The success of coffee globally is based on what coffee represents...community. A beverage that facilitates rootedness, growth, and fruiting of relationships through shared conversation over a cup in our shops or your home.
But today, we are an industry. And our concerns tend to be exclusively around just the business of specialty coffee.
Where is the heart?
Today I am honored and excited to present an interview with someone who is actively and tenaciously pursuing the heart of coffee in her community by honoring coffees root and growing the fruit of what it can bring to people.
We are talking with Head Roaster, Co-founder, and Chief of Staff for Cxffee Black, Renata Henderson!
Renata Henderson is Memphis, Tennessee's first Black female roaster and the co-founder and Chief of Staff of Cxffeeblack, the community-oriented, education-based coffee company she built alongside her husband Bartholomew Jones.
Founded in 2019 on a mission to return coffee to its African roots and build an equitable Black future, Cxffeeblack made history by creating the first entirely all-Black coffee supply chain from Ethiopia to Memphis — with direct-trade relationships extending to producers like Stephen and Margaret Kuria of Liwani Estate in Nakuru, Kenya.
She serves as Head Roaster, Creative Director, and HR lead, Renata brings her deep background in curriculum, instruction, and education into every dimension of Cxffeeblack, from its Specialist-in-Training internship program to the Barista Exchange Program. Her connection to coffee is deeply ancestral — rooted in Ethiopian women's 2,000-year roasting tradition and a family legacy that includes her grandfather marching alongside Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. during the 1968 Memphis sanitation workers' strike, canteen of coffee in hand.
Under Renata and Bartholomew's leadership, Cxffeeblack has earned the 2023 Sprudgie Award for Best Film in Coffee, the 2024 Sprudgie Award for Global Notable Roaster of the Year, and the inaugural 2024 Coffee Coalition for Racial Equity Innovator of the Year award. Built with support from more than 500 community investors, Cxffeeblack's new flagship café and global roasting headquarters opened in December 2025 at 3386 Bowen Avenue in Memphis's Mitchell Heights neighborhood — celebrated with an East African coffee ceremony, live music, and a community brunch — and is now equipped with a new roaster tripling the company's capacity as it expands into Memphis grocery stores and new café partnerships across the city. Cxffeeblack has been featured in Vice, NPR, The Hill, and Black Enterprise, and has collaborated with Miir, Oatley, La Marzocco, NBA player JaeShawn Tate, and West African coffee entrepreneurs at the Black Star Line Festival.
For Renata, coffee has always been more than a beverage — it is, as she says "an open air church to experience God and His goodness."
We discuss:
- Her Grandfather's coffee and community justice that inspired her
- Connecting with Coffee's Origin through Cxffeeblack
- How Cxffeeblack Is Redefining Coffee with Heart and Justice
- Living Among the People They Serve in Memphis
- The hard part and the joyful part of coffee work from the heart
- Navigating Authenticity and Business
- Guidelines Celebrating Individuality in Coffee Spaces
- Personal Growth and Community Impact
Links:
https://www.instagram.com/cxffeeblack/
https://cxffeeblack.com/
KEYS TO THE SHOP ALSO OFFERS 1:1 CONSULTING AND COACHING!
If you are a cafe owner and want to work one on one with me to bring your shop to its next level and help bring you joy and freedom in the process then email
chris@keystothshop.com
of book a free call now:
https://calendly.com/chrisdeferio/30min
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