Supporting our brilliant
community
We are located in the small rural Highland town of Aberfeldy, and supporting and strengthening our local community is an important part of our ethos.
Our roastery cafe is open all year round, providing a hub for meetings and conversation even in the depths of winter. We also host local groups, classes, and events for the benefit of locals and visitors alike.
COFFEE ACADEMY
Set up in partnership with our sister charity Project Northern Lights, the Coffee Academy seeks to mentor young people in rural Scotland through a three-month mentoring programme that includes learning about speciality coffee, barista skills and work placements in cafes.
The programme has been running successfully for three years now and includes a certificate in speciality coffee from Glen Lyon Coffee Roasters for all students who complete the programme.
For many young people in rural areas such as Perthshire a cafe job is the first working experience they gain, and jobs for school leavers can be scarce.
This makes the Coffee Academy even more important as it gives participants an extra edge with proven coffee and customer service skills and real-world experience.
REPAIR CAFÉ
We host a monthly community Repair Café which is run by dedicated volunteers who fix and mend everything from toy cars to electronics and furniture for free.
Part of a global movement with over 2,500 groups worldwide, the goal of the Repair Café is to teach valuable and empowering repair skills and ultimately to help fight the climate crisis by saving broken items from landfill.
Taking place on the third Saturday of each month at Glen Lyon Coffee’s roastery, the Aberfeldy Repair Café is also a place to meet and chat (and drink coffee!) with like-minded individuals who share a passion for local solutions to global problems.
THINK GLOBAL, SOURCE LOCAL
One aspect of the B Corp certification revolves around how a business contributes to the economic and social well-being of the communities in which they operate. As a small highland business we understand the impact that buying locally can have, and so we source as much as possible from local suppliers (with the obvious exception of coffee!).
This includes all of our perishable goods such as milk, tea and pastries, as well as all of our ongoing joinery, plumbing and electrical works at the Roastery.
Additionally, we love to collaborate with local artists and artisans to highlight and enhance the amazing talents all around us in Scotland.
In the past we’ve teamed up with Wasted Degrees, a local brewery, to create a coffee stout, and worked with forager and chocolate maker Charlotte Flower to produce delicious coffee-infused chocolates.
We’re always on the lookout for our next collaboration!
TALKS, WALKS & EVENTS
Aberfeldy and the surrounding area is home to some incredible people who have accumulated several lifetime’s worth of experience, expertise and enthusiasm. We want to share their wisdom and insight with a wider audience, so we host talks, workshops and guided walks to help enrich and enlighten our community.
So far we have hosted writers, storytellers, wild swimmers, chocolatiers and even a competitive whitewater slalom athlete, with many more to come.
We also host Live at the Roastery, an ongoing series of concerts with renowned musicians and songwriters in the intimate surroundings of our atmospheric roastery.