He had a knack for beer. Can he replicate it with beans? His new coffee shop opens soon

Kristine Sherred
·4 min read

Mike Murphy wouldn’t call himself a celebrity of local brews, but he has, in fact, achieved fame (to the geeks among us) in one such category. This year, he turned his full attention to another type of brewing — and roasting.

Outer Dark Coffee Co. is Tacoma’s newest roaster, officially launched in January. In early July, Murphy, a co-founder of Seattle’s Holy Mountain Brewing, will open his first shop at 750 Market St.

Underneath TractionSpace, across from City Hall and next to Cider and Cedar, it replaces Cafe Azure, which served coffee, housemade soup and baked goods for just more than three years.

It feels like a big win for downtown, where, sure, coffee shops abound, but none is directly affiliated with its own brand of beans.

Mike Murphy, owner of Outer Dark Coffee, pulls a shot of espresso inside the soon-to-open Outer Dark Coffee cafe at 750 Market St. in downtown Tacoma.
Mike Murphy, owner of Outer Dark Coffee, pulls a shot of espresso inside the soon-to-open Outer Dark Coffee cafe at 750 Market St. in downtown Tacoma.

Murphy, who was raised in North Carolina and moved to the Pacific Northwest in the late 2000s, has a long history in the Seattle-area beverage industry. He started as a sales manager at age 24, worked with the late Schooner Exact Brewing and then Westland Distillery. In 2015, he and Colin Lenfesty created what became one of Seattle’s most respected breweries in Holy Mountain. The craft beer world was thrilling then, he recalled in June.

“Now craft beer is just beer,” he said.

Importantly, he and his wife Tara settled in Tacoma in 2020. The commute became grueling, but he also felt a tug away from CEO-of-a-company duties and to personal creativity. After selling his share in the brewery, a “little roaster setup in the basement” helped him hone a new set of skills. “I always wanted to spend more time roasting,” he said.

A couple courses later and he was ready: “Tacoma could use more roasters.”

Outer Dark joins a roster that includes Valhalla, Bluebeard, Manifesto, Lander, Campfire and Naomi Joe, each with their own Tacoma cafes.

In January, Murphy began selling bags produced at Roasterworks, a shared facility in Auburn, landing on the shelf at Tacoma Boys and Stadium Thriftway. His brewing background lent a bond with Tacoma’s own E9 Brewing Co. (“We go back,” he laughed), at whose Brewery District taproom you can also find bags. This spring, he has set up every other Saturday at the Haunted Farmers Market, a quirky new gathering of food vendors, crafters and creators in South Tacoma.

At the new cafe, try the Form and Void, Outer Dark’s flagship espresso blend that Murphy described as medium-to-dark, depending on the origin and seasonality of the beans, with a “consistent profile.”

The Feels, a dark roast, is somewhat of a throwback, said Murphy. “I got into coffee on darker roasts — the IPA of coffee.”

He recounted memories of going to concerts with friends and then drinking too much “really terrible, burnt coffee” at Waffle House, the Southern diner staple, “but there was something very nostalgic about it.” Hence, The Feels.

Murphy, who spent 16 years in the beer business before digging into roasting, wanted the Outer Dark brand to evoke a sense of “meandering, a little out of focus.” The cafe walls are black with pops of yellow and white.
Murphy, who spent 16 years in the beer business before digging into roasting, wanted the Outer Dark brand to evoke a sense of “meandering, a little out of focus.” The cafe walls are black with pops of yellow and white.

For single-origins, he turns to a “lighter, more fruity style,” such as the honey process for a Mexican bean, a strawberries-and-cream sensation from a Colombian and berry notes from an Ethiopian.

The cafe itself is on the small side. but it boasts big windows, which Tara and Mike decided to capitalize on with counter seating. They have brought the same artistic sensibility that helped Holy Mountain stand out (beyond the can and the keg, that is), painting the walls and the ceiling tiles some 30 feet overhead black. It makes the space feel bigger somehow, accented by pops of canary yellow. On the walls, Murphy painted curvy white lines that mirror the waves on the bags, designed in assistance with local agency Foster’s Creative.

He wanted it to be “abstract … meandering, a little out of focus.”

In addition to espresso and drip coffee, Outer Dark will serve two types of cold brew: a rotating single-origin and a standard nitro. To eat, he has teamed up with Tacoma’s own Memoranda Kitchen for breakfast and lunch-y sandwiches and Spilled Butter Desserts for pastries.

As Outer Dark grows, Murphy hopes to find the right space for Tacoma-based production, too, and maybe another cafe.

OUTER DARK COFFEE

▪ 750 Market St., Tacoma, outerdarkcoffee.com

▪ Target Opening: July 8, follow instagram.com/outerdarkcoffee for updates

▪ Anticipated Hours: Monday-Friday 7 a.m.-4 p.m., Saturday 8 a.m.-2 p.m.