Redemption Roasters: The Coffee Shops That Train and Hire Inmates

Can a restaurant become more than just a business, but a true social work aimed at improving people's lives? In some cases, yes, when visionary entrepreneurs decide to give life to a project that is much more than a place to eat or drink. Today we want to tell you about Redemption Roasters, a prime example of one of these cases.

Starting as a single location, then expanding to 13 different locations across London, it’s a specialty coffee shop: here you can find seasonal specialty coffees, cakes and tasty brunches, but that’s not what makes the place unique. Its specialty is that the staff are ex-offenders who have been specially trained to work during their time in prison, so they have the skills needed to find safe and meaningful employment.

Not only does the Redemption Roasters project provide employment in its coffee shops, it also helps ex-offenders find work in the coffee industry at large, providing them with an opportunity to successfully reintegrate into society and working to reduce relapse into bad behavior.

What is Redemption Roasters' Project and How Does It Work?

The work of the Redemption Roasters project begins while the inmates are still in prison: right here, those who are interested are trained in the art of coffee, starting from roasting to the creation of an espresso, also passing through more artistic techniques such as Latte Art.

The inmate is provided with a complete training in the world of coffee and then, precisely with a view to promoting their reintegration into society, ex-inmates can be hired at Redemption Roasters coffee shops or look for work in other companies, thanks to the 360-degree training received in the world of coffee.

In this way, they try to avoid recidivism, that is, the relapse into crime of those who have been released from prison. And from what the founders of Redemption Roasters have declared, it seems that this idea is a winning one: according to the numbers of the 2023 annual budget, the company has directly hired 30 employees, 195 people have completed training in the world of coffee and the recidivism of these cases has dropped to 4% out of a percentage that, in the United Kingdom, is around 42% in the space of a year.

The mission of Redemption Roasters coffee shops does not stop at the English company but goes well beyond: to remain consistent with its mission, in fact, the brand uses coffee suppliers from producers who work in particular conditions, for example companies that are located in countries where there are active conflicts. Furthermore, there is a particular attention to the sustainability of producers and to the support of female entrepreneurship.

Redemption Roasters has also launched an online shop to buy the coffee roasted in prison, giving the project the chance to expand well beyond the UK. Redemption Roasters inmates already in prison can learn skills that will help them rebuild their lives once they leave.

The Birth of the Redemption Roasters Project

The idea for the Redemption Roasters project was born from a college meeting between the two future founders of the eponymous coffee shop, Max Dubiel and Ted Rosner. In 2008, in the prestigious corridors of St Andrew's University (the same one where Prince William and Kate Middleton enrolled and met, to be clear) the two met by chance and became friends.

When Max becomes passionate about the world of coffee, Ted decides to follow him and together they open a brand of coffee shops called Catimor. After a few years, in 2016 to be precise, the boys are contacted by the Ministry of Justice regarding the possibility of starting a roasting project for prisoners with the intent of decreasing the rate of recidivism once they get out of prison.

Here Redemption Roasters was officially born and in 2017 the first barista graduated after training in prison, who officially joined the work team of the brand's first coffee shop, opened in London in Lamb's Conduit Street. The project was so successful that in the following years a real academy for baristas was born, the training course was extended to various prisons where hundreds of people completed the course and the original coffee shop became a real chain that, to date, has 13 locations throughout London.