Sunergos is a company born out of a thorough appreciation of great coffee, creative reflection, and simple community.

We derive our name from the Greek word sunergos used in the First Century to refer to relational, collaborative service. We continue to trace the sunergos theme throughout the development and operation of our company. 

OUR LOGO AND EARLY YEARS

Here is the story of how our logo was created as told by Sunergos Cofounder Brian Miller:

“Initially, the image that we associate with our coffee was not intended as a logo. It began as a quick sketch in the pages of my college notebook. As I was doodling, I was thinking about how wonderful it is when there is peace between creatures, especially when the creatures are defined by such vast differences.  Originally, it was a mouse on the back of a bird, perched on the shell of a tortoise, resting on the back of an elephant.

The image may have stopped there had my wife not seen it as I drew and asked me to make it for her.  It came to symbolize for us peace between creatures and represent the attitudes and inner posture experienced in that peace, like gentleness, humility and trust, out of which we work together.  Later that year I set out to make a clay sculpture for her as a Christmas gift (2001). While sculpting I decided to turn the mouse and the bird into a rabbit. She liked it. 

The following year we moved to Louisville. In a season of dreaming toward starting a coffee shop, I decided to bring the image full circle back to paper in the form of a pen and ink drawing.  I called the finished art Sunergos, a Greek word that means “working together”, and gave it to my wife for Christmas (2002).  Around this time I also met Matthew Huested who later became my business partner in the coffee company we were to start. Through the process of envisioning and planning together, Matthew and I decided to use the image and its name to represent our coffee company. In its fourth and final form, I drew a line art version as the logo for Sunergos Coffee.”

In the early years (2003-2004), founders Matthew Huested and Brian Miller began roasting on a small roaster at Day’s Coffee in the Highlands neighborhood of Louisville. They sold coffee to friends and family and developed relationships with local coffee businesses who would eventually become the first Sunergos wholesale customers. Shortly after, Brian and Matthew found 2122 S Preston Street and began remodeling it. Before long, Sunergos’ first retail location was open for business, complete with an on-site roastery featuring a refurbished 10 kilo STA Impianti coffee roaster. 

NEW NEIGHBORHOODS

As Sunergos grew, we hired our first employees and Matthew and Brian were able to cut back their 96 hour work weeks a bit. Growth of the Preston store and wholesale also created the need for a larger roaster. After many hours of scraping, sandblasting, cleaning, and painting the 60 kilo Petroncini that is used today was ready for its first batches of coffee. 

In time, an opportunity arose in the heart of the up-and-coming Beechmont neighborhood for us to begin work on a flagship store on Woodlawn Avenue. After two years of work Sunergos Woodlawn’s doors were open. A few years later we opened our small, espresso-focused shop on 5th street in downtown Louisville and most recently our forth location on Norris Place, right outside of the Highlands where we first began.

Today Sunergos employs nearly fifty people and our coffee can be found in any of our four locations as well as many other coffee shops, offices, and grocery stores.