For those of you who are not twitter active, much of this post will seem strange to you.
A few weeks ago I was panning through my personal twitter feed and I noticed a tweet from @rvafoodie mentioning that a well known indie band, The Mates of State ( @thematesofstate ) were lovers of great coffee and they had thrown out a twitter all-points-bulletin for fresh roasted coffee.
To be honest, I could never be considered a "super-fan" of the band; not because they don't deserve it, I just feel that after a certain number of years, it is hard to get obsessed over new bands because there are so many great acts out there. All of this, of course, is beside the point; I do love interacting with musicians because they take me back to my college days on stage--so on a whim, I shot @thematesofstate a message telling them that @drinkblanchards fresh roasts coffee daily, we love music, and... well, lets talk.
I spent the next few minutes brushing up on my The Mates of State knowledge and catalog. It seems they're a talented duo from San Francisco currently living in the north east making records and, seemingly, drinking coffee. On their website they have a few songs available for free download. My favorite is a cover from an album of covers called "True Love Will Find You in the End" by Daniel Johnston. Their website was nice and led to Youtube videos to find that this duo is absolutely beautiful and charming; just the kind of folks you want drinking your awesome coffee and writing catchy tunes right? I think so. I went ahead and downloaded their album of covers, called "Crushes" from iTunes because I'm obsessive like that, and then I started contacting other twitter friends to find out if they'd ever heard of @thematesofstate so I could brag that I was going to send them coffee.
Many of my friends knew and loved the band so my ego was thoroughly satisfied until, to my surprise, @thematesofstate contacted me on twitter! Wow! A real band member from a real famous band talking to a coffee nerd from Richmond, Virginia! I felt cooler than cool, minus the fact that I couldn't claim this good fortune as a singular act on my part... I owed the idea and the contact information to @rvafoodie (he gets all the great press, that guy). Still, I was pretty smug because @thematesofstate were TOTALLY in to the idea of getting some fresh roasted coffee from a craft-roastery in Richmond, Virginia.
The Deal: The Mates of State and I struck up a little deal; we decided that the members of Blanchard's Coffee Co. needed a care package just like the Mates needed one too, so we orchestrated a trade. I would send them some fresh roasted coffee, they would send us some swag; they would talk us up to their fans, I would talk them up to our fans--brilliant!
The trade was made and we received some great, colorful tee shirts, and a gaggle of CDs while they got a lovely gift box of assorted fresh roasted Blanchard's Coffee. I listened to @thematesofstate all the way to Delaware not long ago and the "Crushes" CD is still in my car's CD player. I was delighted to see that @thematesofstate had posted on their twitter feed that they were enjoying some @drinkblanchards Dark as Dark, one of our most popular coffees. What a great trade!
Some might ask, what was actually gained here? Will @thematesofstate or @drinkblanchards get any new loyal followers because of this short partnership? Maybe, maybe not; but one thing is certain, we've all made a long distance connection over two of my favorite things--music and coffee. Music and coffee are both social ignitors, sparking the flame of conversation, dialog and interaction. This is part of the reason I left music to live in the world of coffee; it is a natural progression (to chance a pun). I'm so very happy that painfully attractive duo up north enjoyed a few cups of our @drinkblanchards coffee because it was roasted, bagged and delivered with love; and I know they feel the same about their music.
The moral of the story? Thats simple, if you haven't listened to @thematesofstate or had a cup of @drinkblanchards coffee, get on the ball; we're all cool, passionate, interesting people and you'll be glad you gave us a shot.
Monday, January 31, 2011
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Wow. I never imagined that RT would get seen by the right person in Richmond. I've seen Mates maybe 6 times now, mostly because they're my wife's favorite band. But, I can't deny their charm. Team Boo is easily one of my favorite albums of all time. It's basically the musical equivalent of coffee.
ReplyDeleteAnywho, I don't know how much swag you got, but if you sold a bag wrapped in a Mates shirt, poster, mouse-pad, whatever... a) it would be cute as hell and b) my wife would buy it.