Our Story
“There’s Nothing Like a Good Cup of Coffee!”
The day I first heard those words, I had no idea what my friend was talking about. But that was many years ago.
Eileen’s love for coffee began one day in the 80′s when her production manager suggested that a “shot in the dark” might get them to their deadlines. Starbucks was coming on strong in the Northwest, and over the next thirteen years as Editor-in-Chief of a large West Coast publishing house, the rich brew got her through many deadlines.
Meanwhile in Chattanooga, Tennessee, Evelyn was leaving the pressures of her high profile administrative job for a vacation in France. During her days there, she tasted “real” coffee for the first time. At a B&B in Paris her first sips of a cafe au lait convinced her that most Americans had never really tasted a good cup of coffee. After seventeen years in administration she also realized the time was coming for a new challenge.
The paths of the two women converged in 1994, when Eileen and Evelyn found themselves on a trip to Israel as a result of a recently published work for Precept Ministries. There, a dream was born to see others experience the Holy Land in a new and more intimate way and they returned to form The Israel Tour Company. Over the next six years, Mason and Wheeler built an exciting and successful organization, offering customized tours to Israel, Jordan, and the Mediterranean Region. Then, after 9/11 the tour business slowed. With the hope of someday returning to the travel industry, the entrepreneurial team turned their attention to another dream — to offer the European experience of artisan-roasted coffee and the European coffeehouse to the renaissance city of Chattanooga.
In 2002, they began roasting specialty coffee under the tutelage of an Oregon Roastmaster. The Chattanooga Coffee Company and Chattz Coffeehouse officially opened on September 11, 2002. Today, almost eight years later, the roasting company continues to embrace time-honored roasting methods and emphasize the importance of superior customer service.
The original opening of Chattz was chosen to pay tribute to the lives lost on that day and to honor the American Spirit that rebuilds and begins again.