About Rebel Bean
about
Rebel Bean is a small batch coffee roaster located in Okotoks, Alberta.
All our coffee is organically grown, fairly traded, and roasted fresh every week in a 10kg Turkish drum roaster that we call ‘Toby’. We are committed to buying the highest quality specialty organic beans available from various coffee-growing regions of the globe and bringing out the best of their flavours and nuances through the roasting process.
We are also committed to our community and look for opportunities to get involved, support fundraisers, local businesses and the great events that make Okotoks awesome.
I’m sara
I bought Rebel Bean from Kerri Ann in the spring of 2021. Your coffee is safe! I promise.
I began my Rebel-coffee-love years ago and when I heard it was for sale I wanted the roastery to stay local and for the coffee to stay awesome. So, I put my money where my mouth was and bought the roastery. I’m not looking back.
Like many others, the last couple of years crystalized my priorities. My happiness and my ability to have balance so I can be present for my family took precedent over other things. I began to seek ways to get back my mojo. Then I talked to Kerri Ann and found a painted rock that said: Create. Your own Future. (Thank you to whoever painted that and randomly left it on my front lawn).
Coffee, for me, is a reason to get out of bed, a reason to commiserate with friends, a mechanism to seek out great experiences and mostly just delicious. We owned 12 coffee makers BEFORE I bought Rebel. (I still can’t explain why.) Yet, like Kerri Ann I’m not a coffee snob. I just love great coffee. And I’m a rebel. (Ask my parents, that job wasn’t easy.)
Bringing you great, small batch, artisan, organic coffee continues to be our priority here at Rebel and Kerri Ann is still involved enough to lean on. Building on the foundation that she so brilliantly created for our community is a privilege I take seriously.
You’ll also continue to find me giving back and contributing to the good that is our community. Together we are a force.
The gratitude I feel to the group of Rebels who drink our coffee is immense. Thank you. I have spent many happy days in this little roastery and love coming to work each day to roast and create coffee for you.
I’m Kerri Ann.
I’m not a coffee snob.
::hides under desk::
In my first year or two of roasting I was worried you might find this out about me. Then I realized, WAIT! That’s the whole point!
If you are looking for someone to tell you about how the particle count in your water is affecting the quality of your pour over brew, in which you’ve meticulously hand ground your beans to the perfect consistency, you’ve come to the wrong place. Not because I can’t. (I’m a mother of teenagers, I can throw down with the best of them.)
But I’m not interested in the most exotic cup of coffee in the world. I’m interested in good, even great, approachable coffee that warms both your body and your heart.
Other coffee companies have turned to big batches, and technology like computers and formulas to create laser accurate consistency in their beans. Here at Rebel Bean, we are doing it old school. This company was started by me, and while it’s now in the hands of Sara on the daily, we’ve decided that we’re sticking with the artisan techniques that have served us and the generations of coffee roasters before us well. With only temperature as a guide, we rely on sight, sound, smell, hand written logs, and intuition to perfectly roast our coffee.
Rebel Bean coffee might not be consistent. But it’s consistently Good.
We’re Rebels like that.
history
What’s the story behind the name “Rebel Bean’?
In every batch there is one single bean that inexplicably doesn’t roast. That bean is among the thousands in each batch that is exposed to heat in excess of 200°C. Every other bean in that batch has lost a good deal of its moisture, lost a percentage of its natural caffeine, and its sugars have caramelized to darken its colour. Except for one. This one bean seemingly flips the bird at chemistry and DOES NOT ROAST. We find one in every batch and have termed it the “Rebel Bean” a name which has also become the personality for the brand and its customers.
BUT WHAT’S THE REAL COFFEE story
Every other roasting company seems to have a story that begins with a great passion for wonderful coffee and while we like coffee a lot, it is not why Rebel Bean was started.
our secret ingredient is love
It actually stared with a desire to do life a little differently and progressed to a love of our community and a deep appreciation for the growers and producers whose coffee ends up in our roastery. It’s a whole cycle of awesome before the coffee is even brewed.
Our love isn’t just for the coffee, it’s a love for the connection that coffee gives people.
And we appreciate how YOU want to drink YOUR coffee. We create roast levels and flavor profiles that suit everyone (hopefully!) so that no one dictates what goes in YOUR cup. The world needs a bit more of that, we think.
We think often about the journey that each bean has made. Imagine just how many people have transferred their energy into these beans before we sip it as our morning cup of coffee.
Our true passion is for what happens when people meet for coffee and the love, and friendship, or hardship and knowing that transpires between them between sips.
Coffee connects humanity in so many ways.
This connection drives everything that we do at Rebel Bean. It informs the charities we choose to support and the way we love, appreciate and respect every one of our Rebel Gang. (Pssst — that includes you.)
In a world where everyone tells us to blend in, to consume more and more, to fit the mold, we are here saying, stand out, be you, we’ve got you!