A Montana coffee road trip, roaster's cafe to roaster's cafe

The route in one paragraph

This Montana coffee road trip follows three highways: US 93 down the west side from Whitefish to Hamilton, I-15 north from Butte to Helena and Great Falls, and I-90 east from Butte through Bozeman to Billings and Laurel, with a detour on Montana Highway 1 to Philipsburg. Every stop is a cafe run by a Montana roaster we list, at the street address that roaster published. We give no drive times, because roads, weather and passes decide those, and we give distances only where Wikipedia states them.

Hours change by season. The ones below were published on September 27, 2026; check again before you set out.

Leg 1: US 93, the Flathead to the Bitterroot

Wikipedia puts US 93 at 287.919 miles in Montana. It runs through Whitefish and Kalispell, along the western shore of Flathead Lake, which Wikipedia calls the largest freshwater lake west of the Mississippi, then through Polson, Missoula, Lolo, Florence and Hamilton. Drive it north to south and the coffee runs in order.

Whitefish and Columbia Falls

Start with the roaster that has the earliest published start date of any we list: 1981. Montana Coffee Traders roasts at 5810 Hwy 93 South, in the farmhouse with the chuck wagon, and runs the Roastery and Cafe there on weekdays. Come on a Tuesday morning and book the roast tour and tasting ahead. Its other cafes are at 110 Central Ave in downtown Whitefish and at 30 9th Street West in Columbia Falls.

Missoula

Missoula has five cafes from roasters we list, so plan a morning.

• Black Coffee Roasting Company, 525 E Spruce St: the roastery cafe, open mornings every day, all certified organic coffee.
• Drum Coffee, 1000 E Broadway: a cafe with its own bakery, open daily.
• Hunter Bay's Toole Ave Cafe, 812 Toole Ave, Suite D: fresh coffee from the Lolo roastery three times a week, and locally sourced food.
• Florence Coffee Company, 2205 Brooks St.
• Mazevo, 2500 Brooks St, roasted in Billings.

Florence and Hamilton

South of Missoula, Hunter Bay's roastery sits at Lolo, where the Bitterroot Valley begins, but it publishes only a PO Box, so there is no door to knock on. Keep going to Florence, where Florence Coffee Company began as a single stand in 2003. Its Florence shop is at 5495 US Highway 93 N.

End the leg in Hamilton at Big Creek's Hamilton Coffee House, 301 W Main St., in a corner building with 1904 oak floors. Big Creek roasts in Victor, at 1105 US Hwy 93 N, but that building is a roastery and office, not a cafe.

Leg 2: Philipsburg and Butte

Philipsburg is a mining town platted in 1867, and Wikipedia notes that Montana Highway 1 passes through it. Philipsburg Coffee Roasters roasts inside Granite Gathering Grounds at 1118 W Broadway, a coffee bar with seating and a free meeting room for up to six people. The roast names, Beaverslide, Hay-Lo, Vaquero and Black Angus among them, come from the ranching in the Flint Creek Valley around you.

In Butte, where I-15 and I-90 run together through the city, Florence Coffee Company does all of its roasting. The roastery address is not published, but two of its shops are: 815-819 S Montana St and 2551 Harrison Ave. Ask for a bag of the Miner's Blend, the dark roast Florence named for Butte.

Leg 3: I-15 north to Helena and Great Falls

Wikipedia gives I-15 in Montana a length of 396.030 miles, running through Butte, Helena and Great Falls. Take it north for two stops.

In Helena, Fire Tower Coffee House at 422 North Last Chance Gulch roasts its organic beans in house and cooks food to order, Monday to Saturday mornings. Florence has a Helena shop too, at 2102 N. Last Chance Gulch. Helena is also where Morning Light started roasting in 1988, but its roasting moved to Great Falls in 1989.

That is where you finish the leg: the Morning Light Cafe at 1701 9th Avenue South, at the roastery, open daily for coffee, breakfast and lunch, with a 20 percent military discount. Its Charlie Russell Roast shares a name with the painter Charles M. Russell, who moved to Great Falls in 1897. Florence's Great Falls shop is at 615 Smelter Ave. NE.

Leg 4: I-90 east, Bozeman to Billings

Back in Butte, turn east on I-90, which Wikipedia puts at 552.54 miles in Montana. It climbs over Homestake Pass at 6,375 feet on the way to Bozeman and crosses Bozeman Pass at 5,760 feet before Livingston.

Bozeman and Big Sky

Bozeman has the most cafes on this trip, so it has its own guide: where to drink Bozeman roasters' coffee. The short list: Treeline's Roasting Room at 624 North Wallace and its cafe at 136 West Main Street, Ghost Town's Bridger Center roastery cafe at 104 Bridger Center Dr. and its downtown cafes on East Olive and West Beall, Rockford at 18 East Main Street, and Mazevo at 7715 Shedhorn Dr. If you swing south to Big Sky, Treeline runs a cafe at the base.

Billings and Laurel

In downtown Billings, Rock Creek Coffee Roasters roasts inside its shop at 124 N. Broadway. It is open weekdays and Saturday and closed Sunday, so do not save it for the last morning if that morning is a Sunday.

Mazevo started in a Billings garage and has four Billings cafes: 1405 38th St W, 3911 Central Ave, 819 Grand Ave and 2204 Grant Rd. It also has a cafe in Laurel, at 401 1st Ave S, Suite C, which opened in September 2023.

Every stop, in trip order

Bring a bag home from each stop

The best souvenir of this trip is a bag of beans from each roaster. Every one pays wages in a Montana town, from a shop crew in Butte to a family roasting in Philipsburg, and that is the reason we built our club around them. Read the full case on our support local page.

When the bags run out, Last Best Coffee Club keeps the trip going at home: a 12 oz bag from a different independent Montana roaster in each box, every 2 or 4 weeks. Start with your first bag free; you pay $7.99 shipping on that first box, then $16.99 a bag.

Sources

• Wikipedia: U.S. Route 93 in Montana
• Wikipedia: Interstate 15 in Montana
• Wikipedia: Interstate 90 in Montana
• Wikipedia: Philipsburg, Montana
• Wikipedia: Charles Marion Russell
• Cafe names, streets and hours: our Montana roaster profiles, written from each roaster's public pages, read September 27, 2026