Glen Crompton, Co-Founder of Rocket Coffee in Hamilton, reflects on 30 years in the industry and being named the best coffee shop in New Zealand.
When did you establish Rocket Coffee?
In 1995, with my Co-Founder Glen Woodcock. At the time, there was only one café in Hamilton so Glen and I thought we’d give it a go. Glen had recently visited Queenstown and discovered a café with its own roastery, so we thought we’d do the something similar here.
How has the industry changed over the past 30 years?
It’s unrecognisable. In 1995, New Zealand didn’t have a café culture and we were the first people in Hamilton to introduce a café-roastery. Since then, coffee consumption and the social culture around it have exploded.
When we started out, no one knew about specialty coffee. We were just trying to roast the best coffee we could, and that’s been our driving force ever since. I’m really proud of how we’ve evolved and continued to better ourselves every year.
Career highlight to date?
Being the only New Zealand venue to feature in the World’s 100 Best Coffee Shops list earlier this year is pretty hard to beat. After putting a lifetime’s worth of work into Rocket Coffee, to be internationally recognised was very special.
We were contacted by the competition to let us know we had been shortlisted, but finding out we’d been included in the top 100 was a surprise. We have been so busy since the list was announced, we haven’t had the opportunity to celebrate as a team yet. Our online orders have gone wild and the coffee shop is busier than ever. We’re tucked away down a side street, so people who have lived here for years are only just discovering us.
The biggest challenges you’ve faced?
In an industry dominated by big players, one of the largest issues we face is being able to compete as a small independent roaster. We can’t afford to give equipment away for free and when trying to secure wholesale accounts that makes it very hard to compete.
With COVID and the economic downturn, the past four years have been our most challenging to date.
Predictions for the future of the NZ coffee industry?
The coffee industry is going through an interesting period – there’s a rebalancing occurring. The price of green coffee is rising and this will mean an increase in prices for consumers. I don’t necessarily think that’s a bad thing because the focus is being put back on the farmers and encouraging them to grow more coffee while being paid more fairly for it.
Even though it’s unsettling, I think this period of uncertainty isn’t the worse thing that could happen and that consumers will get used to paying a little more. That way, the whole industry becomes more sustainable.
This article appears in the April/May 2025 edition of BeanScene. Subscribe HERE.
Find out more about Rocket Coffee here.
