The coffee community is skeptical because he makes a bunch of unsubstantiated claims about quality and provides none of the transparency required to back it up. Coffee is a crop that grows on the side of mountains and is harvested under incredibly varying conditions. Even at the most progressive farms in the world the end result is a product that changes every season. The idea that he's found some magical farm that is resistant to mold is total nonsense. That said, in order to be classified as Specialty Coffee it has to score an 80+ on a 100 point scale. Mold is considered a defect resulting in lower grade. In other words, bad coffee you shouldn't drink anyway. No high quality coffees have mold damage, by definition. The Specialty market is only about 20% of the overall market, so it's easy to drink bad coffee. But this guy is not operating in that 20%, and instead seems to be focused on hacking the marketing instead.

If you drink a coffee that makes you feel bad, I'd respectfully suggest that you've been sold a low grade coffee (80% of a $9 billion market).

Melissa since you're now in Chicago (or nearabouts) I'd recommend getting to know some folks at Intelligentsia. Just as you have with your new meat purveyors. They're operating at a legitimately high level and are helping to make that chain smaller. There are others as well of course, but Intelligentsia is one of the best and in your area.

He doesn't even tell us where it's from. Would you put anything else in your mouth whose origins you couldn't verify?