DC Coffee

Established in 2002 in Melbourne, Victoria by the Valmorbida family, the goal was simple; supply a premium freshly roasted coffee to the local market.

Already established as a leader in the food service industry, the Valmorbida family recognised a need for locally roasted coffee and with that Caffe Ducale was born and a start of the art roasting facility was soon established in Preston.

Over the years we grew quickly across the country, and developed a growing team of coffee professionals.

In 2009, as Melbourne was becoming renowned as the coffee capital of Australia and began entering the global coffee stage, we rebranded from Ducale Coffee to DC Coffee. Updating our blends to be more specialty coffee focused.

Locally, the explosion of the specialty coffee industry gave rise to lots of independent coffee roasters and in order to stand out we embraced our team’s passion for art and music. It was through this passion and our creative hearts, we launched our B-Side blend, which supported live music and explored the connection between coffee and the arts.

We partnered with local industry media and live music venues to put on DC TUNES gigs, covering the cost of bands to perform live. We threw some wild events at venues such as the Espy, and supported over 200 bands in the space of three years!

Around this time, we also invited our first artist to create bag artwork which really resonated with the creative community. Our coffee bags became a canvas for artists, bringing our blends to life. Soon cafes were displaying DC coffee as artwork on their shelves, from Darkness, to Critical Hit, Union Rd and Fitzroy.

In 2017, we finally introduced our specialty coffee with artists designs to the shop floor, giving customers direct access to premium beans.

We began with our products stocked in 20 Coles stores. Quickly, this grew from 20 to 200, and then 800 stores across the nation within 18 months.

Today, you can find DC Coffee in cafes and food service businesses, next to the machines of home baristas or on the shelves of Coles Supermarkets across Australia.

As a business we continue to do what we do with an ethical approach. From our fair trade coffees, relationships with farmers at origin, an ethical supply chain to supporting grassroots community programs and emerging artists.