something about them. This episode is sort of a hybrid between Matchbook and Boss Barista. Ciera Yong is the owner of Mama’s Brew in Houston, Texas, and she’s the July featured roaster for Matchbook. When we first chatted about recording, Ciera touched upon so many big themes that we decided we’d not only air her Matchbook interview on this channel, but we’d do a follow-up interview going deeper into some of the ideas she puts forth. So what you’re about to hear is part one of a two-part episode. Part one is recorded specifically for Matchbook, so we talk about Ciera’s background in coffee and how she went from brewing coffee for her friends in her dorm to starting her own business. As the interview goes on, Ciera pushes on the definition of specialty coffee, and why she, a Black business owner with a background in both large scale quality control and small-batch roasting, doesn’t want to be labeled “specialty.” And that’s where episode two will pick up. The second of this two-part episode was recorded specifically for you, the Boss Barista listeners. We’ll go deeper on what it means to label yourself as a member of the specialty coffee community, and how exclusionary practices are embedded in the fabric of our industry—and what folks like Ciera are doing with their businesses to bring more people in and actively pursue equity. So here’s part one of our interview, which again was recorded for Matchbook so you’ll hear an intro that refers to the project. And part two is already waiting for you to listen when you’re done. Please enjoy!