The Dillanos Espresso Roasters (DCR) headquarters in Sumner, Washington. Courtesy photograph.

Longtime Seattle-area wholesale roasting firm Dillanos Espresso Roasters (DCR) just lately acquired the West Coast enterprise of Olympia, Washington-based Dancing Goats Espresso from earlier proprietor Kaldi’s Espresso. 

The acquisition will quickly end result within the revival of the Batdorf & Bronson Espresso Roasters model, which was folded into the Dancing Goats identify in 2022.

“We’re bringing again the Batdorf & Bronson model,” Dillanos Espresso Roasters Founder and Co-CEO David Morris advised DCN. “That model means loads to Olympians.” 

Larry and Cherie Challain based Dancing Goats as a single espresso store in Olympia, Washington, in 1988. In 1990, the couple acquired their wholesale espresso provider, Atlanta’s Batdorf & Bronson, based by Dick Batdorf & Shannon Bronson.

Over the next many years, Dancing Goats and Batdorf & Bronson operated as sibling manufacturers below the Challains’ possession, with roasteries and cafes in each the Atlanta and Olympia markets. 

A Batdorf & Bronson emblem from 2017.

St. Louis, Missouri-based Kaldi’s acquired Dancing Goats in 2023, and can proceed to personal and function Dancing Goats within the Atlanta space. In the meantime, Dillanos plans to sundown the Dancing Goats model within the PNW.

Kaldi’s and Dillanos haven’t disclosed the monetary phrases of the Olympia acquisition. 

Morris advised Day by day Espresso information that Dillanos will finally shut down Dancing Goats’ roasting operation in Olympia, consolidating it with Dillanos’ current roasting operations in Sumner. In the meantime, the Dancing Goats Olympia cafes will likely be rebranded below the Batdorf & Bronson identify. 

The tasting room on the Olympia roastery will stay tentatively open, whereas the Olympia farmers market cafe location will “definitely” stay open, Morris stated. A 3rd Dancing Goats Olympia retail cafe, downtown, is being evaluated, whereas the Bayview location is owned by a licensed accomplice and thus will stay open. 

For Morris, the revival of the Batdorf & Bronson identify is one thing of a full-circle second for specialty espresso in Olympia. 

“Once we had been simply stepping into roasting in 1992, and we had been visiting their roasting facility, I stated, ‘I wish to be like this some day,’” Morris stated. “We’ll proceed to function the precise blends they had been working earlier than as Batdorf & Bronson.”

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