Keep chasing dreams! The Taiwanese man went to California to open the first Taiwan camp coffee bean roasting factory.

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"Everything, Coffee is my everything for now!" (all, coffee is all I have now) confidently express his love for coffee, he is a post-80s Chen Junkai (Frank Chen) from Taiwan. At the beginning, I came into contact with coffee roasting by accident, but I fell into this field. He was supposed to be an engineer, but now he has opened Bravado Roasting Company, the only coffee roasting brand run by Taiwanese in Southern California.

I originally majored in mechatronics, while graduate school majored in science and technology management at New York University. Chen Junkai, who has been following the route of the "science and technology industry" all the way, never thought that he could have such a deep relationship with coffee. Chen Junkai said that he liked to drink coffee when he was young, "but even at that time, he never felt that there was a deep knowledge behind him." Until I met my current partner Cole (Chen Guofen), I found that the original coffee was not only esoteric, but also full of fun.

The cool-looking Cole is actually the father of Chen Junkai's high school classmate. He used to run a factory in Taiwan. Based on his love of coffee, he succeeded in developing his own machine for roasting coffee beans. When the two talked about their preference for coffee by chance, Chen Junkai was like discovering the Peach Blossom Garden and was brought into the world of coffee. At that time, when Chen Junkai was about to graduate from New York University, the two decided to turn their interests into a career and became a coffee bean supplier.

However, the family is not amazed when it changes from "coding" to "baked beans". There is no objection. After all, I am still very young, and I feel very lucky at this point. Chen Junkai said with a smile that his family felt that as long as he was interested, of course he could go ahead and challenge himself. He admits that although most Taiwanese parents want their children to follow a specific direction, his family does give him a lot of freedom. "what's more, what I've learned in the fields of mechatronics and technology management can also be applied to coffee! Baking actually requires a lot of data, and the ability to interpret that data is exactly what I've learned before. "

Chen Junkai said that baking beans is actually a science, because raw beans will have different tastes due to varieties and producing areas, and the baking process must be adjusted. "each place has its own unique climate, water, soil, and nutrients, all of which affect the flavor of coffee. So the hardest part is deciding how to bake certain beans. " For Chen Junkai, this difficulty is full of fun, "because coffee is to be able to express their own characteristics."

Even if the process of baking beans is interesting, it is still a business. When it comes to sales, Chen Junkai admitted that it is not romantic at all. From the perspective of foreigners, the biggest obstacle to running this brand is the language, and it is very difficult for us to directly enter the mainstream market in the United States. He thought the quality of coffee was very demanding, but at first he hit a brick wall everywhere and no one wanted to buy it. Fortunately, after slowly building up contacts, business began to pick up. He said that even if he played the role of a wholesaler, he did not want to grab the market pie at a low price. "what I want is Better quality with reasonable price" (better quality and reasonable price). Chen Junkai also proudly said that in addition to the reasonable price, he also buys raw beans through fair trade (Fair Trade), so he can get good treatment for coffee farmers at the source.

From an engineer to a bean baker, Chen Junkai is now associated with the smell of coffee every day. While making mellow coffee, Chen Junkai said that he was very happy, and his enthusiasm also infected the people around him. His family members as far away as Taiwan now drink his baked coffee every day. "they used to only drink tea, but now they all drink coffee instead. After all, they are my family."