Long Live the Brotherhood (LLTB) — A Road Trip to Bonefrog Coffee

The interstate stretches long enough to think. Somewhere between Portland and Wisconsin, with 1,600 miles of asphalt ahead, I realized I could detour three hours north. Not for business. Not for a meeting. Just because another Navy SEAL veteran was roasting coffee in Redmond, Washington, and something about that felt worth the drive.

His name is Tim Cruickshank. LCDR, USN SEAL (RET.). After 25 years operating at the highest level, he built Bonefrog Coffee on a simple principle: honor the fallen, support the families left behind, and do it one roasted bag at a time.

I pulled up to the building at 7:30 AM, having driven from Gresham, Oregon the night before.

The Moment You Recognize Your Own

There’s something fundamentally different about walking into a room with another SEAL than with anyone else you might work with day to day. It’s not that you need to explain yourself. You don’t. There’s an unspoken understanding that runs deeper than words. You’ve both lived the same life, just in different chapters, different deployments, different stories. The foundation? Identical.

It’s like reading a book and then reading the sequel. Same universe. Same rules. Different eyes telling the same truth.

We sat down, and within minutes, the traditional jokes started. The insider references. The things that only make sense if you’ve been there. We didn’t need to compare credentials or prove anything. We already knew.

Team Guy, Then Yourself

In the SEAL Teams, there’s an order to operations: team gear and equipment get cleaned, inventoried, and stored first. Then your personal gear. Team first. Always.

That mentality doesn’t disappear when you take off the uniform. It just shows up differently.

Talking to Tim, I recognized it immediately. Not in what he said, but in how he operated. Building something from scratch. No massive overhead. No corner office surrounded by bureaucracy. Just a guy with a vision, the discipline to execute it, and the awareness to bring in the right people when he needed them.

Tim’s built a roastery with a dedicated team, sourcing premium beans, roasting, packaging, and ensuring every bag meets the standard. I’m on the technology research and development side, flying solo, building web platforms and optimizing digital infrastructure for federal contractors and small businesses. Our worlds shouldn’t have much in common.

But Tim runs a tight, mission-focused operation. I operate solo on the tech side. Both of us refusing to hire just to hire. Only the right people for the mission.

Tim handles sourcing, brand design, and the overall vision. I see where technical improvements can make that vision work. He’s great at what he does. I’m useful for what I do.

That’s the veteran entrepreneur mentality. You recognize your lane, you own it, and you respect someone else’s enough to get out of the way.

Quality Over Quantity

Tim walked me through his facility. Cases of K-cups. Roasting equipment. And something that struck me immediately: there wasn’t a ton of inventory sitting on shelves.

“I like them to be sold and out the door before they’re even legal,” he told me, gesturing at the K-cups. “I only make what I anticipate selling in the next week.”

That’s telling. Not just about business efficiency, but about commitment to quality. Fresh roast, premium sourcing. Every bag had to hold the same standard he’d carried in uniform.

I’ve tasted a lot of coffee branded by veterans. Good coffee, some of it. But Bonefrog? It’s not just superior to every other veteran-branded coffee I’ve tasted. It ranks among the best from any major brand.

That’s not coincidence. That’s sourcing relationships most roasters don’t have access to, combined with one of the most acclaimed roasters in the industry. Tim didn’t cut corners. He built the right relationships and hired the right person for the craft.

The Stories Behind the Blends

Tim pulled out bags of coffee. Different roasts, different stories.

Each one had a name tied to something in the SEAL community. Missions. Events. People who mattered. There was the Bonefrog Blend (Medium Roast), the Goat Locker (Very Dark), the Door Kicker (Light Roast), and The Sisterhood, a special reserve honoring the spouses who hold down the home front while operators are deployed.

I joked with him: “Where’s the cake brew for the officers?”

He laughed. Because he got it. That’s the kind of conversation that only happens between people who’ve actually lived it.

But here’s what really stood out: every single customer gets a handwritten thank-you note. Not a printed label. Not a form. Handwritten. Every time.

That’s not business logistics. That’s tradition, honor, and gratitude showing up in the actual product delivery.

Watching a Leader Operate

About halfway through our conversation, Tim brought up something on the computer and then asked to hop on a quick video call with some of his team.

I watched him work.

The way he communicated, the caliber of people he’d brought in to support his vision. It was clear this wasn’t just about coffee. It was about building something that would outlast him and serve a mission bigger than himself.

That’s the SEAL framework applied to civilian life. You lead by example, build people up, and trust your team because you’ve learned that trust is the only thing that scales.

The Gift

Before I left, Tim handed me a bottle of wine from his winery, another venture, another passion project. But the real gift was the coffee: a custom curated, Scottish-themed family heritage blend. It smelled like the best of the bunch, though picking one from what he had wasn’t an easy decision. I’m bringing both home to my wife.

But the real takeaway isn’t the wine or the coffee—it’s the reminder that there are other Navy SEAL veterans out there building businesses, supporting their communities, and operating with the same discipline and mission focus they learned in uniform. Some are roasting coffee. Some are building technology platforms. Some are doing things nobody’s ever thought of before.

And when you run into one? You don’t need to justify what you’re doing or why it matters. They either get it, or they have faith and trust. Either way, the connection is already there.

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If you drink coffee and want to support a veteran entrepreneur and the families of fallen SEALs, Bonefrog Coffee is worth the order. Start with their coffee collection and browse the blends. Each one has a story. Or grab a gift box if you know another operator who’d appreciate it.

Tim’s on his own adventure. I’m on mine. And somewhere down the road, our paths will probably cross again.