The people behind the pour.
A Chicago family story, built one roast at a time since 1985.
Rhonda Stivers
A native Chicagoan, Rhonda fell for coffee as an international flight attendant, visiting coffee shops around the world. In 1976 she bought her first espresso machine. It was bright red.
After years of travel through Europe researching the craft, she and Greg Stivers opened Color Me Coffee in Lake View in 1985. Rhonda later took the brand to McCormick Place, Navy Pier and the Chicago Riverwalk. In 2025 she bought the company back and returned to roasting, and within months Color Me Coffee became the sole coffee supplier to the Obama Presidential Center.
“No one was roasting in Chicago, so we took a leap of faith.”
I have bigger aspirations, bigger dreams to go with coffee. This is definitely a great stepping stone to get there.
Built together, roasted with care.
Greg Stivers
Greg co-founded Color Me Coffee in 1985 and went on to build Stivers Coffee into a wholesale roaster supplying cafés, ice cream shops and colleges across Chicago.
Kavia Simmons
Kavia learned the craft from Greg and runs the roastery today. She also founded her own brand, I Love My Coffee Black, with beans roasted in-house.