Small Town Joe

Interview with Kellsey Butler, loyal customer at Vero Espresso House
By: Cassandra Brewer

Why do you come to Vero Coffee Hose versus Starbucks or another chain coffee shop? I go to Vero all the time. I love it. It is super “home-y”. It is really comfortable and cozy. It is a lot more of an inviting environment, especially for homework. Starbucks is awesome but I just go there to hang out and drink my tea but that is about it. I would never go there to do homework. Vero is a lot easier to stay at all day and complete your work.

Would you say you’re a loyal customer? How often do you come to Vero? I would absolutely say that I am a loyal customer. Especially this year since I only live two blocks away. This term, I would say I come here at least two times a week. I stay here for several hours. I usually get here around seven or eight in the morning and stay until one or two in the afternoon.

Do you like the “home-y”, local coffee shop feel here? Yes. It is one of my favorite parts about Eugene. This is a place that I won’t ever really get to go to outside of Eugene. That is why I love coming here all the time. Like I said, I go to Starbucks every once in a while, but here, I come on a regular basis to do my work. It’s nice to see a similar crowd come every time I’m here. It is just really comfortable and I love coming here.

Do you see the same kind of people that are here? Do you see familiar faces? Yes. When I come here, sometimes I come at seven am right when it opens and there is always these three really old men. There are old couples that are super cute that come in and I really enjoy seeing that. During midterms and finals, I’ve noticed that it is always super crowded and I tend to recognize a couple people.

How are the people that work here? Do you feel like they’re nicer compared to other places? They are definitely different. With places like Starbucks you can always expect really happy, customer-friendly people. But here it’s really nice because there are different personalities and it’s really laid back and kind of quieter. But there are really nice people here.

 

Interview with Joshua Henrickson, owner and manager at Cush Coffee Shop
By: Cassandra Brewer

What would you say is the most rewarding part about owning your own business? Being able to affect people’s lives and the customer interactions that you have. Being able to enjoy time with them and grow and create relationships. You get to see families change over the years.

What do you think your business brings that larger chains, such as Starbucks, doesn’t bring? What do you think that you can provide to your customers? I think a real sense of community and space to share. Family in times when there is a lot of difference between families. Small businesses come together and that is one of the most beautiful things I think about small businesses. They bring the community together and it engages people. A business like ours, where it is an artisan based business, it allows us to really share the arts and our fundamentals for the arts and grow the arts, which I feel like is really being lost in today’s society and a lot of educational systems, as well as in our cultural every day lives.

 Would you say you do that with the live music and the poetry? I think with the live music, the poetry, the live art, the artisan coffee, we inspire people here on a daily. Creating as a community is that in which we are helping to enhance it.

Would you say that this is where you are happiest? I am definitely happy at work. I love what I do. Art was definitely why I started the business—so I could enjoy working. A lot of people, I think, go into business with the idea of making money and I went into business more with the idea of developing my art and the community around me and creating a space where people could be happy, as well as myself—to be happy and enjoy life.

What does it mean to be able to roast your own coffee? With coffee, I feel like it is one of those things where the more control you can have on the process, the better your coffee is going to be. If we could be growing coffee, I think we would be, but Oregon is a very difficult state to grow coffee in. In the future, perhaps, that is something we could do.

 

Interview with Aaron Chester, Owner of Perk Espresso
By: Ryan Rouillard

When you first got the idea to open this place, what went into that and what kind of things were you looking to get out of it? Let’s see. I was running vintage clothing stores at the time or vintage and resale; both the Luxe next door and Kitsch down the street. I missed coffee so I had been thinking about it. I always thought this space would be a great space for a coffee shop because it had a place next door. What went into it? Yeah, we just kind of worked on figuring out a place to great a good community.

This is a town that has a lot of different small coffee shops. Did that help you make the decision (to open the shop), seeing that so many were able to succeed? Really, the majority of them have shown up in just the last few years. Previously, I think about 5 years ago, we probably had a third of the coffee shops we have now. And no, that part didn’t factor in because I know coffee costs and I’ve dealt with it long enough. Coffee costs have doubled again recently and it’s nowhere near the profit maker that it used to be. You have to want to do it.

If you had to single out one thing that keeps you coming back every day, what is that? People. Dealing with people in the community that I have that I’ve built up a lot of friendships and so has everyone else. It kind of turns into a living room of all the people that you want to see, so it’s a brilliant place to sit, be with friends. We have different groups that meet here after hours and do things, and game nights and music nights.

What kind of character did you want this place to have and do you feel like you achieved it? I wanted it to have a small local feel and I wanted it to feel like a coffee shop. Not a specialty coffee bar. I wanted that comfortable, kind of vintage cliché that you think about when you think about the cup of coffee. I wanted it to feel like that and I think we’ve done a pretty good job of it. I think just being friendly has made a huge difference.

 

Interview with Miguel Cortez, Manager of Espresso Roma
By: Ryan Rouillard

What’s your favorite part about running a place like this? Well, I like to be involved with making the coffee drinks. Second, I like working with the campus because 80% (of customers) are young people, kids, young fellas, students. I’m not young anymore, but I feel like they give me the strength to seem like them. I feel happy with them. I don’t see myself too old when all the students come here. I feel, like, involved with them.

What are some challenges of owning a place like this? The challenge is to keep the same type of service and making the same type of coffee all the time. Sometimes, some workers make not good drinks. I need to check and supervise what kind of drinks they’re making. It’s hard sometimes. My wife and I, we make the pastries. It’s no matter what kind of experience you have for the pastries. Every single day is a new day. You’ve gotta practice and practice no matter if you know exactly the recipe. You need to be very careful to make the same pastries. Every single day, we’ve gotta prepare to make them better or at least the same. One little thing, you make a mistake and the pastries change.

What do you think about Espresso Roma makes it so that you’re able to compete with Starbucks? Well here, I am not afraid. I don’t care. They’re a big monster. I’m very little, very small compared to them but I’m not afraid of them because I am really good at making good drinks. Since I have good coffee beans, I know how to make the drinks. So long as I have the coffee beans from my family’s roast, I don’t have to be afraid of anyone. I can compete with every company, everyone.

So you’re happy doing what you’re doing? Yes. I am very happy with this.

 

Interview with David Buzanski, General Quality Control and Training Manager at the Wandering Goat
By: Madi Weaver

Can you give a brief explanation of what the Wandering Goat is? Our coffee shop is located in the heart of the Whitaker neighborhood, and I think that that really defines us as a coffee shop. We’re always a bit more on the fringe and a little bit more alternative. We’re probably the coffee shop that’s open the latest, at least originally we were. When we got started there was really nothing like this that had a late night environment with shows and live music—just a place you can go to hang out . . . in addition to having high quality coffee.

Why do you think being local and community focused are so important to the Wandering Goat? The focus on the community for us kind of comes from the location. Our owner was always a part of the Whitaker neighborhood when he started the coffee shop, and I think he had this idea for a really welcoming venue for people to come and also get good coffee. I think that our owner would say that he really just wanted to give back to the community that he was already really involved in. So he started out working at Sundance local foods and a lot of those people started the Goat with him. He was already involved in the community, he was playing shows around town, and he just saw a need for this coffee shop environment that a lot of big cities already have. It also really helped us to be working with the community. We have really good relationships with a lot of the small grocery stores.

What do you see being in the future for the Wandering Goat? We’re really focused in solidifying the roastery as our identity. A lot of people know that we have a coffee shop, but they might not even know that we roast our own coffee. Sometimes people don’t even know that we’re from Eugene. We have this kind of conflicted, mixed identity in Eugene. I think we’re really trying to focus on getting more accounts, getting our coffee out there, working with other businesses, and I think eventually working on getting more cafes and expanding within Eugene. I’d say the vision was never one that was really set in stone. It’s a family business—it’s kind of just “let’s see where it goes.”

 

Interview with Brian Skinner, Customer and gardener for Cush
By: Madi Weaver

What got you involved in Cush in the first place? Well I help with the garden in the back mostly, and I’ve known Josh for several years. When he opened his original shop, he immediately wanted to have a garden there. Opportunity presented itself to collect materials to do that, so that’s what we’ve been doing. We collect scrap wood from wherever we can and use the resources that we find – we have some pretty crafty people around here. One guy comes out and collects random finds all the time, and it all creates a different kind of atmosphere.

What do you think it is about a local coffee shop that brings the community together rather than a typical Starbucks? The creativity that comes with it. Inherently, with something that’s a corporate owned business, everything from the design to the recipes is kind of sent down to you from the top and that’s a big difference than all of this where it’s organic and ideas grow organically, basically.

Do you get coffee anywhere else or do you like to stick with the coffee served at Cush? Oh, sure. I mean, I even get coffee from the coffee booth by my house, but this is the best coffee around.

What do you think it is that sets this coffee apart from others? The attention to detail and love of the trade that Josh has for it.

Do you think this is what he expected from the shop? Is it more successful than he anticipated? I think this is definitely what [Josh] wants – the community atmosphere that people can work and make creative ideas and get good coffee at the same time. Coffee shops have been the hub for creative thinking for years. The music is one of the main staples. We’re trying to create an atmosphere of creativity, and there’s nothing better than that.