Meet Chris Cheney

We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Chris Cheney. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Chris below.

Hi Chris, we’re so appreciative of you taking the time to share your nuggets of wisdom with our community. One of the topics we think is most important for folks looking to level up their lives is building up their self-confidence and self-esteem. Can you share how you developed your confidence?

I feel like for me, I naturally struggle with self-doubt. However, through the years doing difficult things in life started to prove to myself that with the intelligent application of effort and perseverance, there have been a lot of obstacles that I started to see that I had overcome. Those things don’t have to be over the top. In the beginning, they can be simple steps – completing a difficult project at school, achieving a goal that stretches you a bit, etc. But over time, continue to stretch yourself and overcome. As you do, you build not only skills, but the confidence in your ability. Even failure in those tasks creates opportunity to learn, adjust, and overcome in the future. Don’t let the fears, failures, and doubts hold you back. Take those small steps to start to build your skills and confidence, and overcome. This doesn’t happen overnight though. However, with consistency, one day you will look back at the things that seemed like insurmountable tasks that used to fill you with self doubt, and they now seem commonplace because you have done those tasks enough times that they no longer are a big deal.
There is a quote by Alex Hormozi that goes right along with this, he says “you don’t become confident by shouting affirmations in the mirror, but by having a stack of undeniable proof that you are who you say you are. Outwork your self doubt.”

Great, so let’s take a few minutes and cover your story. What should folks know about you and what you do?

Contrast Coffee is located in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. The Upper Peninsula (UP) is a remote part of the country that has a ton of natural beauty from its abondance of lakes and forests, pleasant summers and snowy winters. The population of the region is low with only a handful of towns that were in their prime while the mining industry was booming, but several decades ago the mines closed and the population of many of these towns started to wain as the jobs dried up.

Contrast started in 2015 dedicated to the goal of making positive impact. That impact includes several facets, for example a positive economic impact in the region by creating jobs both directly in Contrast as well as supporting suppliers and businesses in the region we purchase from to continue our operation (i.e. Farmers, contractors, etc). It also applies to making a positive social impact in the region by creating safe and enjoyable high quality coffee shops for the community to enjoy – many of these communities were small enough that they didn’t have spaces like that before we entered. Finally, we help promote positive impact globally by our dedication to our coffee farm partners all over the world. They work incredibly hard to make a high quality coffee product and through our purchases, we are a piece of creating positive impact in those communities overseas as well (typically in developing countries).

With that focus in mind, we like to say that Coffee is Community – As coffee holds a special place in society. It brings together friends, family, colleagues, etc. It is a point of meeting and connection. A coffee shop plays an important part of a community and just purchasing from us then goes right back into creating those positive impacts we discussed. Each person plays an important part of the community as we couldn’t do any of this without coffee producers overseas, we couldn’t do it without an incredible team dedicated to making high quality drinks, or the fantastic suppliers and contractors that make sure we have things like fresh milk and beautiful spaces to meet. And we absolutely couldn’t do any of it without our guests that purchase these wonderful coffees. It takes the entire community coming together and together it really creates something wonderful. That is what Coffee is Community means to us.

Contrast itself then pushes that vision forward through our five coffee shops located across the UP as well as through our wholesale coffee roastery and bakery located in Iron River, MI. Through that central facility in Iron River we supply not only our own coffee shops, but several other coffee shops, grocery stores, restaurants, hotels, offices, churches, etc all across the region and beyond.

There is so much advice out there about all the different skills and qualities folks need to develop in order to succeed in today’s highly competitive environment and often it can feel overwhelming. So, if we had to break it down to just the three that matter most, which three skills or qualities would you focus on?

At a high level, I believe three areas of skill/knowledge that are vital to any organization and that were absolutely critical to us were:

1. Becoming a master in your craft – When we started, we really didn’t know anything about coffee. That doesn’t need to stop you though. No one is born an expert. Dedicate yourself to learning your craft. Read, study, go to trade shows and seminars. Don’t stop learning, but don’t just rely on others to teach you. Experiment and push the boundaries of what people say is possible and don’t just accept good enough. With time and perseverance, you will have this moment when you suddenly realize the people around you view you as the expert and come to you for guidance in your industry because of the dedication and experience you built.

2. Administration – One of the dangers of business or organizations in general is that a leader can be passionate about a topic, but knowing a ton about coffee doesn’t mean you can run a good coffee company. Every organization has a lot of not fun parts that are vital to its success – payroll, taxes, HR, bookkeeping, marketing, training, organizational policies and procedures, etc. When you are starting out, it seems like over half of the job is just doing these tasks. If you don’t have these skillsets though it will limit your growth and create a lot of headaches unless you either learn these skills, hire them out, or have a partner or close advisor that knows how to do these things and can assist in ensuring they are happening.

3. Leadership all about caring for people – With all the desire to focus on serving incredible coffee and creating impact – with all the pressing needs of running an organization – with all the tasks that pull every day, don’t forget that organizations are teams of people and effectively leading them shouldn’t come from a place of fear or treating them like robots, but a good leader cares and inspires. The people on your team have hopes, dreams, goals, and frustrations, just like you. As a leader in your organization, one of the primary goals needs to be helping your team win. Making your organization a place where your team can thrive and where they know you have their back. Sometimes, that even means spending time and money that you may rather spend in other ways, but your team sees that and it builds loyalty, care, and trust.

When you are a master of your craft, have an organization that operates properly, and are dedicated to leading your team in a manner that they know they can count on you to not just look our for your own best interests, but theirs as well, you have something really special – regardless of that being a coffee company, a different business or non-profit, etc.

How can folks who want to work with you connect?

A major part of our operation is coming along side other businesses and helping them succeed. That can be through general business coaching, coffee training, helping get them deals on equipment (or even free equipment), getting them set up with the coffees that suit their needs and, in many cases, even custom coffees labeled for their brand. If that is something anyone is interested in, feel free to reach out to me at [email protected]

Contact Info:

• Website: https://contrastcoffee.com
• Instagram: @contrastcoffee
• Facebook: https://fb.com/contrastcoffeeco