Black Rock Coffee Bar grew from a 160-square-foot Oregon stand to 200 company-run stores by selling two kinds of fuel: small-batch coffee and a brightly flavored energy drink that now supplies roughly a quarter of revenue. Its next test is whether a culture built at the drive-thru window can travel as fast as the real estate pipeline.
A bicycle trip supplied the romance. Voodoo Ranger supplied the scale. Thirty-five years after its basement debut, New Belgium is testing whether craft-beer values can survive national reach, restless consumers and a change of ownership.