Why "Highwire"?

Lately, as we've been meeting lots of new people unfamiliar with our company, I've been asked how we arrived at our name. My initial reaction is awkwardness, as the process was not glamorous or sophisticated.

Rich, Eric and I brainstormed for a VERY long time, coming up with lists of names that I'm too embarrassed to try and recall. We had several rules, such as "no puns about coffee, no misspelled wordz, and nothing that plays up the drug abuse angle of coffee or tea consumption". There was also the challenge of how to address our equal love of both coffee AND tea, but ultimately felt that was a dead end for us.

Those of you who know Rich (and to a slightly lesser extent, myself), know that he is a fan of things vintage. We started riffing off electronics and amps but veered way too close to our rule about caffeinated names. Then one day I was listening to some AC/DC at home and came across the tune "Live Wire". This had a ring to it, but was also deep into rule-breaker territory.

I was thinking about conversations Rich, Eric and I were having about roast, and our individual preferences. We felt that the pendulum of preference had swung too widely from deep, dark roasts that favor body and presence over origin character and brightness to the light roasts that showcase origin character and acidity but lack "guts" or body. We had long sought coffee that married both body and origin character. In other words, coffee that was balanced. That's where "Highwire" comes in.

And balance is what we try to achieve with almost all of our coffees (don't worry French Roast drinkers, we got you covered).

Cheers.