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Dhaka · Bangladesh

North End Coffee Roasters

Since 2011 · Rick Hubbard, Chris Hubbard

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Overview

North End Coffee Roasters was founded in Dhaka in 2011 by American expats Rick Hubbard — a former Starbucks Coffee Master — and his wife Chris, opening their first cafe and roastery on Pragati Sarani in Shahjadpur near the US embassy. Fifteen years on, North End operates fourteen Dhaka cafes and a Ukhiya outpost, roasts roughly six tonnes of imported and domestic Arabica per month, and is widely credited as the operation that introduced specialty coffee to Bangladesh.

Known for

  • Founded 2011 by Rick Hubbard (former Starbucks Coffee Master) and his wife Chris
  • First specialty cafe-roastery in Bangladesh — Pragati Sarani, Shahjadpur, Dhaka
  • 14 Dhaka locations plus 1 in Ukhiya as of 2025
  • Roasts ~6 tonnes per month, all Arabica, sourced from Singapore, Brazil and Bangladesh
  • Buys nearly all the coffee grown in Bangladesh — mostly Bandarban in the Chittagong Hill Tracts

Why it matters

Bangladesh is not on most maps of producer countries, and before North End there was no commercial specialty coffee roaster in Dhaka and almost no domestic market for the small amount of Arabica grown in the Chittagong Hill Tracts. Founder Rick Hubbard's parallel work — collaborating with the FAO and local NGOs to train CHT farmers, and buying their underripe early lots at a loss for years to keep them growing — is the reason commercial coffee farming exists in Bangladesh at all.

Production

destoning
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head roaster
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color sorting
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roaster machine
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filter equipment
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cupping frequency
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roastery location
Dhaka, Bangladesh
espresso equipment
Nuova Simonelli and VBM espresso machines
annual volume tonnes
72

Café

Pragati Sarani, Shahjadpur, Dhaka (original branch)

Recognitions

  • Pioneer of Bangladesh's specialty coffee sector

Sources

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