Coffee and Wellness with Kerry Sachs

John C. Morgan, known on the show as JLD, introduces Kerry Sachs, co-founder of Puroast Coffee and developer of the company’s patented roasting process. He asks Sachs to share a belief about success that most people disagree with. Sachs answers that many aspiring entrepreneurs underestimate the level of commitment required. He describes entrepreneurship as exciting and rewarding but also “incredibly frightening,” arguing that people often have an insufficiently realistic idea of what success will demand. Sachs also says he does not measure his own success primarily by financial return. He believes success includes many other rewards, although he does not detail all of them in the opening exchange. JLD uses that answer to frame the episode as both a coffee discussion and an entrepreneurship lesson: Puroast, he says, attempted to create a leading solution to a real problem in a growing industry. He cites figures attributed to ChatGPT claiming that 66% of American adults drink coffee every day and 73% drink it at least once a week, making coffee a widespread product category for the conversation.

Sachs says the company began with an “aha moment” while he was working with coffee growers in South America. Coffee is widely valued for its caffeine, aroma, and flavor, but he argues that its potential health benefits have been overlooked. Historically, he says, coffee was considered a healthy beverage; the problem Puroast identified was that modern coffee roasting introduces substantial acidity. According to Sachs, green coffee is the seed of a fruit and is not acidic when it comes from the farm. Acidity is produced during roasting. He contrasts traditional roasting methods, preserved by growers in the Andes of western Venezuela, with modern, computerized roasting designed for speed, volume, and profit. In his account, the modern approach changed coffee from a traditionally healthy drink into a beverage with a major acidity problem. Puroast’s solution was therefore not to add ingredients or alter the coffee bean, but to use an older roasting craft that preserves the expected flavor, aroma, and caffeine while reducing the formation of acids.

Sachs explains that he originally went to South America to develop technology that would help farmers dry their crops using low-cost renewable energy, including waste fuels from the farms. He did not even drink coffee before beginning the project. While spending time on the farms and drinking the local coffee, he became curious about why it tasted so different and asked whether coffee roasting worked like brewing beer. The growers told him, jokingly, “No, not quite, Gringo.” When the crop-drying project failed to progress as he had hoped, Sachs focused more closely on the farmers’ roasting methods. He learned that the approach was not widely used because applying it at mass scale with conventional energy systems was too expensive. That led to the key combination: inexpensive, sustainable energy paired with the traditional roasting craft. Sachs and his collaborators spent several years developing a repeatable system that fused the two ideas. He says the company eventually reproduced the process and received a patent for it in the year of the interview. The path to market was difficult. Sachs says “every door” seemed to slam shut, and companies did not want to discuss low-acid coffee. He recalls Howard Schultz of Starbucks responding that selling low-acid coffee could make the rest of Starbucks’ coffee sound high-acid. Sachs says that concern ultimately proved understandable, because the industry generally roasts coffee in the same way.

After Puroast began selling coffee in California, customers started reporting that it was easier to drink. Some said they had ulcers or normally experienced heartburn after coffee and asked what Puroast was adding. Sachs says the company initially did not know why customers were describing that experience, but the repeated feedback persuaded them to investigate. They worked with the University of California, Davis, and convinced coffee chemist Dr. Shibamoto to study the product. Sachs says the researcher was surprised that roasting alone could alter the coffee’s pH and increase antioxidants while retaining 100% pure coffee and caffeine. A second study, according to Sachs, found that the way Puroast delivers heat during roasting converts compounds that would otherwise become acids into phenols or phenolic compounds. He explains that phenols are antioxidants, so the roasting system is designed to produce antioxidants instead of as much acid. The episode presents Puroast’s resulting claims as four times less acid—or, in the introduction and description, acid reduced by 70%—and five times more antioxidants than traditional coffee. Sachs attributes those differences to the roasting process rather than to additives. He says the method produces a smooth flavor and aroma while remaining pure coffee.

Sachs says the next challenge was turning the technical discovery into a consumer brand. He connected with his brother, James Sachs, and the two decided to “step off the cliff” and pursue the business. James brought practical expertise in getting a product onto shelves and into distribution, while they worked with artists to create a brand image that reflected the company’s origins. Sachs emphasizes that neither brother had prior experience in coffee, sales, or the broader consumer-products business, so they learned through trial and error. Persistence was reinforced by customer responses. Sachs recalls people telling the company that they had stopped drinking coffee because of discomfort but could drink it again after trying Puroast. Those messages, he says, sustained the team through difficult periods. The company also had to find ways to generate revenue and operate efficiently while managing multiple functions: technology, research and development, a manufacturing facility, branding, sales, and distribution. JLD presents this as a broader entrepreneurial lesson: innovation is not enough by itself. A founder must build the systems and commercial organization that allow the innovation to reach customers. Sachs agrees that the company’s continued progress depended on combining the technology with persistence, customer impact, and practical business execution.

Looking ahead, Sachs argues that Puroast’s roasting method could become a preferred approach as consumers pay more attention to health, wellness, and functional foods. He calls the roasting issue a “dirty little secret” of the coffee industry because people often discuss bean origin and other qualities without discussing how roasting affects the final chemistry. Since most producers use similar roasting methods, he says the industry has not focused enough on the consequences of the process. Sachs believes Puroast has a significant opportunity because its technology produces the lower-acid, higher-antioxidant coffee commercially rather than merely proposing it in theory. He describes coffee as a massive industry and says owning a process that is necessary to produce the company’s particular product gives Puroast a basis for future growth. His call to action is for listeners to try the coffee and compare how they feel after drinking it. He also warns people to investigate health claims in an era of online misinformation. Sachs says Puroast is not the only brand making low-acid claims, so consumers should examine how each company conducted its research and how its product is made. He closes with a demonstration from a grower: chewing a green coffee bean was like chewing a dried pea, while chewing the same bean after special roasting produced an immediate sensory burst. Sachs says the lesson was simple—“roasting matters.”