The article first appeared in The NDTV on February 08, 2024
Suman Das, 34, grew up in West Bengal’s Rasan village, drinking chai in mud cups with his younger brother Subham and his family of six, including the parents. “Chai was our national drink,” he says, smiling. Now, as a lead roaster at Blue Tokai, one of India’s fastest-growing and biggest specialty coffee companies, Suman drinks 30-40 cups of coffee every day. As a roaster, sipping coffee and trying different varieties of what others may like drinking is part of the job. “Coffee kya hai ye mujhe Blue Tokai mein aake samajh aaya (I learned what true coffee is here at Blue Tokai),” he says. Before joining Blue Tokai over a decade ago, Das ran errands at an advertising agency in Delhi.