Cat & Cloud Podcast

On September 30th, 2016 we opened the doors of our first cafe and roastery on Portola street, Santa Cruz. Ten years later, we're still here, thanks to the enduring love and support our community has shown us. In this birthday special, we sit with Chris, Jared, and Charles to reflect on everything from road trips to Santa Barbara with green coffee in the trunk before the brick & mortar day...

Disneyland has been a long-time inspiration for us at Cat & Cloud in terms of their inspiring ability to completely immerse their guests in an experience. To compound this: they consistently do it at scale. This is something that a lot of small businesses struggle to maintain as they grow and owners are forced to take a step back from the front of house. This is what has brought us back, year...

Originally aired March 10, 2025 Some exciting news: as we approach Cat & Cloud's 10 year anniversary, we are gearing up to launch some changes to the Cat & Could Podcast. New segments. Fresh industry voices. Candid insights into all things craft, hospitality, culture and leadership development. While we're heads-down, we're pulling some of our favorite episodes from the arch...

Originally aired March 11, 2024 Some exciting news: as we approach Cat & Cloud's 10 year anniversary, we are gearing up to launch some changes to the Cat & Could Podcast. New segments. Fresh industry voices. Candid insights into all things craft, hospitality, culture and leadership development. While we're heads-down, we're pulling some of our favorite episodes from the arch...

Originally aired March 11, 2024 Some exciting news: as we approach Cat & Cloud's 10 year anniversary, we are gearing up to launch some changes to the Cat & Could Podcast. New segments. Fresh industry voices. Candid insights into all things craft, hospitality, culture and leadership development. While we're heads-down, we're pulling some of our favorite episodes from the arch...

Originally aired January 25, 2025 Some exciting news: as we approach Cat & Cloud's 10 year anniversary, we are gearing up to launch some changes to the Cat & Could Podcast. New segments. Fresh industry voices. Candid insights into all things craft, hospitality, culture and leadership development. While we're heads-down, we're pulling some of our favorite episodes from the ar...

Summer camp but for coffee professionals! Learn about what Jared & Charles were up to this week at Camp Coffee Shop, a brand new retreat hosted by Barista Magazine all about building community in the coffee industry. This was four days of coffee workshops and skill-building sessions, unplugged in nature, with everyone from new business owners to coffee industry veterans. Jared gives us the ind...

This week Chris & Jared get carried away in conversation with a newer member of the Cat & Cloud team. Misha Holtz— who's been ramping up in the marketing team at Cat & Cloud for the last three months— gets pulled onto the mic without warning and grilled about her path from founding software engineer to leading our digital platforms and marketing work. Turns out her Cat & Cloud...

Cat & Cloud Podcast   Cat & Cloud Coffee www.catandcloud.com Interview with Chris Baca: 10 Years of Cat & Cloud, Building Culture, and Keeping Specialty Coffee Accessible Reflecting on nearing Cat & Cloud’s 10-year milestone, Chris Baca emphasizes valuing day-to-day progress over anniversaries while acknowledging the achievement of surviving a life in small business and growing fro...

Cat & Cloud Podcast   Cat & Cloud Coffee www.catandcloud.com Two Big Ideas: Café Ownership Reality Check & Why Coffee Can't Be What It's Not Episode Summary Chris Baca and Jared Truby dig into Casey's prompt "What's the big idea?" with a pair of hot takes on the state of specialty coffee. Jared argues the classic neighborhood café — unless run by one or tw...

Cat & Cloud Podcast  Cat & Cloud Coffee www.catandcloud.com/ Episode Summary Chris Baca and Jared Truby sit down with Rachel Keen, green coffee buyer at Counter Culture Coffee, about her winding path into the role — from barista in New Zealand to farms in Costa Rica and Colombia, teaching English in Japan, and an educator job that turned into green buying. They cover the real, day-to-day o...

Cat & Cloud Podcast  Cat & Cloud Coffee www.catandcloud.com/ Part 2: Cafe Imports Source "Where Do We Go From Here" Panel hosted by Chris Baca - Ep# 457 Welcome to Part 2 of this live panel discussion hosted by Cafe Imports recorded at the World of Coffee, in San Diego, CA.  Cat & Cloud’s own Chris Baca moderates This Source Event as the conversation shifts into new territory...

Cat & Cloud Podcast  Cat & Cloud Coffee www.catandcloud.com/ Cafe Imports Source "Where Do We Go From Here" Panel hosted by Chris Baca  Episode Summary Recorded live at the World of Coffee, in San Diego, CA, Cafe Imports hosts the second SOURCE event, a panel discussion focused on “Where do we go from here?” - where business leaders in coffee tackle issues facing the industry tod...

Cat & Cloud Podcast  Cat & Cloud Coffee www.catandcloud.com/ Ping Pong Q&A with Cat & Cloud Owners, Chris Baca and Jared Truby - Ep# 455 Jared, Casey, and Chris try (and mostly fail) to follow the rules of a structured Ping Pong Q&A — but the detours are the good stuff. After a bird interrupts the studio, they dig into how basketball and skateboarding have shaped how they lead...

CAT & CLOUD PODCAST Cat & Cloud Coffee www.catandcloud.com/ From Soil to Service Part 6: Interview with Cat & Cloud Head of Retail, Herman Madrigal - Ep# 454  EPISODE SUMMARY Jared and Chris sit down with Herman Madrigal, Head of Retail and one of Cat & Cloud's longest-tenured team members at eight and a half years. They trace his unlikely path from championship cell phone sal...

Cat & Cloud Podcast  Cat & Cloud Coffee www.catandcloud.com/ From Soil to Service Part 5: Interview with Cat & Cloud Head of Wholesale and Partner Program, Marc Gessler (contd)- Ep# 453   In this episode, the team continues the conversation with Marc to explore what great hospitality actually looks like in practice—from cafés to wholesale partnerships. They cover the importance of core...

Cat & Cloud Podcast  Cat & Cloud Coffee www.catandcloud.com/ From Soil to Service Part 4: Interview with Cat & Cloud Head of Wholesale and Partner Program, Marc Gessler - Ep# 452   Chris and Jared sit down to trace Marc’s full arc — from a listener and fan of the Cat & Cloud podcast, to becoming the Partner Program's Wholesale Director. From a six-page job application essay, h...

Cat & Cloud Podcast  Cat & Cloud Coffee www.catandcloud.com/ From Soil to Service Part 3: Coffee Roasting Field Trip and Interview with Cat & Cloud Roastery Leaders continued -  Ep# 451 Chris Baca continues his interview with the Head of Coffee Roasting at Cat & Cloud, Jonson Henry and Connor Doyle. What starts as an honest look at the operational pressures of running a roastery —...

Cat & Cloud Coffee  www.catandcloud.com/ In Part 2 of the From Soil to Service series, the Cat & Cloud Roastery team pulls back the curtain on what it actually takes to roast, organize, and ship tens of thousands of pounds of coffee while still staying connected to craft, quality, and intention. Connor Doyle and Jonson Henry share their very different paths into coffee, the realities of sc...

Cat & Cloud Podcast  Cat & Cloud Coffee www.catandcloud.com/ From Soil to Service Part 1: Inside the World of Green Coffee - Ep# 449 In this episode of the Cat & Cloud Podcast, Chris Baca and Casey Ryan sit down with Director of Coffee Dulce Venancio to explore the journey of coffee “from soil to service.” Dulce shares how her background in agriculture, her connection to producers in M...

Cat & Cloud Podcast Cat & Cloud Coffee www.catandcloud.com/ Episode Summary This episode explores what it really takes to build a café from the ground up—starting with a blank slate but bringing hard-earned experience along. The conversation moves from practical decisions like choosing the right neighborhood and building authentic community connections, to deeper reflections on mindset, mo...

Cat & Cloud Podcast Cat & Cloud Coffee www.catandcloud.com/ The World of Coffee Reflection: Observations, Stories, and Lots of Love for the Community of Coffee - Ep #447 In this episode, Chris, Casey, and Director of Coffee Marc Gessler, recap World of Coffee San Diego 2026: the caffeine overload, the booth shifts, the reunions, the strange travel moments, and the bigger feeling of being p...

Cat & Cloud Podcast Cat & Cloud Coffee www.catandcloud.com/ Coffee and a Danish Barista Champion, Christopher Hoff - Ep #446 Summary: In this episode, Jared and Casey sit down with Danish Barista Champion Christopher Hoff, a top-six finisher at the World Barista Championships, to talk about competition, coffee, and the deeper story behind both. Christopher shares how his world routine cent...

Cat & Cloud Podcast Cat & Cloud Coffee www.catandcloud.com Taking Care of the Pack w/Leah Wolff in HR - Ep #445 Summary: In this episode, the team sits down with Head of HR Leah Wolff to explore what it really looks like to build people, culture, and leadership inside a growing coffee company. Leah shares her journey from starting as a concierge during the pandemic to stepping into an exec...

Cat & Cloud Podcast  Cat & Cloud Coffee www.catandcloud.com/ What We Think Matters vs. What Actually Matters w/ Chris and Casey - Ep# 444  This episode opens with an introduction to Casey Ryan—his background in filmmaking and eventually as an independent school principal, and how he found his way into Cat & Cloud—but quickly shifts into a deeper conversation about hospitality, coffee c...