Roaster of the Year: Micro Category Winner 2025 — Dear Green
By Emily Puro
For Lisa Lawson, Dear Green—Roast’s 2025 Micro Roaster of the Year—is a labor of love, a tangible expression of her own core values.
“When you start a business,” says Lawson, who founded the company in 2011, “you don’t know you have a mission, or you should have, and it’s just when someone asks you, you realize what it is. From the early days, it’s just your personal values that you bring to the business.”
Those values, and thus the company mission, fall into three broad categories: People. Planet. Product. And as the company has grown, Dear Green has not only stayed true to those values, it has blossomed into a powerful force for social and environmental good as well as a pioneering champion for specialty coffee in its hometown of Glasgow, Scotland, and beyond.
Dear Green roastery in Glasgow, Scotland.
PEOPLE
“When I started, I knew I didn’t want any staff feeling exploited,” Lawson says. “That was a big one for me, to make sure people are treated well. People in our supply chain. The team. All of our stakeholders. Our community. Our customers.”
Three U.K.-based programs help Lawson ensure that Dear Green staff feel valued and secure. “We have never hired anyone to work on less than the Real Living Wage,” she says, “and are also proudly accredited for Living Hours and Living Pension.” Real Living Wage is a minimum hourly rate calculated by the U.K.'s Living Wage Foundation based on average living costs and the income required to cover them. Living Hours prescribes a minimum number of hours for each employee, as well as an employment contract and a minimum notice period for schedule changes. Living Pension is a calculation of how much the company should contribute toward a pension to cover costs after an employee retires.
“It’s not just our full-timers who are respected by being paid the Real Living Wage as a minimum,” Lawson says, “but our full team benefits from basic courtesies of at least a four-week notice period for shifts, a right to a contract that reflects accurate hours worked, and a guaranteed minimum of 16 hours per week.” In addition, salaries are reviewed annually against industry benchmarks.
Other employee benefits include a profit-sharing program that distributes 10 percent of net profits quarterly when individual and team key performance indicators are met; paid annual leave that includes the employee’s birthday and a day for winter holiday shopping; paid volunteer hours; a monthly allowance for personal development; interest-free loans for employees to upgrade personal technology devices and bicycles for commuting; team-building events; and free coffee for team members as well as discounts for friends and family.
Lisa Lawson, founder of Dear Green (left) with Ruairì, roastery assistant; Stine, project manager; Sarah, account manager; and Kenan, production roaster.
Lawson is committed to investing in her employees and providing opportunities for growth and professional development. Dear Green’s head of roasting and production, Anna Plain, began as a roastery assistant packing coffee. Nearly three years ago, when a roasting position opened, Plain asked for the opportunity to step into the role, even though she had no professional roasting experience. Lawson agreed—and has no regrets. “She had the sensibility to do it straight away,” Lawson says. “I just knew she was great to invest in.”
“After settling in at Dear Green as a roastery assistant, I jumped at the chance of doing some production roasting, and I loved it,” says Plain. “There was something about the curves and the numbers that just worked for my brain, and I found the flow of the whole process really satisfying.”
Looking beyond employees, Dear Green supports communities at home and at origin. Through its charitable giving programs, the company donates 1 percent of profits to environmental causes and an additional 1 percent to social causes. Local projects include community gardens, community cycling projects and forest biodiversity programs. Projects at origin are typically farmer-led. “This year, we started supporting a coffee seedling project in Uganda for the farmers we buy our coffee from,” says Lawson. “We are aiming to establish a long-term connection with this project and to directly give money to farmers to support their projects.”
Kenan Kiziloz, production roaster.
In addition, as a coffee roasting company in a traditionally tea-drinking country, Dear Green has focused a great deal on educating customers about specialty coffee. The company invites wholesale customers to the roastery for barista and sensory training, and staff host cuppings and other events as often as practical in support of Dear Green's rural customers on the remote Scottish Isles of Arran, Bute, Harris, Orkney and Skye. The increase of in-home brewing during covid-19 also increased the popularity of Dear Green’s latte art and barista master classes, and the team offers public tours and a cupping experience at the roastery as well. To support young people—and the future of specialty coffee in Scotland—Dear Green works with barista training programs in public schools and with occupational training programs in Glasgow, providing a trainer, the use of the roastery, and a scholarship for students in need.
Lawson is proud of the fact that Dear Green is currently a woman-owned and women-led business. And even though the company uses a blind application process—the hiring team can’t tell a candidate’s gender or racial background from their application—the leadership team is entirely female. Lawson hopes Dear Green’s success might inspire other women to see themselves in leadership roles in the industry.
At Dear Green, staff training begins with the basics of working in a roastery.
PLANET
In 2020, Dear Green earned B Corp certification, a stringent third-party certification that measures a company’s social and environmental performance, supply chain transparency and more. As part of the company’s participation in the program, Dear Green has committed to becoming net zero by 2030. Lawson hired a sustainability coordinator, Martha Bytof, to ensure the company’s measurements are accurate and its efforts are as impactful as possible.
Both Lawson and Bytof are adamant about avoiding greenwashing and ensuring the company’s efforts result in measurable and meaningful reductions. To that end, they are careful to make the distinction between carbon neutral, which can include purchasing carbon offsets to reduce a company’s calculated carbon footprint, and net zero, which focuses on truly reducing emissions. “That’s basically buying your way out of a situation in a really lazy way,” says Lawson of carbon offsetting. “Ultimately, we need to all reduce, or we’re not making any difference to the world.”
“Net zero has a clearer mission of reducing emissions first,” agrees Bytof, “and carbon neutrality has been used by a lot of larger businesses as an excuse to continue business as usual and offset emissions but does not demonstrate actual change.”
To set a baseline for Dear Green’s emissions and highlight the areas where the company can make the biggest impact, Bytof—who has training from the Institute of Environmental Management and Assessment, and CDP (formerly “Carbon Disclosure Project”)—calculated the company’s carbon footprint in 2023. Using the greenhouse gas protocol, she included direct emissions from company operations (known as Scope 1 emissions), as well as indirect emissions from purchased power (Scope 2) and indirect emissions that occur across the supply chain and are outside the company’s direct control (Scope 3).
“Our plans include taking our recorded baseline year and building a reduction strategy to reduce emissions and calculate the carbon footprint annually going forward,” Bytof explains. “Our second year of calculating has not been published yet but has been calculated. This helped our reduction strategy to develop intensity targets and a carbon budget for business travel for origin trips.”
Dear Green's packaging is 100 percent home compostable.
Waste reduction is one area where the company sees potential for immediate action, working to increase recycling from 73 percent of all waste, where it is currently, to 80 percent. Since the beginning, Lawson has sold used coffee sacks for £1, with all proceeds donated to Girls Gotta Run, a nonprofit in Ethiopia focused on empowering women and girls. “We find a way to repurpose everything we possibly can,” she says. “That also comes back to personal values. … I don’t chuck anything out. I hate the thought of putting anything in the landfill.”
Dear Green has invested in electric vehicles and has an efficient driving policy for business travel, deliveries and commuting. Other actions now underway involve monitoring gas usage and cooling time during roasting to improve efficiency and reduce emissions; supplying coffee to wholesale clients in reusable tubs; increasing organic coffee offerings; delivering coffee by bicycle within the city center; reducing packaging; and making packaging more environmentally friendly.
“We are one of the few coffee roasters who have 100 percent certified home compostable packaging,” says Bytof. The packaging is plant-based rather than petroleum-based, she adds, “which we believe is a step closer to moving away from fossil fuels.” And while home composting options are limited in the Glasgow area, the packaging will decompose even if it’s put into general waste.
“We have ensured that all of our packaging is certified to the highest standards in order for us to have due diligence around this choice,” says Lawson. “The next step for us is to find a more local manufacturer.”
While reducing direct emissions is the main focus for Dear Green’s initial efforts toward achieving net zero, the company is also working to ensure that all of its suppliers are committed to reducing their emissions, and every supplier is required to sign an agreement to verify that commitment.
“It is a lot of work, and it feels like we are still at the beginning of it,” Bytof says. “The B Corp assessment was a huge motivation, looking at how many suppliers are women-owned, for example. We started with our top five suppliers, and then top 20, top 30, working our way down to see our suppliers’ commitment to sustainability and the ambition to become net zero and report emissions data. Without our suppliers, we will not be able to reach net zero ourselves. They are part of our supply chain and usually where the largest emissions lie.”
“We also prioritize supporting local businesses where possible,” adds Lawson, “which is good for our local economy as well as the carbon emitted in the journey to our roastery.”
In recognition of its comprehensive sustainability efforts, Dear Green has received numerous environmental awards, including the Glasgow Business Net Zero Award; the Scottish Women in Business Net Zero Award; a Best Small Business Commendation from the Scottish Environmental Protection Agency Vibes Awards; and The Scotsman Scran Awards Sustainability Award.
Dear Green is dedicated to empowering employees with opportunities for growth and career development.
PRODUCT
“My background is in hospitality, and I’ve always been obsessed by flavor,” says Lawson, whose previous work included stints as a chef, bartender, server and wine sales rep. Her introduction to coffee came in 2000, when she got a job at a small roastery while traveling in Australia. “It was a very accidental route,” she says. “It was just to get a job rather than to really pursue coffee.” As fortune would have it, that small roastery was Toby’s Estate, and Lawson was among its first employees. As the company grew, she had the opportunity to learn about all aspects of the business, including roasting.
Once back in the U.K., Lawson was working in wine sales when a client told her he had purchased a coffee roaster, and she offered to quit her job to roast for him. “After a wee while,” she says, “I realized I could do this for myself.” In 2011, she bought a second-hand Probat L12 roaster, and Dear Green—a nod to an affectionate nickname for Glasgow, The Dear Green Place—was born.
Since the beginning, Dear Green has focused on high-quality specialty coffee, ethically sourced from smallholder farmers and fully traceable through transparent supply chains. As the staff has grown, training has become a priority to ensure the company’s coffee quality remains high.
Staff training begins with the basics of working in a roastery, including food safety and employee health and safety. In addition, every employee has access to the Barista Hustle education platform, with time allocated to go through the modules at their own pace. Employees can also request to attend other online or in-person courses to support their professional development.
An Authorized Specialty Coffee Association (SCA) Trainer for sensory and barista skills as well as a Q Grader, Lawson leads a sensory foundation class with every new staff member. The roasting team cups coffee together every week following strict Q protocols, and Lawson, Plain and others often lead sensory trainings such as triangulation, Nez du Café and more. Lawson has also invited industry leaders to present educational sessions, such as Dr. Fabiana Carvalho—a neuroscientist and psychologist who researches how we perceive the sights, smells, sounds and tastes associated with coffee—who led a coffee sensorium weekend with the team.
“Before Dear Green, I was a barista with a passion for specialty coffee, but I had no roastery experience,” says Plain. “Coming here, I was fully immersed not only in the day-to-day working of a roastery— learning by experience and from those around me— but I was introduced to the wider world of the specialty coffee industry.”
An early adopter of Cropster, the company prides itself on investing in the latest roasting equipment and innovations. The team follows a comprehensive quality control process and often consults with fellow roasters to make sure Dear Green is staying up to date with industry best practices. Staff attend as many industry events as possible and foster a culture of learning by sharing articles and research regularly.
Plain takes the role of roaster seriously and understands the responsibility it entails. “I look at it as one step in a super long chain of processes,” she says. “Endless amounts of work have gone in at origin, and by exporters and importers, to get these beans to us at the quality they are. I get to carry out the next step, the roasting, to unlock the coffee’s full potential before it goes to the consumer.”
In addition to B Corp certification, Dear Green has earned Safe and Local Supplier Approval (SALSA), a U.K.-based food safety certification. Third-party verifications such as these are important to Dear Green to ensure any statements the company makes related to the quality of its products and its social and environmental impacts are accurate and can be supported. “When you are a small business,” says Lawson, “you are trying to find the best way to do things all of the time, and a way to have procedures in place and make statements with integrity, so that you are not just using the latest hashtag to explain what you are achieving.”
ELEVATING SPECIALTY COFFEE IN THE U.K.
Promoting exceptional specialty coffee is important to Lawson, and she has made it a priority to nurture the industry locally and throughout the U.K. One of the most impressive ways she’s done that is by creating and hosting the annual Glasgow Coffee Festival (GCF), which she proudly describes as “the only Scottish coffee festival and one of the most well-established coffee community events in the U.K.”
“We believe that this might be the most sustainable coffee festival in the world,” adds Bytof. (The impact report for the festival, which includes its carbon footprint, is available at glasgowcoffeefestival.com/sustainability.) Perhaps most impressive is the fact that the festival has operated without single-use cups since 2018. While that first year was “tricky,” Lawson says, “the next year we could see a culture shift, and now … it’s just known, if you’re coming to the festival, you have to bring your own cup.”
In addition to that remarkable feat, GCF has worked with a recycling company to compost coffee waste and keep other waste out of the landfill. Panel discussions and workshops often focus on environmental and social justice issues, like a talk Bytof hosted on climate justice for smallholder coffee farmers at GCF 2024.
Since debuting in 2014, GCF has grown from a one-day event hosting mostly local exhibitors and visitors to a two-day event, broken into four half-day sessions to maximize capacity, with exhibitors and visitors from throughout the U.K. and beyond. It takes a huge amount of time and effort to organize, but “we don’t really stop to think about it like that because it’s a labor of love,” says Lawson. “It is a lot of work. It’s extremely distracting. But the outcomes are great. You’re bringing the entire Scottish coffee community together. We bring people from all over the world here now. We have espresso machine manufacturers, importers, exporters, coffee farmers, the entire spectrum of anyone who’s in coffee in the U.K. comes to the Glasgow Coffee Festival, and it’s growing and growing.”
In 2024, the festival hosted the first national competition for Scottish roasters, called Roast Hero, with Plain taking second place. (She also placed sixth in the U.K. Coffee Roasting Championships in 2023.) In 2025, GCF will host the U.K. finals of the Cup Tasters Championship, and Dear Green’s roastery assistant, Alexander Anderson, hopes to qualify after the preliminary heat in 2024.
But GCF isn’t the only way Lawson and Dear Green support the greater coffee community. She participated on the working committee to establish the Coffee Roasters Guild of Europe and helped establish and has co-hosted the U.K. Coffee Roasting Championship. She also helped establish the Scottish AeroPress Championship and hosted it in 2014 and 2015, and Dear Green has hosted U.K. Barista Championship heats, U.K. Cup Tasters Championship heats and the U.K. Brewers Cup Championship final.
In 2018, Lawson worked with the Coffee Roasters Guild and the SCA U.K. chapter to create and host First Craic, an event bringing U.K. coffee roasters together for a roasting demonstration, cupping and panel discussion, and to announce the winner of the U.K. Coffee Roasting Championship. She also invited the Indy Coffee Guide team to Scotland and encouraged them to create The Scottish Independent Coffee Guide, which highlights independent coffee shops and roasters in the country. “It was the first of its kind and a great resource,” she says. “Salt Media have since published several updates.”
When Dear Green applied for B Corp recertification in 2024, the team was encouraged to find its scores had increased since initial certification. “That’s what it’s all about,” says Lawson, “and a lot of it we’ve done it without realizing. It’s just constantly trying to find better ways to do everything.”
As Plain puts it, “Dear Green has a big heart. We really genuinely care. That includes caring for the team who work here, the producers at origin, the environment, the quality of the product, the knowledge we can share, the way we can support causes and charities, the coffee community—the list goes on. Our impact is always at the forefront of everything we do, and we strive to do everything in the best way possible.”
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Emily Puro is a freelance writer and editor living in Portland, Oregon. In addition to Roast, her articles and essays have appeared in Writer’s Digest, Better Homes and Gardens, Portland Monthly, The Oregonian and numerous other publications. She enjoys learning about the art and science of coffee, as well as the social and environmental impacts of the industry, and she continues to be amazed by those devoting their lives to this work.
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