Two Marines Found a Love for Coffee in Afghanistan… Now It’s Their Business

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It’s easy to see how Compass Coffee honors U.S. vets. It’s right in the name.

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If you ask Michael Haft or Harrison Suarez, founders of the D.C. based coffee shop, they’ll say “compass” refers to life as Marine.

Before launching Compass Coffee, the entrepreneurs enlisted as Marines. They were stationed in Quantico together as second lieutenants and were later deployed into Afghanistan as platoon commanders in May of 2001, according to The Washington Post.

Haft tells the news outlet, “It’s one of the most important skills for a Marine: to know where you are, and where you’re going, and how to get there.”

And, they each admit they had some pretty awful coffee during their time in combat.

“Sleep deprivation is part of the training,” Haft told the Post. “So you buy a 20-ounce cup of coffee for a dollar, and it’s disgusting, but it has the caffeine and it keeps you awake.”

Haft and Suarez quickly learned that awful coffee would birth a friendship and a mutual desire to bring communities the perfect brew.

That’s how Haft, 27, and Suarez, 26, got their start in the coffee business. In 2013, they each put on their entrepreneurship hats and set out to bring excellent coffee products to the world.

RELATED: After 21 years of service in the Air Force, one mom wasted no time turning a long held idea into a business

Since their service, the dynamic duo have co-written an e-book called “Perfect Coffee at Home,” and Compass Coffee now serves communities all over the world.

When they opened up to news outlets about the journey toward becoming business owners Haft said, “We knew it would be hard, but we didn’t know it would be this hard.”

One of the many startup roadblocks, according to Haft and Suarez, was funding.

For starters, a big portion of their savings and a low-interest loan from both families, went toward solidifying what would become the Compass Coffee base – an old laundromat on Seventh Street NW, in Washington DC.

They kept with it, and now Compass Coffee has an offering of nine coffee blends from beans grown all over the world. Haft and Suarez now work with some of the world’s best coffee buyers, from places like Guatemala, Ethiopia, Indonesia, and Kona, to import the most flavorful beans the word has to offer.

These brave men are true veteran success stories – an example of how helping the country as a veteran continues even in the years after service.

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