On Christmas Day, the Slades, family friends since childhood, invited my family to stop over for our annual holiday visit.

Gary Slade, who was a few years ahead of my sister and me in school, now lives with his lovely family in Madison, MS (near Jackson). Quite the entrepreneur, Gary, in 2001, launched Seattle Drip, a coffee drive-through business, which has grown from a single java joint to 13 in the Southeastern United States.

Recently, he schooled himself under a master roaster enabling him to add a micro-roasting operation. He now imports beans from more than a dozen countries from which he creates special blends and single origin coffees.

As a gift, Gary generously gave us a couple of bags of coffee and was especially interested to hear what I thought about the Ethiopian. Even before I visited their website and read their “The Smoothest Coffee on the Road” tag line, the overwhelming characteristic of this tasty coffee was its velvety smoothness about which I remarked to my parents. (Typically, I drink Starbucks decaf which I enjoy, but extraordinary smoothness is not necessarily one of its hallmarks. I think I’m just a sucker for the SB aesthetic, corporate culture, and overseas social consciousness.)

Stay linked to the Seattle Drip website for upcoming online purchasing opportunities, including a coffee club. In the meantime, if you or anyone you know is interested in a franchise or in fundraising opportunities, that information is currently available. And, certainly, if you live in or visit the Southeast, be sure to drive on through for a “drip” of some of the, well, smoothest coffee on the road.