We’re inviting coffee shop and roastery owners to take part in the second-ever Coffee Business Owner Compensation Survey.
Two years ago, we launched the first version of this survey to try to understand how much coffee business owners take home. We then released three reports of our findings, and the results were eye-opening.
The average coffee shop owner earned $48,234 annually, while coffee roaster owners averaged $53,374. The highest earners ($100K+) shared three commonalities: they owned slightly older businesses; operated multiple locations; and reported spending significantly more time working on growth, development, and strategic planning than day-to-day operations. We found surprising commonalities between owners: many reported that despite the strife (and debt) involved in opening a business, the effort was worth it.
Now, we’re back to do a deeper dive. This second edition of the survey includes new questions about non-cash benefits, business debt, and profitability to help us understand the full picture of coffee business ownership and compensation.
Here’s a few important notes about the survey:
- The survey is only open to businesses located in the United States
- This survey will take seven minutes to complete
- All answers are completely confidential. We will never share identifiable data
- Survey run dates: June 13th – July 12th
- Results to be published: Fall 2025
How We’re Expanding The Survey
The 2023 survey results became some of the most-read content in Fresh Cup’s history. Coffee business owners had real data to benchmark against, and prospective entrepreneurs gained realistic expectations about the financial realities of coffee business ownership.
But we heard from many of you that salary alone doesn’t tell the complete story.
A coffee shop owner making $45,000 in salary plus full health benefits, a company car, and paid internet is in a very different financial position than someone making $45,000 with no benefits and $50,000 in business debt payments. Our first survey didn’t capture this difference.
This expanded survey addresses those gaps by addressing:
- Non-cash benefits — health insurance, vehicle allowances, internet reimbursements, and other compensation you receive through the business, plus their estimated value.
- Business debt obligations — current debt loads, annual interest payments, and how debt service impacts your ability to pay yourself.
- Total compensation breakdown — both regular wages and profit distributions to understand your complete personal income from the business.
- Work reality — hours worked and actual job responsibilities to contextualize compensation against workload.
The Stakes Remain High
Coffee business ownership shouldn’t be a financial shot in the dark. Many aspiring business owners put their life savings on the line to build their dream business, and reliable data on potential compensation can help them calibrate their investment and expectations for a more sustainable business. Existing business owners need data from peers to know if they need to adjust their operation to hit more sustainable benchmarks, or if it really is just that hard all-around.
Ongoing conversations about fair wages in coffee can’t happen in a vacuum. Understanding how business owners compensate themselves—and what constraints they face—provides essential context for industry-wide discussions about sustainable business models and equitable compensation structures. Your participation helps build the transparency our industry desperately needs.
If you have any questions about the Coffee Business Owner Compensation Survey or how we will use the survey data, send us an email.
And make sure to sign up for Fresh Cup’s newsletter and follow us on social media to get the results as soon as they’re published.
