Blackboard has roasted in Burleigh Heads since 2013 on a Loring machine; head roaster Danny Andrade was crowned 2026 Australian Roasters Champion. Its lots include a Panama Geisha from the Lerida estate.
Best for Single-origin and blend coffee roasted on a Loring machine by 2026 Australian
Blackboard Coffee Roasters has operated out of Burleigh Heads, Queensland since 2013, describing itself as one hundred percent Queensland owned. Its head roaster, Danny Andrade, was crowned 2026 Australian Roasters Champion, an award the roastery credits to his work on the Burleigh Heads Loring roaster. The core lineup runs four espresso blends — Seasonal, Bold, Organic and Dark — alongside rotating single-origin espresso and filter releases, including limited exclusives like a Panama Geisha from the Lerida estate and an Ecuador lot from producer Pepe Jijón. The roastery emphasizes direct relationships with growers as the basis for its single-origin sourcing. Beyond bags, it sells drip bags, pods, brewing gear and accessories, ships direct to consumers, and runs wholesale partnerships with cafés, backed by a subscription program offering a fifteen percent discount. The championship title is the standout fact here: a roaster whose head roaster holds a current national title, working single-origin lots specific enough to be named for the estate and grower behind them, rather than sold under a generic country label.
East Coast Roast roasts coffee in Ashmore on the Gold Coast under regionally named blends, including Hinterland and Coastal, both Golden Bean 2025 bronze medalists; the Australian-owned roastery supplies wholesale and retail customers with coffee, milks, syrups and tea.
Best for Australian-owned roastery supplies wholesale and retail customers with coffee, milks
East Coast Roast roasts in Ashmore on the Gold Coast, under blends named for the region - Hinterland, Coastal, Costa D'oro and Jungle Bean - and the roastery's own account traces its roots back to Queensland's first coffee cart, run as Cre8ive Coffee at Griffith University before new owners rebranded the business as East Coast Roast in 2023. The results have been validated on a national stage: at Golden Bean 2025, the world's largest coffee roasting competition, East Coast Roast took bronze medals for both its Hinterland and Coastal blends, and the Coastal blend has separately been recognized as a Golden Bean Australia winner for best milk-based coffee blend. Beyond its own retail bags, the roastery supplies wholesale accounts across the Gold Coast with free local delivery, runs contract roasting for other brands, and offers barista training and equipment support to café partners. Its shelves also carry plant-based milks, syrups and specialty tea alongside the coffee, rounding out a wholesale-and-retail operation built specifically around the region it roasts for. For a shop whose entire blend lineup is named after Gold Coast geography, the competition medals are the concrete evidence behind what might otherwise read as local marketing - two Golden Bean placings on locally roasted, locally owned coffee.
Run by father-and-son David and Luke Ridden, Granddad Jack's distills gin, vodka, whiskey and liqueur at Miami on the Gold Coast, its first site opening in 2018. The distillery has taken more than 100 awards and added a bar in Newcastle.
Fifteen years on the Gold Coast and around forty competition medals — fourteen for the Costa D'Oro blend, including a 2010 Sydney Royal Fine Food Show bronze listed by the roastery, eight for Bellissimo Premium. Even the Colombian decaf has placed, taking a silver.
Best for In 15 years on the Gold Coast
Premiato has operated on the Gold Coast for 15 years under owner John, building a competition record that now runs to roughly 40 medals across its blend and single-origin range. The two flagship blends carry most of that tally between them — Costa D'Oro with 14 awards and Bellissimo Premium with 8 — while the single origins add smaller counts: three for the Organic Ethiopian, two each for the Colombian and Organic Blend, and a silver for the Decaf Colombian. That last detail is worth noting on its own terms: decaf rarely wins medals, and a placed decaf is a genuine sourcing and processing credential rather than a footnote. The roastery ships same or next business day, a logistics commitment aimed at freshness rather than shelf life, and rounds out its range with chai, drinking chocolate and brewing equipment alongside the coffee. Premiato also runs a standing charitable partnership with the Save The Bilby Fund, directing support toward the endangered Australian marsupial, and sources packaging and complementary products from Australian suppliers rather than importing them. For a shop with a five-star, 33-review local rating, the medal count functions as the more substantial credential — independently judged rather than self-reported.
A Gold Coast roastery that mycotoxin-tests its organic and Swiss Water decaf lines independently, anchored by the bronze-medal Platino blend. Barista training has run through Silipo University for fifteen years.
Best for Platino coffee and Swiss Water decaf
Silipo's flagship blend, Platino, combines five single-origin beans and has the record to back the claim: a Bronze Medal at the Australian International Roasting Awards, alongside tasting notes of spiced fruit, chocolate and nut. The rest of the lineup splits by character rather than by origin alone — Nero, an Italian-style roast built for traditional espresso; Marrone, a chocolate-forward blend built on Brazilian beans; Verde, sourced entirely from certified organic farms; and a Specialty Decaf that combines Colombian sugar cane processing with the Swiss Water method to reach mycotoxin-free status.
That decaf claim isn't just marketing language — Silipo runs independent mycotoxin testing on its decaf and organic blends to keep them above an 85-point specialty rating, a quality bar the company applies to itself rather than leaving to a supplier's word. Since opening in Southport on the Gold Coast, the roastery has also run Silipo University for fifteen years, training baristas alongside its wholesale and retail coffee business, and gives 25 cents per kilogram sold to Project Waterfall, which funds clean water access in coffee-growing communities.
Six-Tricks Distilling makes gin, vodka, Queensland molasses rum, single malt whisky and cane spirit at Mermaid Beach, including its Coolangattan Gin. The distillery runs a tasting room, tours, cocktail classes and private cask programs.
Stuart Surf Design shapes, glasses and finishes its boards on-site at Mermaid Beach, about 250 metres from the sand. The factory-direct operation makes custom and pre-made surfboards and handles repairs, rentals and second-hand boards.
Yoshiro 'Yosh' Takeda has shaped surfboards under his own name in Currumbin for close to two decades, building classic longboards, fishes and single fins as well as high-performance shortboards. The Traders Way workshop also produces Takeda Goods, a small line of shirts and surf accessories.
Wildflower Gin distills at Varsity Lakes, drawing on native flora and honey from the founder's rooftop bees for its signature, pink and navy-strength gins. The boutique distillery also produces a Lamington vodka and ready-to-drink cocktails.
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