WEST

Westrock Coffee Co

A beverage-solutions company that makes coffee and tea extracts, concentrates, and ready-to-drink products for big foodservice, retail, and convenience-store brands — a "brand behind the brands." It began in Rwanda in 2009, when former Alltel executive Scott Ford built a coffee mill to help local farmers earn fairer prices, before opening a roasting plant in Little Rock, Arkansas, and acquiring S&D Coffee & Tea in 2020. Its name echoes the old Alltel cell-phone carrier, a nod to its founder's telecom roots.