Meet the Founder of Rozali Coffee
Meet David, the Founder of Rozali Coffee.
David was born in Yogyakarta (Central Java) and grew up in a small town on the eastern side of Indonesia called Kupang. Kupang is the capital of Nusa Tenggara Timur (West Timor), which borders East Timor (the country). Once David completed his schooling, he moved to Australia in 2006 to undertake tertiary training.
Up to this point, his only experience w coffee was drinking Nescafe instant coffee. However, that all changed in 2008 when he got his first job as a barista. David remembers tasting espresso at a Rio Coffee barista training course. The espresso was sweet, creamy, and had just a hint of pleasant bitterness. That espresso blew his mind. That was the moment his interest in coffee started, and it has only grown over the years.
In 2010, David moved to Sydney to study Accounting and Finance at the UTS Business School. Over the next few years, his life involved full-time study, f work as a tax accountant, and a weekend job as a Barista. While he had to keep busy p for his study fees, he d a strong passion for coffee. David soon discovered the f floral and citrus flavours of washed E, the blueberry and blackberry from Kenya, and some outstanding Panama Geishas. After David graduated from Uni, he worked f as a barista and coffee roaster at Circa Espresso in Parramatta. He then decided to invest his time entirely in coffee.
In 2015, David undertook a Q-Grader course in Melbourne, a course which has a failure rate of up to 80%. He did the course with many well-known coffee professionals and experienced cuppers who have been working in the industry for a much longer time than him. It was very intimidating, to say the least. Out of the 24 people enrolled in the course, only 4 passed. He was one of those who passed. David is proud to say that he had the highest sensory skills, especially in the sweet, sour and salty test. This certification has boosted his commitment and drive to work in the coffee industry.
In 2016, David moved to Germany. He became a Barista at The Barn Roastery in Berlin in January 2017. After one month, he moved to the roastery and became the Head Roaster and Head of Production. During this time, David made two interesting observations. Firstly, he observed that many coffee consumers were surprised that coffee could taste delicious and not bitter. They don’t need to add milk and sugar to enjoy it. It can be a beverage that they can truly experience and enjoy. Secondly, because of the high price of specialty coffee, many people demonstrated uncertainty about how to correctly brew the product, fearful of ruining the coffee during the brewing process. Based on these two observations, it became clear that there is a huge communication problem between coffee roasteries and end consumers, as the necessary information about what specialty coffee is and how to make it has not been effectively communicated to consumers. Additionally, there is a noticeable lack of cafés or roasters that offer customer service throughout Germany. While the larger German cities (like Berlin, Hamburg and München) are home to some high-end specialty coffee roasteries and cafés, there is a lack of such quality cafes in the smaller cities like Leipzig or Dresden. That being said, David saw an opportunity to offer consumers in these smaller cities a specialty product with superior customer service.
That is when the dream of Rozali Coffee came to life! Adopting the lean start-up methodology, David raised 7.500€ to finance this project.
Rozali Coffee has a mission to cultivate and nurture human connection by roasting exceptional coffee because coffee brings people together and fosters community. Our ultimate goal is to have high-quality coffee in every household in Germany and eventually the world. This is our big audacious goal. David believes everyone deserves to have great coffee that has been skillfully roasted. He loves that coffee brings people together. It makes the moment more memorable with delicious coffee.
