What We've Learned... So Far

I cannot believe we’re already nearing our 6 month birthday. It has been a wild ride thus far and I can only assume things will continue to be as surprising, tumultuous, exciting, exhausting, and 100 other feelings. They say every day is a new day, well whoever “they” are, they must have been a business owner because we have seen so many different versions of days already.

The first big lesson? You might think you’re prepared but you’re not, and that’s ok. We forgot napkins on our first day and still don’t have them! Dozens of you have heard me use the same corny jokes when I hand you a piece of paper towel but I love how that little bit of improvisation has broken the ice between so many of us because we’ve all been at a family dinner and used paper towel instead of holiday themed napkins because mom had a thousand other things to get ready and forgot to get them. We struggled for the first six weeks to stay on top of inventory, especially retail coffee, because you all blew our doors off from day one supporting this crazy dream, and we thank our lucky stars every day that we found this amazing community to share our passion with.

Lesson two? Coffee industry people are incredible! We’ve both worked in coffee for a long time but neither of us realized exactly how much other coffee professionals want to help each other succeed. Whether it’s other coffee shops sending customers our way, or local roasters bailing us out with emergency coffee orders, or previous employers lending us extra furniture, this industry is full of top shelf humans and we owe so many of you all the props. We hope as we continue to grow that we can repay those kindnesses and pay it forward to the next round of new coffee pros.

Hardest lesson? This may shock you but finding work-life balance is pretty damn hard when you start a new business. We have definitely struggled to leave work at work and still have to concentrate a great deal of effort on having a life outside of Gratitude Coffee. Our friends and families have been incredibly understanding and supportive. Thank you for coming to visit us at work because we have zero energy left after work! As we start settling into something resembling a routine, we are finding small pockets of time to life together and it’s amazing how much you take that for granted. Thankfully our favorite thing to do is make coffee and talk about it so we do get plenty of joy every day thanks to all of you.

So what about the lessons we haven’t learned yet? As business continues to grow we find ourselves talking about what that means for Gratitude. We’ve tossed around the idea of adding a person to the staff (we’re not there yet), finding a way to have something resembling health benefits (this has to happen before we hire, because we want to have them available for anyone who eventually works with us), and expanding our business in some other, additional direction (more coffee education, online sales). The great thing about having a coffee shop is you never know who is going to walk in and give you a nugget of advice that changes everything. Thank you to those of you that have done this for us already. To anyone else reading this, if you see something or know something that you think would help us, please don’t be shy. We are new at this entrepreneur thing and will take all the tips you have to offer.

Are we sore? Yes. Are we tired? Absolutely. Do we feel like the stress is going to kill us? If not kill, seriously incapacitate. Would we trade it in? Not a chance! This has been the most rewarding experience either of us have ever had. Getting to know you all these last few months has been so special. You’ve shared your victories with us, you’ve trusted us with your tears, we’ve hugged, we’ve laughed over answers to the weekly wall questions, you’ve shown us your bank statement with our name all over it. For every anxiety induced meltdown we’ve had since this started there have been hundreds of happy tears shed for all the love we’ve felt from you. We hope our little space has provided some small comfort to you as it does for us.