Red Bay Coffee Headquarters & Cafe
Permanently Closed
Airy cafe & roaster: unique lattes, pastries, community events
Airy cafe & roaster: unique lattes, pastries, community events
"Red Bay Coffee in Oakland is one of our favorite spots to hit up for fantastic coffee - and they just opened a brand new café in Fruitvale. Stop by to check out the airy, three-story space (it used to be a bank) and grab a cappuccino or a charcoal latte, which you can enjoy inside or take to go." - julia chen 1
"On a busy corner of Fruitvale sits the headquarters of Red Bay Coffee, Oakland’s Black-owned coffee company with a social justice ethos. The space is open, airy, and industrial, with lots of places to sit and work. On weekends, it often transforms into a lively community events space. Go for unique offerings like the charcoal or candied yam lattes." - Dianne de Guzman
"Red Bay Coffee in Oakland is one of our favorite spots to hit up for fantastic coffee - and they just opened a brand new café in Fruitvale. Stop by to check out the airy, three-story space (it used to be a bank) and grab a cappuccino or a charcoal latte, which you can enjoy inside or take to go. We haven’t been here yet, but want you to know this spot exists." - Team Infatuation
"Housed in a towering three-story former bank that was gutted by fire in 2014, this 11,000-square-foot space was intentionally chosen to bring specialty coffee and community programming to East Oakland: it features a sleek coffee bar with a Sanremo machine tuned for three distinct espressos, a plum-colored linoleum counter inspired by Copenhagen cafes, a hand-built pourover station, and room to serve full meals and warm baked goods. I appreciated how the design—bright, open, full of ferns and hanging plants, long windows and abundant outlets—prioritizes comfort (even offering cappuccinos in ceramic cups after a long pandemic of paper cups) and accessibility rather than exclusivity; the crown of the pillared building even bears Red Bay’s motto, “Beautiful Coffee To The People.” The cafe will host panels, workshops, filmed video content, visiting-chef pop-ups and music (opening festivities included Chinese lion dancers, a mariachi band and the Afro-Brazilian troupe SambaFunk!), and will develop an on-site food program that includes African-inspired savory hand pies; regular hours are 7:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m., seven days a week." - Elazar Sontag
"As one of the country’s few black-owned specialty coffee companies, Red Bay Coffee Roasters is moving into a major new headquarters in Fruitvale — a stately former bank at 3136 International Boulevard just around the corner from its existing Public Roastery production and coffee bar space and not far from where founder and CEO Keba Konte launched Red Bay out of his Fruitvale home in 2014. The three-story, 11,000-square-foot building, constructed in 1930, will include a cupping lab for coffee tasting, a design studio for the growing team, and the bank vault repurposed into “a space for community story exchange.” In its five years the company has pushed its mission to promote inclusion and diversity in specialty coffee, expanded to several locations (including a new roasting operation in San Francisco inside bagel bakery and creamery Daily Driver), and even serves as the primary coffee supplier for Facebook’s Menlo Park headquarters. Keba Konte said he’s excited to expand in the neighborhood and partner with mission-driven companies and sustainable farmers, and today local artist Angel Chavez spent the day painting a sign reading “Beautiful Coffee To The People” across the building while comedian Hannibal Buress posed with Konte in front of the new HQ." - Caleb Pershan
