I am very excited for this Founder Friday! When we talk about coffee shops we often talk about culture, authenticity, and relationships. I have the immense pleasure of presenting to you a conversation with someone whose business and way of operating in the world of coffee exemplifies those things. Today we are talking with the dynamic Jackie Nguyen, founder of Cafe Cà Phê, a ground breaking Vietnamese coffee shop based in Kansas City, MO.
Jackie is a first generation, Vietnamese American, daughter of a refugee. Born and raised in sunny San Diego, California. After graduating California State University, Fullerton with a BFA in Musical Theatre, she moved to New York City to pursue a career on Broadway. Some of her favorite jobs were performing on stage with Reba McIntyre, Ashlee Simpson, many holiday seasons with How The Grinch Stole Christmas the Musical and most recently traveling the country with the Broadway Revival Tour of Miss Saigon.
After ten years of being a New Yorker, ten International and National Broadway tours, she decided to take a career pivot, relocate to KCMO and pour her heart into Cafe Cà Phê. Spending 8 years of being a barista, a trip to Vietnam last year, and a yearning for entrepreneurship, the idea of a Vietnamese coffeeshop was born.
I have had the honor of having Jackie as a client since the start of her business and am so excited for you to hear the story of Jackie and Cafe Cà Phê's mission, development, and impact on the KCMO community and beyond.
In this conversation we cover:
Links:
Episodes to listen to next:
281 : The Vietnamese Coffee Revolution w/ Sahra Nguyen of Nguyen Coffee Supply
279 : Founder Friday! w/ Daniel Brown and Nephthaly Leonidas of Gilly Brew Bar
199 : Founder Friday w/ Mario Jimenez of Banana Dang Coffee, Oceanside, CA
086 : Founder Friday w/ JoEllen Depakakibo / Pinhole Coffee
097 : Founder Friday w/ Erica Escalante of The Arrow Coffeehouse
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Systems, efficiencies, and optimizations of your business are needed elements to make sure it is healthy and thriving. There is, however, a dark side of optimization. When taken too far and left unchecked it becomes obsessive and starts to drain the life from the very thing it was meant to serve.
In today's shift break we will discuss over optimization and how to balance your pursuit of systems and efficiencies with the heart of what makes your coffee shop run.
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People open coffee shops for many reasons. Some good and some-not so good. It really all depends on how you approach the "why" behind your business that determines your success. In a time where the barrier to enter the coffee house space is quite low we see a deluge of new cafes opening and quickly struggling then closing due to a lack of proper preparation born from a lack of proper mindset going into it.
On today's episode we will be chatting about five of the most common reasons people open a coffee shop and why they might not be the best reasons for beginning this journey.
1. The Dream
2. My Own Business
3. The Money Maker
4. The Community Hangout Space
5. The Vanity Shop
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223 : Building a Financially Resilient Business w/ Andrew Carroll
239 : 5 Best Practices for the Best Small Business w/ Henry Lopez
202 : Mastering your Finances and Accounting w/ Keila Hill-Trawick of Little Fish Accounting
202 : Mastering your Finances and Accounting w/ Keila Hill-Trawick of Little Fish Accounting
242 : A Conversation with James Hoffmann
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Every shop has that one barista that seems to attract more attention the the rest. The comment is made by customers often about this person that they are my "favorite" barista. The question is, is this a good thing or a bad thing? Well as with any situation involving people-it depends.
Today we are going to be discussing how we should approach and react to the issue of the "favorite barista" in a way that creates an improved experience for staff and customers alike.
Listen to these episodes next:
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Running a coffee house is all about making sure you are able to serve the needs of your customers and to do so consistently. In order to do that you need to be able to not only listen to them but you need to know how to then respond to what they say.
For a ton of coffee shops there is either not enough listening going on causing the cafe to miss out on service opportunities, or there is too much where the shop ends up doing everything they hear the customer say out of fear they might lose them. There is a better way.
Today we will be discussing the art of listening to your customers and how to determine what to put into action so that it serves both their interest as well as the interest of your shop.
We cover:
Episodes to listen to next:
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We like to be in control. The shop is your baby and you have all the authority in the world to assert yourself into the operations and correct things you see that are off. Trouble is that this is not always helpful and often can create more problems and confusion. Today on shift break we will be discussing the need to exercise self control and create structured communication in order to effectively solve problems, address concerns, and support your staff.
Listen to these episodes next!
109 : Leadership Abandonment Syndrome : Lack of development in senior staff and what to do about it
261 : The Basics of Managing Managers
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The best espresso machines in the world!
"Vietnam is the future of specialty coffee!" Today we are going to unpack this statement and discuss how the Vietnamese coffee movement is creating opportunity for a marginalized coffee variety and people with our very special guest, Sahra Nguyen!
Sahra Nguyen is the founder & CEO of Nguyen Coffee Supply the first-ever specialty Vietnamese coffee company importing and roasting in Brooklyn, New York. On a mission to transform the coffee industry through diversity, inclusion, and transparency, Nguyen Coffee Supply has been featured in the Wall Street Journal, VICE, New York Magazine, New York Times, Forbes, Fortune, and honored with the 2019 StarChefs Rising Star Award. Early January 2020, Imbibe Magazine featured Sahra Nguyen as one of the #Imbibe75 -- people, places, and directions that will shape the way you drink in 2020. She is a Gold House Collective Founder for Spring 2020 cohort, a leading network to celebrate and elevate the Asian American community.
In this conversation we get to hear the story of how Sahra founded, grew, and now leads Nguyen Coffee Supply on a mission to flip the script, change the narrative, and create a place in specialty coffee for Vietnamese coffee and coffee culture.
We cover:
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256 : Founder Friday w/ Varat Vichit-Vadakan of Roots Coffee Roaster in Bangkok, Thailand
247 : Founder Friday! w/ Ritesh Doshi, CEO of Spring Valley Coffee, Nairobi, Kenya
236 : Founder Friday! w/ Meil Castagna-Herrera & Curtis Herrera of Cafe Corazon!
209 : Founder Friday! w/ Linda Thach of Little Skips, Brooklyn, NY
171 : Founder Friday w/ Matt Chitharanjan and Namrata Asthana of Blue Tokai Coffee Roasters in India
279 : Founder Friday! w/ Daniel Brown and Nephthaly Leonidas of Gilly Brew Bar
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Time and color in the roasting process are inextricably linked. We are fairly used to using time as a tool but what about color? Turns out that the color of your coffee is actually one of the most important but under-utilized, and poorly tracked metrics for determining flavor in the final roasted coffee. On this 5th edition of the Rate of Rise series we are going to be talking with Morten Munchow, the co-author of the Roast Magazine article: Flavor Development-The Relationship Between Time and Color in Coffee RoastingMorten Munchow To help us dive into this
Morten Munchow is the Founder of Coffee Mind a coffee roasting academy, research, and consultancy company based in Denmark. Morten is a scholar of biology who through over ten years of intense practical and scientific research and application gained a unique insights that have pushed the specialty coffee industry forward worldwide. He is a sought after speaker and presenter having published several papers in scientific journals.
In our conversation today we will be discoing the relationship between time and color and how we as an industry need to start regarding color and its subsequent tracking as a primary tool in creating consistency, quality, and serving a product that delights our customers
We will cover:
Links:
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RoR #1: A Conversation w/ Anne Cooper of Equilibrium Master Roasters
RoR #2: Exploring Quality Control w/ Spencer Turer of Coffee Enterprises
RoR #3: Making Contingency Planning a Reality w/ Andi Trindle Mersch of Philz Coffee
RoR #4: Practical Thermal Dynamics w/ Candice Madison of Royal Coffee / The Crown Oak
Interested in coffee consulting? Let's talk! Email me: Chris@keystotheshop.com
When we seek to change things in our coffee shops we often underestimate the amount of time and investment it will take to actually turn things around. I have experienced this both in my consulting as well throughout my career in cafe management helping cafes scale and refine operations.
On this shift break we will be discussing how to approach making big changes to your company in a sustainable and effective way.
Episodes to listen to next:
Communicate, Duplicate, Repeat : Key habits that make information stick
191 : Retraining your Staff on new Standards
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265 : Gaining Clarity on Transparency w/ Jonas Lorenz of The Pledge
072: Taking an Origin Trip w/ Kim Elena-Ionescu : How to go to origin in a mutual beneficial way
060 : Serving the Coffee Plant w/ Hanna Neuschwander, World Coffee Research
140 : A conversation w/ Erika Vonie, Director of Coffee at Trade Coffee
237 : Thoughts on Post -COVID Coffee
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