Jimmy's Iced Coffee launches roasted beans range

Jimmy’s Iced Coffee launched a brand of coffee beans, Jimmy’s Roasted Coffee, yesterday.

The beans will be available on the Jimmy’s website.

The roasted coffee beans are packed in biodegradable paper bags with a fully natural, woven hessian outer casing, as part of the Christchurch business’s efforts to be plastic-free in 2020.

Each bag of beans is made to order so there is no waste.

The brand has launched three nostalgically-named coffee bean bags: Jimmy’s Happy Days coffee from El Salvador with a flavouring of cherry and dark chocolate; Shoot the Pier, a Brazilian blend with a cocoa and hazelnut essence; and Surfin’ Bird from Indonesia with hints of fudge, citrus and spice.

Jimmy’s Iced Coffee says the coffee is ethically sourced and supports farmers with paying fair wages and helping with infrastructure opportunities.

Co-founder Jim Cregan said: “I’m so stoked that we are now in the roasted bean game. It’s important when you’re starting out in business to do one product really well, but as we’ve grown, we’ve been able to check out new product ranges and the straight-up, direct-to-consumer roasted beans route feels like a natural progression.”

Suze Owen, who co-founded the brand with brother Jim, said: “Launching our coffee beans is purely selfish. I want to lie in bed on a Saturday morning with a mug of our good stuff in the hot form. Read into that what you will but I strongly advise you buy a bag. You won’t look back.”

The coffee bean sacks range from £9 to £10 per 250g bag.

Jim Cregan has told how he became hooked on iced coffee during a trip to Australia but returned to the UK to find it difficult to obtain.

The early recipes for Jimmy’s were mixed at Suze’s cafe in Christchurch.

The siblings have built the product into a brand which is set to sell more than five million units this year, with one per cent of profits going to charity.

It is stocked in more than 5,000 stores worldwide, including Tesco, Sainsbury’s, Waitrose and Morrisons.