Keia & Martyn: An Electric Dream & Long Road Ahead

Keia & Martyn Have an Electric Dream (and Long Road Ahead)!

UPDATE: On December 23rd, Martyn suffered a heart attack and had to have emergency triple bypass surgery. It was during the middle of our latest bout of extreme weather but luckily he listened to his body and found himself being cared for by some of the state's best cardiovascular teams. After seven days of hospital care, he was able to return home. He will have about eight to twelve weeks of precautionary physical and occupational therapy until his body heals. Keia and Martyn are fortunate to have a strong community of support around them and have been overwhelmed by the offers of help.

As part of our desire to bring wellness and care to those around us and to experience it ourselves, we are asking our community to consider helping us during this time by:

OG STORY:

Hello. We are Martyn and Keia from Keia & Martyn's Coffee. After many years of experience working in the coffee industry, we decided to create our own coffee company rooted in our interests and values. At the end of 2019, mere weeks before the pandemic, we launched our online coffee subscription business. We knew we didn’t want to follow the same cafe model that has become the standard for most micro coffee roasters but the reality of the pandemic made us really more deeply that we would need to continue to be innovative and flexible. We were excited to try something different with an innovative flair and a conviction to remain laser-focused on selling high-quality coffees to our subscribers. After trying several different approaches, we grew from just a single customer (shoutout to Linda!) to a solid core of club members and fans.

Our humble little venture has grown in the past three years. We've added some of the best instant coffee you'll ever have and now sell our whole-bean coffee across the United States. Since late 2019, K&M has branched out into wholesale and grocery, and you can now find our coffees in Market of Choice (statewide!) and several businesses in PDX like the Sports Bra. We are proud to watch our company grow and are excited to make new friends and business relationships in the Portland community.

An Electric Dream

We think that the next big idea is that the very nature of sustainability has to be sustainable itself. The concept needs to be both practical and radical. We want to begin building out a carbon-neutral and sustainable, electric mobile cafe/shop and delivery service that meets people in their communities.

Our vision has been to invest in an electric vehicle, a Truck Trike, or a hybrid e-bike, eventually growing our mobile capacity with a motorized, electric vehicle. Since October, we have been working with the owner of Truck Trike bicycles to help us build a multi-use bike that we can use to deliver to our subscribers, our business accounts, and pop-up events around town. The Truck Trike has a flatbed on the back that we are working to build into a mobile market that meets people in their communities. This flexible model enables us to remain rooted in community and expand our outreach while being more sustainable. Our Electric Dream is being able to offer Portland subscribers sustainable local delivery and serve the wider Portland coffee with our mobile coffee shop and market. Help spark this new venture with us!

Project Costs:

Truck Trike: $ 4,000.00

Aluminum Box for delivery/pop-up events: 2,000.00

Spare 48 V Battery for Trike. $1,500.00