Does RoasterTools do roast profiling?

No, and it does not claim to. It handles orders, production paperwork and the books; the curve happens in Artisan or Cropster on a different machine. Which is fine, and also the reason most RoasterTools roasteries are paying two bills. Compare the pair, not either half.

Is RoastConsole cheaper than RoasterTools?

On the software alone, only if you are small. Both rate cards are public so you can check this yourself. Under about 450 lb a month we come out cheaper. Above it they do, and it widens: at 5,000 lb they are near $199 where we are near $390. What that number leaves out is the roast, which they do not do. Add the Cropster or artisan.plus bill sitting next to it and the two totals land close together. Compare the pair against the pair.

Do you integrate with QuickBooks?

Partly, and we would rather be precise than encouraging. The QuickBooks connection itself is built — you can authorise your company file — but pushing invoices into it is the next piece of work and is not finished. Xero is the path that works end to end today, alongside Stripe for card payments, and there is a public API and webhooks if you want to bridge it yourself. If QuickBooks invoicing has to work the week you sign up, buy something else for now.

Can I keep using my own wholesale ordering portal?

Yes. Orders can come in through the API or through Shopify and Square, so an existing storefront or portal can keep taking orders while production, stock, and invoicing happen here. What we do not have is a customer-facing wholesale portal of our own, which RoasterTools does.

CompareRoasterTools

RoastConsole as a RoasterTools alternative

RoasterTools is good at the half of the day that happens at a desk. It does not touch the roaster. So the useful question is whether you want the batch you just dropped to be the same object as the invoice it eventually pays for, or whether typing it twice is a cost you are happy to keep paying.

Credit where it is due

What RoasterTools does well

Wholesale ordering built for the customer, not just for you

We both give wholesale accounts a portal to order through, but theirs is the more developed one: dynamic discounts, order reminders, exclusive products and white-label options on top. If your accounts already order that way and the selling motion depends on those extras, that is real and we are not going to talk you out of it.

QuickBooks Online sync

RoasterTools syncs invoices to QuickBooks Online today. We connect to Xero and Stripe, and QuickBooks is part-built: you can authorise the connection, but invoices do not push to it yet. If your books are in QuickBooks and you need that working this quarter, they have it and we do not.

Shipping and fulfilment integration

Shipping is wired into the order flow, with ecommerce order imports and carryover tracking on the production side. It is built by people who have clearly watched wholesale orders go out of a door.

Cheaper than us on sales and operations alone

Their rate card is public and, past roughly 450 lb a month, it undercuts ours: $199 covers 5,000 lb where we would be near $390, and the gap widens with volume. Unlimited users come on every plan too. If sales and operations software is the whole of what you need, they are the better-priced answer and we would rather you read that here.

The honest limit

Where the record stops

RoasterTools is not roasting software and does not present itself as any. That is a coherent choice, and it is also the whole of the difference.

The roast happens somewhere else
No live curve, no profiles, no connection to the machine. Somebody roasts, then walks to a computer and enters a number that came from Artisan or a notebook. Two records, kept in step by a person who is also trying to get the afternoon batches out.
No cupping or quality record
Cupping scores and sample evaluations have nowhere to live. That matters the day a wholesale buyer asks why this year's Guatemala tastes different, because the answer is in a notebook and a spreadsheet rather than attached to the lot they are asking about.
Green is stock, not a lot with a history
There is green reporting, but no moisture, density, screen size or defect count, and nowhere to record the pre-purchase sample that told you whether the lot was worth the money. Green becomes a quantity rather than a coffee with a history.
The price is for half the operation
Their rate card covers the desk half, not the roaster, so most RoasterTools roasteries are paying a second bill for Cropster or artisan.plus. At 5,000 lb a month that is $199 plus whatever the roasting software costs, against $390 here for both halves. Run those two totals against each other and the gap looks very different.

Side by side

Including the rows where RoasterTools wins.

	RoasterTools	Pilot · free	Cloud · paid
Pricing	$99–$2,300/mo by volume tier	Free	$79/mo base, then a falling per-lb rate
Users	Unlimited on every plan	Per Mac	Unlimited people and machines
Live curve and control	Not covered	Live capture and control	—
Roast profiles and comparison	Not covered	Yes	Shared across the team
Cupping and QC scores	Not covered	—	Included
Green physical analysis	Green reports	—	Moisture, density, screen, defects
Wholesale orders	Customer portal, discounts, reminders	—	Orders through to delivery
Customer-facing portal	Portal, discounts, reminders, white label	—	Wholesale customer portal
White label	Yes	—	Not covered
Accounting	QuickBooks Online	—	Xero and Stripe; QuickBooks connect built
Shipping integration	Yes	—	Not covered
Production planning	Yes	—	Weekly drag-and-drop schedule
Point of sale	Not in their published features	—	Counter and walk-in

Moving

If you are weighing the two

Ask what your roasting software costs you

Almost nobody runs RoasterTools alone. Add whatever you pay for roasting software to their number before you compare it to ours, and if that roasting software is free Artisan, compare it against free Pilot plus Cloud rather than against Cloud on its own.

Check the accounting question first

If your books are in QuickBooks Online and moving them is not on the table, RoasterTools has a working sync and ours is half-built. Ask us where it has got to before you spend an evening on a trial — the answer changes month to month and this page will lag it.

Bring the roast history

Artisan and Cropster roast data import directly, with CSV and JSON for lots, suppliers, products, customers and price lists. Whichever of those you have been roasting into, the history comes with you rather than staying behind as the reason you cannot move.

Questions

Including the ones where the answer is “stay”.

Does RoasterTools do roast profiling?: No, and it does not claim to. It handles orders, production paperwork and the books; the curve happens in Artisan or Cropster on a different machine. Which is fine, and also the reason most RoasterTools roasteries are paying two bills. Compare the pair, not either half.
Is RoastConsole cheaper than RoasterTools?: On the software alone, only if you are small. Both rate cards are public so you can check this yourself. Under about 450 lb a month we come out cheaper. Above it they do, and it widens: at 5,000 lb they are near $199 where we are near $390. What that number leaves out is the roast, which they do not do. Add the Cropster or artisan.plus bill sitting next to it and the two totals land close together. Compare the pair against the pair.
Do you integrate with QuickBooks?: Partly, and we would rather be precise than encouraging. The QuickBooks connection itself is built — you can authorise your company file — but pushing invoices into it is the next piece of work and is not finished. Xero is the path that works end to end today, alongside Stripe for card payments, and there is a public API and webhooks if you want to bridge it yourself. If QuickBooks invoicing has to work the week you sign up, buy something else for now.
Can I keep using my own wholesale ordering portal?: Yes. Orders can come in through the API or through Shopify and Square, so an existing storefront or portal can keep taking orders while production, stock, and invoicing happen here. What we do not have is a customer-facing wholesale portal of our own, which RoasterTools does.

The like-for-like swap

Pilot is a free Mac download.

Run it beside what you use now and compare the curves before anything changes.

Download Pilot

Only if you need it

Cloud holds the record the roast belongs to.

Green lots, production, cupping, orders, and invoices, agreeing with each other. Fourteen days, no card.

Start Cloud trial