Jimmy Schillreff has been onto the coffee craze since almost the beginning.

Originally from Southern California, Schillreff saw the rise of coffee culture in the late ’90s when L.A. started to get hooked on java. He worked in marketing within the tech industry at the time, but when the tech bubble burst, he and his wife moved across the country to Boone, North Carolina. They started the original Jimmy’s Java coffee shop in 2001. It lasted three years. “Retail coffee is the hardest job in the planet—and it doesn’t pay much,” he says now.

But a second try resulted in a lasting brand of coffee that made its way into Southwest Florida.

In 2010, family connections brought the couple to Cape Coral, where they saw an underserved market and decided to revive the Jimmy’s Java brand. Instead of opening a coffee shop, they tried a different route: Farmers markets. They found that aside from the impulse Starbucks purchase, people tended to buy their coffee on a weekly basis. And the weekly farmers market circuit was the perfect place to introduce a new product into their routines. The idea worked, and it helped launch Jimmy’s Java as a formidable coffee brand in Southwest Florida, with beans sourced directly from growers and roasted in a 3,500-square-foot facility in the Cape. Jimmy’s Java is sold at 18 farmers markets, where the business does the majority of its sales, and in about 20 retail locations, as well. Its next step is to expand the wholesale operation online, Schillreff said.

Jimmy’s Java’s most popular roasts take on a Floridian theme—Sanibel Sunrise or Matlacha Midnight. Its Cold Brew Espresso, with its patented percolation process, might be the most recognizable. “I challenge anyone to find better tasting coffee than ours,” says Schillreff. “Well, you might find something just as good. But probably not better.”