By high school, he was tired of leaving.<\/p>\n
When his family moved again during his junior year, Dave chose to stay.<\/p>\n
He stayed for his senior year with a family friend in a house full of six children and exchange students.<\/p>\n
The lesson he carried forward was simple and lasting.<\/p>\n
\u201cI just wanted to stay somewhere,\u201d Dave said. \u201cI wanted to finish what I started.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
They met in the mid-1990s through work in Naples, where Dave was teaching a financial seminar. Susan stopped by afterward with a question about retirement planning.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis cute little blonde girl pokes her head in and asks if I\u2019d explain her retirement plan,\u201d Dave said. \u201cAnd I thought I would like to talk to you.\u201d<\/p>\n
Susan went home and called her mom.<\/p>\n
\u201cI remember saying \u2018I think this guy is really cute,\u2019\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
Four months later, they were engaged. Eleven months later, they were married.<\/p>\n
Neither planned to build a coffee company.<\/p>\n
Dave studied economics and built a career in real estate and finance. Susan studied nutrition and built a career in pharmaceutical sales and management.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Both were disciplined. Both were successful. Neither felt finished.<\/p>\n
A garage and a hobby<\/p>\n
Coffee was always a quiet, constant in their lives and they found joy in the search for a better cup.\u00a0<\/p>\n
After moving to Tampa, they struggled to find coffee they enjoyed drinking in the local coffee shop scene.<\/p>\n
They began roasting their own coffee, first with a popcorn popper-style roaster and later with a small roaster in their South Tampa garage.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The first cup of freshly roasted coffee reset their expectations.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe looked at each other and said, \u2018This is a game changer,\u201d Susan said.<\/p>\n
They shared the coffee with friends, served it at dinner parties and brought it into offices.<\/p>\n
READ: TAMPA BAY BUSINESS NEWS<\/a><\/p>\n As demand grew, friends began buying coffee directly from the Wards\u2019 home. A bag by the front door, $10 in a box. Nothing more was required.<\/p>\n \u201cPeople would just take the coffee and leave the money,\u201d Dave said. \u201cThere was no checking.\u201d<\/p>\n Then, they needed a name.<\/p>\n Buddy Brew was inspired by their dog, and stuck because it captured something they could not explain any other way.<\/p>\n Loyalty. Friendship. Unconditional Love.<\/p>\n For nearly a decade, coffee remained a hobby. It was something they did together after work, and it belonged to them alone.<\/p>\n Then the economy began to fracture.<\/p>\n When stability disappears<\/p>\n By 2007, Dave could see the collapse coming.<\/p>\n Commercial real estate did not slow down so much as it stopped.<\/p>\n Wall Street shut down property divisions, life insurance companies froze lending and long-term deals reached their endpoints with no refinancing options.<\/p>\n \u201cAt some point, you realize the thing you built your career on is no longer there,\u201d Dave said.<\/p>\n READ: TAMPA BAY REAL ESTATE NEWS<\/a><\/p>\n At the same time, orders for their coffee were increasing.<\/p>\n One career was unraveling while the other was asking for more.<\/p>\n Dave began writing a business plan and running numbers. They bought a larger roaster and installed it in the garage. They traveled to Sandpoint, Idaho, to learn how to roast properly.<\/p>\n Susan stayed in her corporate role longer, holding the household steady while risk shifted beneath them.<\/p>\n Eventually, coffee became a calling.<\/p>\n \u201cI loved my job,\u201d she said. \u201cBut coffee was tugging on my heart.\u201d<\/p>\n Burning the ships<\/p>\n They opened their first space in 2010.<\/p>\n It was not intended to be a cafe but a tasting room that allowed them to roast legally and sell wholesale.<\/p>\n The room measured just over 650 square feet.<\/p>\n Susan designed the room to feel like a kitchen rather than a counter service operation. The roaster sat in the center and the windows faced the street.<\/p>\n The night before opening, they realized they did not have a point-of-sale system.<\/p>\n They used the coffee can.<\/p>\n Susan left a job she loved weeks later. Friends questioned the decision, especially given the economic uncertainty. Security was exchanged for risk.<\/p>\n \u201cThat was the moment we burned the ships,\u201d Dave said. \u201cThere was no going back.\u201d<\/p>\n READ: TAMPA RETAIL & HOSPITALITY NEWS<\/a><\/p>\n Their days followed a strict rhythm. Brewing began in the morning. Roasting followed at midday. Packaging filled the afternoon. Deliveries happened by hand at night.<\/p>\n If customers walked in while the roaster was running, Dave and Susan chased them down the sidewalk with free cups and asked them to return the next day.<\/p>\n Losing customers was not an option.<\/p>\n \u201cYou don\u2019t get many chances with people,\u201d Susan said. \u201cWe didn\u2019t want to waste one.\u201d<\/p>\n One of their first regulars, Ralph, came from a nearby halfway house. He did not have money, but he kept coming.<\/p>\n \u201cOne day he came back with this big coin from some country I didn\u2019t even recognize,\u201d Dave said. \u201cHe didn\u2019t really have money. He just wanted to give me something.\u201d<\/p>\n They stayed behind the bar every day, learning names, habits and stories. The room filled because it felt personal.<\/p>\n Growth without distance<\/p>\n The opportunities arrived faster than they expected, even as they chose to move deliberately, including an invitation to open at Oxford Exchange in downtown Tampa.<\/p>\n The exposure was unplanned and impossible to manufacture.<\/p>\n About a year in, they were invited to walk through the building before it opened. At the time, it was stripped to its bones, with dirt floors and torn-down walls that revealed more vision than certainty.<\/p>\n \u201cThey took us on this vision walk,\u201d Dave said, recalling the moment. \u201cAnd we thought, this is incredible. They were doing something really special.\u201d<\/p>\n It was not only an opportunity for expansion, but also a statement of trust, and what stayed with them was not the scale of the project but how it unfolded.<\/p>\n READ: TBBW COVER STORIES<\/a><\/p>\n \u201cOxford Exchange received so much attention for what it became,\u201d Dave said. \u201cBlake and Allison were incredibly gracious to us. They have an incredible talent, and we\u2019re forever grateful.\u201d<\/p>\n They were made part of the process, part of the thinking and part of what the space was meant to become.<\/p>\n Each opportunity raised the same question. How do you grow without losing warmth?<\/p>\n They designed against sameness and against intimidation. At a time when specialty coffee often felt exclusive, Buddy Brew felt accessible within the Tampa coffee and hospitality scene.<\/p>\n \u201cNo matter how much we scale, we will never compromise quality,\u201d Dave said.<\/p>\n They were not building alone. Tampa was changing too, learning what local meant at the same time they were.\u00a0<\/p>\n They grew with intention, guided by the same philosophy that shaped their first days.<\/p>\n The work inside the work<\/p>\n Building a company together did not protect their marriage. It challenged it.<\/p>\n There were sleepless nights and long stretches when the business followed them home. Decisions did not end at closing time. Pressure did not stop at the door.<\/p>\n \u201cIt forced us to become a better married couple, which allowed us to be better leaders,\u201d Dave said.<\/p>\n One image stayed with them. When they came home, they learned to take their shoes off at the door and leave the business there.<\/p>\n Inside, they were parents and partners.<\/p>\n \u201cThat boundary saved us,\u201d Susan said. \u201cWe made the decision to always prioritize our relationship with each other and our children.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n READ: DOWNTOWN TAMPA DEVELOPMENT & REAL ESTATE NEWS<\/a><\/p>\n Inside the house, roles shifted.<\/p>\n They were no longer operators or decision-makers but parents and partners, responsible for the life they were building together outside of work.<\/p>\n They also learned to focus on their strengths. Susan led culture, hospitality and design. Dave focused on systems, growth and risk.<\/p>\n The balance worked because it had to, and because each trusted the other to lead in their area of strength.<\/p>\n Their children, both in high school, grew up in the cafes, doing homework at tables and watching work happen in real time.<\/p>\n They heard conversations, saw effort and learned what commitment looks like before they could name it.<\/p>\n Responsibility was not taught explicitly. It was observed.<\/p>\n Faith as foundation<\/p>\n Faith runs quietly through everything they built.<\/p>\n \u201cWe felt like it was a divine leading to start a business that would do good in the world,\u201d Susan said.<\/p>\n That faith was tested and refined over time.<\/p>\n Coffee is grown in some of the world\u2019s most impoverished regions. The distance between the cup and its origin was not just geographic. It was structural.<\/p>\n From the very beginning, Dave and Susan were committed to sourcing coffees in ways that would help farmers thrive.\u00a0<\/p>\n They developed direct relationships with smallholder farmers and importers who valued transparency and integrity.\u00a0<\/p>\n That led them to Long Miles Coffee in East Africa, one of their first partners and one they still work with today.\u00a0<\/p>\n What mattered to Dave and Susan was not just quality but philosophy.<\/p>\n Long Miles paid farmers differently. They invested year-round. They built relationships hill by hill, year after year and invited roasters into that accountability rather than shielding them from it.<\/p>\n Through that partnership, Dave and Susan saw what happens when incentives change.<\/p>\n Irrigation systems appeared. Processing improved. Knowledge spread. One farmer taught another. Then another.<\/p>\n They remain committed to that work in small repeated ways, cup after cup and year after year.<\/p>\n Over the years, Buddy Brew has quietly supported local and national organizations focused on disaster relief, anti-human trafficking, foster care support and community programs across Tampa Bay.<\/p>\n \u201cWe just try to be a bright light wherever we are,\u201d Dave said.<\/p>\n A pattern emerged in how decisions were made. Their philosophy took shape through action rather than declaration.<\/p>\n Brew good. Do good.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s how we decide,\u201d Susan said. \u201cNot just what we do but how we do it.\u201d<\/p>\n Coffee is what they do. Love is why they do it.\u00a0<\/p>\n What remains<\/p>\n Today, Buddy Brew operates eight cafes, a roastery and cold brew production facility<\/a>, distributes nationwide, employs<\/a> more than 130 people and clears over eight figures a year, yet the business still turns on decisions made up close.<\/p>\n What started with trust in a stranger and a coffee can lasted because that trust never stopped at the counter.\u00a0<\/p>\n Stay Informed<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"On the first morning they opened, Dave and Susan Ward did not own a register. Instead, they placed…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":140823,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[24110,4364,3090,6184,25800,39121,575,7269,687,6652,585,135,1703,52537,7682,137,136],"class_list":["post-140822","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tampa","tag-business-growth","tag-community-impact","tag-dining","tag-downtown-tampa","tag-entrepreneurship","tag-family-owned-businesses","tag-food","tag-leadership","tag-restaurants","tag-small-business","tag-south-tampa","tag-tampa","tag-tampa-bay-business","tag-tampa-bay-business-news-and-top-stories","tag-tampa-bay-hospitality","tag-tampa-headlines","tag-tampa-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/140822","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=140822"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/140822\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/140823"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=140822"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=140822"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=140822"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Susan](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/Untitled-10-15-728x410.jpeg.optimal.jpeg\")
Susan and Dave Ward, co-founders of Buddy Brew Coffee, prepare coffee at the original Kennedy Boulevard location. Photo courtesy of Evan Smith.<\/p>\n![\"Susan](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/Untitled-10-16-728x410.jpeg.optimal.jpeg\")
Susan and Dave Ward, co-founders of Buddy Brew Coffee, sit outside the Hyde Park location in Tampa. Photo courtesy of Evan Smith.<\/p>\n