FIGBREW: A local couple winning awards and gaining national attention for creating a healthier alternative to coffee made from brewed figs

STORY BY ERIN COGGINS | PHOTOS BY JOSHUA BERRY | LIVING 50 PLUS

The coffee culture in America is strong. It’s everywhere. Think of the popular television show, Friends–six friends find comfort and fellowship at their local coffee shop. But what happens when coffee is just not one’s thing or coffee stops loving you back?

The answer is figs.

Andy and Marianne Whitehead, owners of FigBrew, developed an alternative to coffee made from brewed figs that yields a robust, coffee-like drink.

“People know all about coffee. But there’s also a thriving world of coffee alternatives. These are mostly instant and herbals, and tea is also one,” Andy said. “The instant and herbals don’t cut it for hardcore coffee drinkers. They need something robust that you can stand a spoon up in it. The strength of coffee is generally associated with the total amount of dissolved solids in coffee. And fig, as it turns out, actually has more total dissolved solids than coffee does.”

Using figs as an alternative to or an enhancer of coffee is nothing new. Andy says he came across an article a few years ago detailing how the British used figs as an alternative to coffee during World War II because coffee was rationed.

“Coffee was sent to the soldiers on the front lines because it was a mind-altering stimulant. And if people got it, they wanted to drink as much as they could,” Andy said. “So they blended it with roasted fig to stretch the rations. Then, after the war, everybody went back to coffee, which was what they had been after. It turns out they were adding something remarkably healthy in the fig.”

And that is precisely what FigBrew is doing–making a healthier coffee alternative. Heart arrhythmias, acidity, and blood pressure issues are three of the most common health issues that prompt coffee drinkers to seek an alternative.

“When I was younger, I could drink as much coffee as I wanted, but like a large subset of coffee drinkers, I aged out of coffee. As people get older, they develop heart arrhythmias and gastric reflux, and then the doc says you’ve got to scale back the coffee, right? And that is a hard thing to do,” Andy said. “So, we attempt to make that transition easier by giving people a beverage that tastes like coffee, brews like coffee, but keeps you in the wheelhouse.”

Figs, unlike coffee beans, grow on every continent except for Antarctica. Where the average coffee tree puts out less than two pounds of coffee a year, the average fig tree yields 40 to 60 pounds per year, and it is twice as concentrated.

“If you drink a cup of coffee every day for a year, you consume the output of 20 coffee trees. It’s a very resource-intensive habit. The output of the fig tree is much greater in terms of making a cup of coffee,” Andy said. “And on top of that, between disease, deforestation, climate change, and with coffee prices being at an all-time high and going up, we think the fig can directly address these things. It’s an unusual product for a very unusual time.”

There are a thousand different varieties of figs, and they do not all roast the same. It took the Whiteheads six months to develop their first commercial product, finding the fig variety that fit perfectly with their goal of creating a coffee alternative. Currently, they source their figs from Mediterranean countries, primarily Turkey, Spain and Greece. The only place figs are grown commercially in the U.S. is California, and those figs are black mission figs, the Spanish planted 200 years ago, perfect for charcuterie boards, but not for a drink.

“The figs we use have been grown over there for thousands of years by people who earn an honest wage,” Andy said. “We use upcycled figs, the smallest fig, even if it has a blemish. They still taste fine, and not any different from the larger fig.”

Andy says the couple is currently cultivating a fig farm in Morgan County–just one more part of the business they are building in the Tennessee Valley area. After five years in business, FigBrew has three full-time employees and several part-time employees who help with production and manufacturing.

Part of the process is to slow-roast the figs at a lower temperature than for coffee beans, caramelizing the fructose in the figs, which results in a slightly sweet taste. Once the drink is ready for packaging, that too is done at the business’s location on Leeman Ferry Road in Huntsville.

Andy says ultimately, they will outgrow their current space as the demand for their product grows, but they will keep all manufacturing in Huntsville. That is important to both Andy and Marianne.

“We are trying to bring manufacturing here, and intend to keep manufacturing here, and not send it overseas,” Andy said. “Actually, Huntsville was the birthplace of contract manufacturing. Not many people know that. Before it all went to China, Asia and Vietnam, it started right here in the Tennessee Valley.

As a former tech company founder, Andy’s goal is to turn Huntsville from a technology city into a food-and-beverage city. In conjunction with FigBrew, the couple converted part of their roasting kitchen to an on-site incubator for consumer-packaged goods (CPG) entrepreneurs.

“When we started, there was no real mentorship around. We just kind of had to learn all of this on our own. Then we discovered there is a somewhat thriving industry locally for people who want to be consumer packaged goods (CPG) entrepreneurs,” Andy said. “Local people use it. They think they have a great product idea and want to do it. So, we provide mentorship, and it is a shared commissary with learning that goes along and free advice.”

Despite not having a mentor in the CPG business, the Whiteheads found the right path in promoting their product at coffee trade shows, where they have garnered not only a following but some national awards.

The Original Digestive Roast won two awards at Midwest’s largest coffee festival. Within the first month of rolling out the Morning Prebiotic Roast, it won Best of Show in the decaf category at the NOLA Coffee Festival.

“When people go to these shows, they get tired after making the rounds, and they don’t usually want to circle back. But we have had people circle back to tell us that we are the best thing at the show,” Marianne said. “For me, that is the biggest compliment, especially when other coffee companies at the shows are telling people that they have to try FigBrew.”

FigBrew comes in K-cups or three-pound bags. It is currently available at some local shops, including Harrison Brothers, or can be purchased at local craft shows held at the Orion, the farmers’ market or MidCity. And the brew is offered at some boutique grocery stores, mainly on the East Coast, West Coast and upper Midwest. Mostly, though, FigBrew can be ordered online through the company’s website.

The couple’s next goal is to get FigBrew into more grocery stores and coffee shops. Their intention is not to replace coffee or even interfere with the coffee culture, but to be part of it.

“We want to make the coffee culture as robust as possible. We want to develop a ready-to-drink to sell in coffee shops to help them reach customers that they don’t normally reach because of health or religious issues,” Andy said. “We want to recreate the coffee culture for everyone.”

To learn more about FigBrew, go to www.figbrew.com or call 256-617-3105. You can use the coupon code “50PLUS” for 15% off your purchase.