Business Profile: Bear Mountain Coffee Roasters, Mahopac

The only thing that gets most people out of bed in the morning is the sweet aroma of coffee soon to be sipped as another workday approaches. For Jonathan Baratz, owner of Bear Mountain Coffee Roasters, his job is to help others prepare to take on everyday stresses with a quality cup of joe.

He’s the coffee roaster radio stations, film centers, and countless individuals, including celebrities, turn to in order to ensure they start their day starts right.

In business for almost a decade, Baratz, a Yorktown Heights resident, has been supplying the universally known pick-me-up throughout the Lower Hudson Valley and beyond. In Mahopac for the past two years, get within the vicinity of Baratz’s roasting warehouse and a strong aroma of coffee begins to fill the air. Come inside and it’s a coffee lover’s dream with coffee beans roasting non-stop and bags of supplies scattered between a basketball hoop and drum set that fit in perfectly with the high ceiling.

Noting he has a “diverse customer base” packages come in either 12-ounce bags for individual customers or five pound bags for other businesses. Just recently, Baratz started selling organic coffee.

“To us, the person that enjoys it and they keep on coming back and purchasing our coffee and giving us compliments all the time,” Baratz said. “That’s really what makes this worth it.”

Bear Mountain’s reach is local and also national. Well-known establishments like The Freight House Café in Mahopac purchases its coffee from Bear Mountain while there are international celebrities like Martha Stewart in which Bear Mountain is a coffee roaster for one of her products, according to article on Daily Coffee Magazine.

Evidence of Bear Mountain’s popularity can be traced to the fact Baratz hasn’t had to make a sales pitch in more than two years, with notoriety all word of mouth and customers seeking Bear Mountain out.

Baratz’s mantra is sales comes when somebody wants the product.

“I’m not a salesman,” Baratz said. “I don’t like to go out there and sell. When I do demos, I don’t want them to buy the coffee, I want them to try it, enjoy and then if they want to, they can buy the coffee.”

Baratz’s career path has been a winding one. He opened up an ice cream parlor in Florida in the 1980s before moving back to New York. Then years later, he worked seven years in telecommunications and then ten years in commercial real estate.

“I didn’t want to die at the desk if you will,” he said.

Coming to Mahopac from all over the word includes coffee beans from countries like Columbia, Kenya, Brazil, Ethiopia, and India, to name a few. The color and shades of the beans can vary depending on the country or region in which they come from, Baratz said.

Baratz pointed out there are many healthy benefits to coffee, acknowledging that he has at least one cup a day in the morning. And of course, he strictly only consumes his own brand.

“Dunkin Donuts is a definite no-no,” Baratz said.

While the success of Bear Mountain Roasters can’t be denied, Baratz isn’t resting on his laurels. He is pushing a new brand called Wicked Good Tea and plans on opening up his warehouse to the general public once a week beginning in September.

“Most people have never met a coffee roaster before,” Baratz said. “You met a lot of accountants, met lawyers, you met doctors, but you don’t meet many coffee roasters that can talk coffee, which people drink every day.”

 Bear Mountain Coffee Roasters is located at 100 Bucks Hollow Road in Mahopac and its phone number is 914-960-4455.

David Propper