Bright Vibe Coffee

From Office Cubicle to Coffee Educator and Competitor, Talitha Clemons Opens Up the OKC Coffee Industry

When I think of Talitha Clemons, I immediately think of her bright personality and compassion. You may know Talitha from her mobile coffee cart, her posts on Instagram sharing brewing methods, or her national coffee competition journey, but the full story is that she’s on a personal mission.

Although Talitha didn’t grow up visiting coffee shops or drinking coffee, it’s easy to hear the passion in her voice when she speaks about it. Her passion was percolating before, but she fully connected to it while working at an NGO overseas in Egypt. “I love coffee. I like how people connect over coffee in a way I haven’t seen in other environments.”

After returning to the US and working on data entry in an office cubicle, reflecting on the human connection that coffee nurtures was enough to make her take a blind leap into the coffee industry. She eventually got her foot in the door at a local cafe and learned more about her newfound love.

“The goal was to work in a cafe for a year,” she laughs and pauses, “but it took me a whole nine years to actually step out and do coffee things on my own.” She officially opened her business, Bright Vibe Coffee, in 2020. Its logo is a pink flamingo, an ode to her grandmother who was a part of a social and church group that referred to themselves as The Flamingo Club. “I was thinking of my grandma right around the time I started and I realized how little I really had to remember her by.” The logo became a way to stay in touch with her past and the figure who loved and cared for her growing up.

Now over a decade into her career, Talitha’s mission has become honed to a point: providing educational opportunities to increase diversity and representation in the coffee industry. After being subject to and witnessing discrimination towards BIPOC and marginalized baristas, producers, competitors, and others, Talitha recognized the discrimination and exploitation inherent in the industry. With that structural gap in equality and equity, Talitha aims for a change. The key is to “break down the perception that coffee is not welcoming,” she explains. “I want to be a part of the new wave of coffee that is about making space for people.” The industry is beginning to embrace transparency and the value of diversity, but it still has a long way to go.

Beyond teaching others, Talitha focuses on her own education by attending coffee cupping competitions and classes on roasting. “I had to step out of my daily routine, as a barista, and really find those opportunities,” she emphasizes. Without access to information or people in your community who have experience, it is incredibly difficult to further your career, especially when factoring in systemic racism and inequality across the industry. That can mean having to broaden your horizons. When she talks with those interested in a career in coffee, she recommends looking beyond Oklahoma for guidance and assistance. Talitha has benefited from organizations like Getchu Some Gear and Glitter Cat, which strive to get costly coffee gear into the hands of groups often excluded from the coffee industry. They have also sponsored her for the 2022 U.S. Coffee Championship’s Cup Tasters Championship where Talitha was among twenty-four coffee professionals from across the nation to compete.

She received the Doña Ivone scholarship through the Coffee Coalition for Racial Equity which provided funding for educational growth opportunities for six Black coffee professionals in the US and Brazil. She used those funds to enroll in Specialty Coffee Association courses at Firedancer Coffee Consultants/Diedrich Roasting Academy in Schaumburg, Illinois. Within a week, she took Beginner Roasting, Intermediate Roasting, Introduction to Sensory, and Introduction to Green Coffee, passing exams in each.

As part of her investment in the community, Talitha also works with local coffee shops to build their operations and coffee programs. When OKC’s Culture Coffee opened in 2019, Talitha was there to build. “I like to help shops get up and running as quickly, safely, and cost effectively as possible.” She’s also worked with The Copley, Spoked, and, most recently, Equity Brewing Company in Norman.

Between creating educational content, taking classes, and consulting with coffee shops, Talitha is an active conduit between soon to be coffee professionals and the wealth of knowledge and materials available. “The main goal is to make coffee and knowledge about coffee more accessible,” she affirms. If you are an Oklahoman coffee professional or just starting out, Talitha is someone you want to engage with and emulate. Bright Vibe Coffee’s future is a very bright one, for both Talitha and the community.

> Bright Vibe Coffee, @brightvibecoffee