Coffee With A Side Of Community Giving.
The Coffee Industry Gives Back.
Editor’s note: We will update this list as the year goes on. Come back each month to see the new recommendations.
At the end of each episode in 2025, we’ve been asking our guests if there are any charitable efforts that they support and would like to share. The comedian Mike Birbiglia does the same on his podcast Working It Out. It isn’t an original idea, but it is one worth expanding to a new audience.
We give what we can when we can. We don’t expect that we or anyone else can do so every month. There are no rules. Sometimes volunteering is as impactful as a cash donation. We find a need we can help and help. Talking about it feels a bit weird, but that is just the Midwestern in me. I’d rather feel a bit uncomfortable and help these supportive campaigns to grow.
2025: Season 13 Guest Recommends
Stephanie Welter-Krause, Swelter Coffee
https://food4farmers.org: “We partner with coffee-farming communities in Latin America to cultivate a food-secure future. Our co-op partners and the thousands of coffee-farming families they represent are working to put good, healthy food on their tables every day.”
https://www.beanvoyage.org: “If smallholder women farmers are equipped with the training, capital, and market connections, then, they will drive their communities toward a thriving future.”
Chuck Patton, Chuck’s Roasts
Grounds For Health: Their mission is to reduce cervical cancer among women in developing countries, which are often coffee-producing countries.
Grant Gamble, Leaderboard: The Coffee Game
Your local homeless support organizations.
Suneal Pabari, Leaderboard: The Coffee Game
Your local food bank.*
2024: GIVING
In my personal life, my wife and I have been trying to give a bit back to charities or those in need more consistently under the belief that it will be habit-forming—similar to saving each month. It can be hard to decide where to put our funds. There is a lot of need out there.
January: Coffee for residents in Altadena through Bevel Coffee. This wasn’t an official charity, but we wanted to support a small coffee business displaced by the Eaton Fire. Bevel is based at Prime Pizza at 1900 Allen Ave in Altadena, CA. My wife and I lived in Altadena when we first moved to California for her graduate school residency. It was where we fell in love with California and a major reason we’ve spent the past decade here in Southern California.
Like many others we collected blankets, warm cloths, and paper goods to donate to fire-displaced residents in Los Angeles. Shout out to the Flying Pig Pub & Kitchen for collecting, sorting, and driving four semis full up to LA.*February: We were inspired by Suneal Pabari of Leaderboard: The Game. We donated to the North County Food Bank. It is a chapter of the larger Jacobs & Cushman San Diego Food Bank, which provides food to 400,000 hungry people every month. Last year, they distributed 63 million pounds of food. For reference, that would be like 84 million 12oz bags of specialty coffee.
In 2024 we supported:
The Nature Conservancy, The National Parks Foundation, San Diego Botanic Garden, Voice of San Diego, Network of National Abortion Funds, Birdies 4 Brains, Warrior Dog Rescue, San Diego Mountain Bike Association, National Parks Conservation Association, Sierra Club