The Heart of Carabello Coffee: Our Core Values
In January 2024, Carabello’s leadership team [pictured above: our leadership team as of November 2025] met for a partial day offsite to, among other things, establish core values for Carabello as a company. Carabello Coffee has always operated under a social contract for how we interact with each other as a team as well as how we interact with our customers. However, as our company has grown, we felt it was time to come up with a more defined set of core values that thoroughly represent us and can be woven into staff trainings and our daily work.
Before we explain how we incorporate our six core values into our regular work rhythms, here is our fleshed out list...take a look!
Carabello Coffee Core Values
We are teachable. We strive to be good at giving and receiving feedback. We are willing to say “I’m wrong.” We never want to be stuck in our ways. We are willing to learn from our wins and losses. We value training and education. We are willing to receive instruction from those in the company and from outside experts. We are always willing to learn more about coffee, people, and business.
We have integrity. Our “yes” means “yes.” When something is asked of us, we say “yes,” taking into consideration our ability to follow through. We are honest with our limitations. We are quick to speak up and admit our faults and mistakes, and we respond with a willingness to right our wrongs. We are willing to admit when we don’t have the answers. We are not afraid of, “I don’t know.”
We are innovative. We are forward thinkers and anticipators. We constantly look for ways to improve our systems and make things better. We don’t say, “Not my problem.” We tackle problems with creativity and thoughtfulness. We graciously accept our failures and leverage them to guide our future endeavors.
We are committed to excellence. We strive to source, roast, and serve exceptional coffee—that looks like committing ourselves to places and producers that grow exceptional coffee as well as educating ourselves to adequately showcase their coffees. We are excellent in customer service. We consistently seek to exceed customer expectations. We are committed to hiring and developing an exceptional staff.
We are others-oriented. We go above and beyond to create a lasting impression on those we serve. We are willing to set aside our own agenda and be patient in order to perceive the needs of others. We make allowances for each other’s faults and we willingly extend kindness and mercy. We handle our emotions in a responsible way that is considerate of others.
We are loyal. Our team has each other’s backs. We are devoted, consistent, and dependable. We are steadfast and long-suffering with each other. We are loyal to our customers. We focus on remembering customer names, and we are intentional to get to know them beyond their usual order.
Core Values in Practice
Twice a year, in the winter and summer, we close our café for Staff Day, a day where leadership, production, and café staff all get together for connection, updated training, and cleaning projects. Since solidifying our core values, we have started each staff day (that's the last 6 Staff Days) with an activity meant to activate our values.
On this most recent Staff Day (July 13, 2026), each employee was given a sugar cookie flower on a stick with one of the six core values written on the back. We each took a turn giving the flower to the person on our left and sharing with the whole group how we have seen that coworker demonstrate the core value on the back of the cookie. It was such a fun, meaningful (and delicious!) way to refresh our memories of what our values are AND how we see them playing out each day. This was actually the second time we used cookies for a core value activity (and, in the opinion of this author, cookies are the best way) and it was such a great way to start this Staff Day!
Besides cookies, we've done core value activations ranging from collages—where we each had to create an artistic piece around an assigned value—to having to find other employees in the room who fit certain characteristics. One thing that is consistent no matter which activity is chosen is that we take the time to share out loud how we see these values in each other—this is the part that truly helps these values become ingrained in us and trains us to look for them in our teammates.
Staff Days aren't the only times we bring our core values into practice. Recently, our Marketing Team had an offsite where we used our core values to help evaluate how well we feel we're doing in different marketing areas, whether we aligning with our values in these areas, and how we can use our values to inform decisions and improve processes.
Something you may not know is that at the beginning of each year, our full-time leadership team members have annual evaluations. These aren't your average evaluations! At the start of an evaluation—typically led by two of our three "chiefs", Justin Carabello, Emily Carabello, and COO, Emily Shinkle—each staff member is told the positive ways in which our chiefs have seen the core values reflected in each person's work throughout the past year. This is done before moving on to goal setting for the next year. These evaluations are such a positive way our top leader trio builds into the rest of us who lead at Carabello Coffee.
Last—or perhaps this should have been first as it really starts the employee's journey—when we hire new employees, not only do they receive training in things like coffee history and processing, register training, barista training, etc., but they learn our core values as well. We believe the best thing we can do to set up a new employee for success is to make sure they know Carabello Coffee's core values and how they hold our company culture together. It's our hope that you can see them too, whenever you you stop into our cafe, order online, talk to us on the phone, or choose to work with us as wholesale customers!