How the Hell Did You End Up Here — with Kaileigh Mulligan

Origin Story: Get to know our beloved sales rep from SLAYER Espresso and the path that led her to the coffee industry

Introducing our new series, How the Hell Did You End Up Here, where the Education Department at DOCR gets the inside scoop on all your favorite coffee lovers. Every choice we make leads us down a path in life — sometimes in directions we never expect.

Coffee isn’t a typical career pathway, but it’s one that usually includes some of the most passionate, down-to-earth, and friendly people. The community thrives on connection, and coffee itself is a great tool to connect and collaborate with others.

I sat down with Kaileigh Mulligan, our sales rep from SLAYER Espresso, back in June while she was in Michigan for a week filled with all things Slayer. From a Tech & Demo Day at Dialed Coffee Services in Grand Rapids, to another at DOCR's Ferndale Cafe + HQ — followed by a classic Latte Art Throwdown — we managed to carve out some time in between the buzz to talk about how her path led her to where she is now.

Kaileigh and Taylor of SLAYER Espresso leading Tech & Demo Day at Ferndale's Cafe + HQ in July 2025.

So sit tight, get comfortable, and grab yourself a cup of coffee. Here’s the story of Kaileigh Mulligan — from dreams of becoming a fashion designer on Newbury Street to being one of the driving forces behind many of the Slayer Espresso machines you’ve seen in action across the U.S.

Disclaimer: It should be noted that, earlier on the day prior to this interview, Kaileigh spent two and a half hours in a car driving from Grand Rapids to Detroit. Let it be known.

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Emma: How the Hell Did You End Up Here?

Kaileigh: That is a nuanced question with a big answer… I drove from Grand Rapids!

But I kind of wound up in coffee by accident. I'm from Boston, so I grew up with my parents always drinking Dunkin’ iced coffee. I have some pretty vivid memories of being a kid and it being summertime and just grabbing for that iced coffee.

Emma: How old were you when you had your first coffee?

Kaileigh: Probably… I don’t know, eight or nine? And my parents were definitely always drinking coffee. It was a thing that they would have at dinner or after dinner when people came over. They loved their Dunkin’ Donuts. When I grew up in that town, I wanted my own money and I wanted to go to the mall with my friends. I wanted to get a job.

There was a Dunkin' Donuts three blocks away from my house, and I started working there. It was a drive-through… fast-paced… which was fun. I did that because it was close by. I could get tips, and my parents were cool with the hours. Fast forward to going into the city to go to school where I was going for fashion. I was trying to get a job on Newbury Street.

Emma: Fashion school?

Kaileigh: Yes! I ended up dropping out because I hated making patterns.

I always liked fashion, clothes, and accessories. But I wanted to work on Newbury Street, which in Boston is sort of like their SoHo — fashion and shopping area downtown.

So I was trying to work down there, and nobody would hire me because I was 18 and didn't have any experience. I just wound up working at a coffee shop because that's the experience that I had.

I just continued to make friends in the environment that was familiar to me. I wound up sticking with it because I had the experience from high school. And in that, I just discovered so many things.

It was in the coffee shops that I kind of learned, like, oh, there's more to this than I thought. For me, I guess, as a young coffee person at that time, that was sort of like the ‘aha’ moment. Like, oh, man, this is bigger than I realized.

And I learned that coffee is something that I'm so, so curious about, and I have so many questions. I was working at a place that was pretty short-lived. They were on Newbury Street downtown, and they closed within a few months. It was okay, because I wound up on a journey from there.

It was later down the line, after I had a different coffee job for a little while, I worked for Peet's Coffee and Tea. And there, through one class, I learned about origin, processing, and tasting notes, and got really curious.

I wound up calling this place that I would get sandwiches from and asked if they needed people because I really liked coffee and wanted to learn how to be a good barista. It was probably 2009/2010 at the time. They said that they really wanted people who want to learn about specialty coffee, so I wound up working there.

Emma: That was like right when specialty coffee was taking off?

Kaileigh: Yes, it was going from second wave coffee into third. It was a different time, and the sandwich shop, which was previously Espresso Royale Caffe, was trying to do this brand switch into what is now Pavement. They wanted to do the specialty coffee thing, so I was there during that transition. A lot of my friends who I worked with at that time went on to be coffee people, and some of them still are — years and years later, all over the country.

That was where I met a lot of my friends and became a coffee person, and I really wanted to stay in it. Then after college, I was offered a job in my field where I would have been making less money than I made at the coffee shop.

Emma: So you didn't finish your fashion degree?

Kaileigh: No, I stayed at the same school but changed majors, and I went into a social sciences program. I liked it; the work was really hard. But the job offer I got out of college was far away and didn't pay well.

So, I thought I might as well just stay working at the cafe for now. I had my eye on Counter Culture because at the cafe that I worked at prior, we switched to Counter Culture from another roaster. 

They opened operations in Boston and had trainers, and we could take free classes, and it opened up this whole world of, like: "Oh my gosh, so you could be a trainer for a wholesale company. That's so cool." I had never even thought of that. At that time, I was probably 20, 21 years old. I was just learning about wholesale and how big coffee could be.

I thought I'd love to be a trainer at Counter Culture. At the time, I met my friend Jake at a convention that was hosted in Rhode Island called the MANE Conference (RIP). He worked for Counter Culture and introduced me to his colleague Park in NY, who said he would let me know if they were ever hiring, but that I had to get some management experience. So that's what I did.

I was like, all right, I'm going to get that management experience. So I got a barista job at a cafe for a small roasting company, and I was able to become a supervisor. Later down the line, I became the manager. After about a year, I heard from Park in NY (on Twitter!) about an opening. I applied for that Counter Culture job, and I moved to New York City to do that in 2015.

So yeah, I just kind of went from Dunkin’, to working in shops in college, to realizing I really wanted to do things on the wholesale side, the business side, and just taking the small steps I needed to be able to get qualified for that.

And then, through that, I learned at the time, there weren't very many roles at Counter Culture. You were either an account rep, trainer, technician, or a salesperson. And we wound up needing a salesperson in my region after a few years. I didn't know at the time that I was sales-capable.

I didn't realize the thing I realize now, which is that everybody who works at every place is a salesperson to some extent.

Emma: It is very similar to working any job, you're trying to convince somebody that they need it, you know, that they want the product. It's funny how much sales shows up.

Kaileigh: I think the especially cool thing about coffee is that I never really ever felt like I was trying to convince anyone of anything. I've been very lucky.

I wanted to work at Counter Culture. I didn't want to work anywhere else. I had my heart set on that. When I finally got there, I thought, this is the best place, and I really believed in that.

And so I didn't feel like I had to convince anyone. 

I love this thing, here's why, and if you want to be part of this, with these coffees and these people, then you should come and do that with us.

That social aspect of coffee, that connectedness to the thing, made sales really easy.

Once the sales job at Counter Culture came up, I thought, I've been doing this for a few years. That would be a challenge. I should try that. And that's where I got the experience of selling machines. Because when you sell whole bean coffee, you sell machines, too.

Then, a friend of mine who I had worked with had gone on to SLAYER a few years before and got a promotion to a marketing job and needed a replacement. So that's how I got to SLAYER. After a few years of selling coffee and machines, I got an opportunity to work for the manufacturer. So I've been doing that for just over three years.

Emma: I think it's funny because nobody really goes into coffee and thinks: "I'm going to do that forever. That's going to be my career." But it's cool that it just works out that way.

Kaileigh: For the artsy, sensitive people. People who are a little bit awkward in an endearing way. It's the perfect little slice of niche, and it's just so lovely that it's everywhere.

So you could move to a different place, you can go visit somewhere else, and you always sort of feel like you're part of that place, even if you're not at the shop you're familiar with.

Emma: Do you still do a lot of creative stuff outside of work today?

Kaileigh: Like all the time.

Emma: What’s your favorite?

Kaileigh: Right now I'm really into floral arrangements. I did the floral arrangements at the SLAYER's Specialty Coffee Association Expo (SCA) booth this year.

We had a really fun time with that. We had two big ones in the center that were in cowboy boots, perfect for Houston. And we had some smaller ones that we had out on the tables, but I actually got to do my first floral arranging for an event when we launched our Steam Single last summer in Denmark. So I did the floral stuff for that and for SCA.

I just usually have a weekly arrangement at home, so that's kind of lately been my most consistent hobby. I also have a little point-and-shoot camera that I take on all my work travels. So I'm always shooting little film pictures and experimenting.

Emma: Do you have a favorite flower?

Kaileigh: Oh, hardest question, oh man. Lately I have been very into asters, just any kind of aster daisies.

I just feel like they're kind of the iconic, most flowery-looking flowers, and I'm really into those right now. I'm into learning about the different ones, but my floral obsession knows no bounds.

Emma: What's your favorite fun fact about coffee to somebody who knows nothing about coffee?

Kaileigh: The thing that immediately comes to mind: when you tell someone that coffee is the seed of a fruit, they're like, "What?" So when you ask that question, that's the first thing I thought: if they really don't know anything and you tell them that, they're like, "It's a fruit? Are you kidding me?"

Another one that comes to mind is that coffee can be whatever you want. I feel like sometimes when I tell people that I work in coffee, they're like, 'Oh, like you must be a connoisseur. You must have so many opinions. You must know everything about everything. Oh, don't watch me putting milk in it,' you know, and it's like this thing that people expect from me as a 'coffee expert.'

It feels like people want me to be polarizing about it, even pretentious, like, 'I know more about this than you.' And actually, I think the best thing about coffee is that there's this enormous spectrum of 'how to drink it,' because it's just a drink.

Obviously, it's an important drink. There's a lot of complex conversation around it, and where it comes from, and why it exists. But I think that, of course, if you really care, if you really want to get into all the meat and potatoes and abundant background of coffee information out there, like, totally. It is infinite. But put your milk and sugar in there, girl, like, drink it the way you want.

If you enjoy coffee, I think that's really cool. And you should drink it how you feel is best for you. I don't have any judgments about people ordering a pour over and putting milk in it or whatever. You know, I think you shouldn't drink it how you think you should drink it. You should drink it how you like it. And it's kind of a cool thing that everybody seems to like it slightly differently.

I really feel that you should just be drinking it, you know, like, no matter what, just just drink it. Just drink the coffee.

Emma: What is your favorite part about working for SLAYER?

Kaileigh: The people. That's always probably going to be and has always been my answer to the question, "What do you like about your job?" Whether it's SLAYER, or anything else in the future I might do, or anything I've done in the past — it's always the people that kind of keep me going. I think coffee industry people are just top-notch human beings.

We care way too much about a thing that we drink, and I think that is wonderful. It attracts just a certain type of curious "people-person," and those are my people.

With SLAYER specifically, I truly have never really felt like I was convincing anyone that they need the thing I'm selling, or that they should want it. Quickly, after learning more in-depth about SLAYER and what makes the company different, and the origin story of it, and the differentiation between our few models that we have, I was sort of shocked and like kicking myself a little bit. I've been in this industry so long, and I didn't know all of this information about this machine that's been under my nose all these years.

I mean, part of that is just there aren't that many SLAYER espresso machines in the world. It's a young company, and we haven't made a ton of machines, but I truly think it is so cool. I think it's such a nice quality machine. I think the design is beautiful, I love the people behind it, I love the story behind it, and because of those things it never feels disingenuous. I don't think I could just sell anything.

I enjoy sales, I'm good at it, but I don't think I could just do it for any company, for any brand, for any industry. And that's really kind of the necessary thing for me, even for Counter Culture. I wanted to work for them.

I wanted to sell that thing, I believe in it, I love it. I can be truthful and just hope that people want to share that with me and let me share that with them. And I feel the same way with SLAYER. It feels to me like the best option, and I love talking about it with folks. I love seeing the reaction that people have when they get to work on it.

I love that we get to bring a tool to people that makes them excited to do their job, that makes them feel understood and thought of, and that's kind of what it's all about.

So yeah, I really do truly like the product, and the people behind it, and the story behind it. And it's been wonderful to learn a different side of the coffee business, going from working more closely with baristas, coffee shop owners, barista trainers and program managers to technical service companies, more of that end of specialty coffee. Trade shows are also something I never did regularly before. So that's all been really fun to explore as well.

Kaileigh attended Detroit Coffee Week in July 2024 and hosted a SLAYER Tech & Demo Day at our Ferndale Cafe + HQ in July 2025, where she's spoken on panels and judged a number of our Latte Art Throwdowns.

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Well, there you have it — Kaileigh’s story on how the hell she ended up in the coffee industry. Big thanks to Kaileigh for her time and for sharing her story with us!

If you’d like to get in touch with Kaileigh about SLAYER Espresso machines, please reach out to our Director of Sales + Education, Amélie, at amelie@dessertoasiscoffee.com.

Stay tuned for more interviews with the folks who make up the heart of our coffee community — right here on the DOCR's Certified Good Stuff blog.

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About the writer: Emma LaVoie is the Education Manager for Dessert Oasis Coffee Roasters. She's the brains behind this blog and lit a fire under our team to follow suit. You can almost always find Emma reading a book with a coffee in hand. If you're interested in reaching out to Emma, shoot her an email: emma@dessertoasiscoffee.com. She'd be happy to geek out over coffee with you. (Seriously, don't hesitate to reach out — she'll love it.)