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The metro-Atlanta coffee business works to give incarcerated people of color a second chance
A metro-Atlanta business owner is looking to expand his coffee roaster business to create jobs for incarcerated people of color, and the generosity of the community is helping to make that happen.
Woodstock, Ga. – A metro-Atlanta business owner is looking to expand his coffee roaster business to create jobs for incarcerated people of color, and the generosity of the community is helping to make that happen.
Paris Darnell Landon Jr. founded Woodstock Coffee Company in 2015.
His Seattle upbringing gave him early exposure to all things Java.
“Growing up, drinking coffee every day and being around it every day and people roasting coffee gave me my passion and that’s where it started,” Landon Jr. said.
“We get coffee from all over the world, from Ethiopia, Indonesia, Peru and Mexico,” Landon said.
While the company has several partnerships with cafes and restaurants that carry the coffee, Landon says getting things off the ground has not been easy since he was incarcerated years ago.
He explains that job opportunities were limited and he encountered many roadblocks when trying to start a business.
As Woodstock Coffee Company grows, Landon says he is now focusing on creating Second Chance Coffee. Opening up job opportunities for people who are already in prison.
Woodstock Coffee Co. in Woodstock.
“Being someone who’s had legal challenges in the past and had to start in a different place than people I know, it was really hard for me to get some money, so I wanted to make it a little easier for people of color and people of color. He’s been in prison before,” Landon Jr. said.
The family-owned business is labor intensive.
“My dad and I brew the coffee ourselves,” explained Landon Jr. “He does the cold brew.”
His brother-in-law recently started a Go-Fund-Me to help him with this passion project, and it quickly gained support.
More than $40,000 has been donated.
“I was just grateful for that opportunity and I had plans to do a lot of things,” Landon Jr. said.
“Part of it has already been used to secure the larger roasters and more coffee products we need.”
It’s been an unexpected blessing for Landon, and he says he hopes he can now pass that on to others looking for a second chance. “I’m just really impressed and surprised that people in general have put up that kind of money to help us with what we want to do,” Landon said.
Woodstock Coffee Co. also sells its coffee at the Woodstock Farmers Market on Saturdays.
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