2022: Making Moves BBY
Intro
2021 went by in a flash yet was monumental for us and the shop. We’ve definitely improved in almost every way I can think of and are in a better place than ever to continue moving forward. Despite all the issues with shutdowns, we were able to sustain through the entire year, increased sales enough to raise the base pay of all the employees $1/hr to $16/hr, and have finally, fully extricated the Retail Coffee shops finances from the Wholesale Roaster business. We also suffered a number of setbacks, lost some accounts, saw some shops close their doors for good, and most unfortunately, saw the departure of Jessica Bueno, my partner and accounts manager from the business. I feel like any or all of these things deserve blogs posts and discussions each themselves but alas, time is so hard to come by when dealing with these types of things, beyond that, finding time to keep the updates going is even more hard.
I do want to look forward from here and provide updates for things to come in 2022 and also give a snapshot of the goals we are striving to achieve moving forward.
Roastery:
As far as roasting goes, we spent quite a bit of money on the shop, the good news is we have finally moved back to profitability and are saving up to perhaps purchase a permanent warehouse space to operate out of. It’s difficult, because we want to make so many building and tenant upgrades, have multiple roasters, walk in fridge systems, a full cold brew keg brewing, filling, and cleaning operation, but it really doesn’t make sense to do so in a smaller spot we have now, or a spot where the rents just continue to raise on us, year after year. It’s been something Jessica and I discussed often and was the plan before we found the perfect spot for our first coffee shop, so.. it’s time to start that process all over again and begin saving up. Maybe 2023 would be the year for such a big move for us.
As far as coffees sourcing go, its a headache and I don’t expect that to change any time soon. Prices for everything are going up, supply chain issues have not gotten any better. I’m just extremely happy we decided to raise prices back in October. I hate doing it, always worry it will lose or upset clients but it was inevitable (unless people start wanna start drinking robusta ? hello? ) and has allowed us to continue purchasing strong coffees from good sources. If things continue to get worse with sourcing and expenses… idk. I would be forced into a very difficult position with our clients but… some things are out of my control and all we’ve been doing is staying competitive with the market so far.
Nothing special here, was just looking through my phone for some nice pics. I believe I was dialing in a grinder when I took this.
Coffee Shop:
Now for the fun stuff, below I attached some fun things we are working on at the shop. The first is our first ever P/L sheet. Its kind of sad and misleading , cause it’s only 6 weeks but I do want to check in periodically and throw this on the blog to let people know how the shop is doing and progressing.
Secondly is my rough draft for having employee ownership at the shop. It’s probably very obvious I am not a lawyer, nor have I ever done this before (I did do a YouTube search on employee owned business lol) , but I did the best I could knowing the way our business is structured (S corp) and what I thought made sense. It is included below and if anyone out there has any specific questions or reservations or suggestions feel free to email us or write them below. It’s obviously a very rough draft and I’m sure very incomplete to what it eventually will be, but I wanted to start the conversation somewhere.
Xanadu Coffee Shop Employee Path to Ownership
Madi (my daughter ) roasting some beans for Machacha Coffee
Co-op:
About the same, we still miss Eric at Mythical Coffee lol. He was such a powerhouse. But we are finding the courage to move on. We have added SPCE coffee, Jay from Rising Phoenix Brands, and have a few other accounts waiting in the wings . The reality of the situation is that until we expand or can accommodate multiple sizes of roaster, this will continue to be a smaller part of our business. Speaking of which, I have agreed to buy a Deidrich IR12 from another roaster I know in October and will be installing that roaster at the house next to our shop, at 619 N 7th St. It’s supposed to be a 24lb roaster, but times have changed so now is more like an 18lb roaster, so I am think we set it up for 6 and 18 lb roasts specifically for our coop roasting clients . That would allow me to pursue more clients as they would no longer be interfering with our wholesale clients.
Me (Left) and Madi’s (right) first ever latter art competition!