A small Nashville pop-up shop is on the brink of something big. Currently located inside of Germantown’s collaborative workspace The Skillery, Steadfast Coffee is a collaboration between coffee veteran Sean Stewart and entrepreneur Dale Clay. The two previously founded coffee consulting company Steadfast Coffee will move into their permanent home in January, 2015. 

Come January, Steadfast will roast their own coffee. A Diedrich IR-12 has already been purchased and direct trade relationships with producers are being lined up. Considering that Sean used to be the head roaster at Crema, we expect great things.

In the meantime, Steadfast is brewing coffee from Slate Coffee Roasters in Seattle. When I visited they were pulling shots of the Finca El Eden, Colombia on their La Marzocco GS-3 (the permanent location will feature a Modbar). Their espresso parameters for this coffee are a rather unconventional 17.5 gram dose with a 57 gram yield, resulting in a higher extraction and a lower concentration. One sip made me a believer, yielding a balance of sweetness and a transparency of flavors one rarely finds in espresso.

Nashville is just the beginning for Steadfast. Their financial backers have already purchased the historic Spindletop Building in Louisville’s Highlands neighborhood which will be the future home of a Steadfast location. The two cities have long had a friendly coffee rivalry, but this marks the first time a company has attempted to run stores in both cities. It’s a new era in Southern coffee, and Nashville is poised to become its capital. We expect Steadfast will play no small role in that.