The Audacity to Believe You Can Build A Successful Art-Inspired Coffee Studio

Sometimes, the critical first step to launching a business is having the audacity to believe that you can be successful. George Davis Jr., the owner of Muse Coffee Studio in Chicago, shares his entrepreneurial journey and the work it took to achieve the milestone of launching his small business. Starting with an abstract vision for a soulful coffee studio, Muse is an art gallery styled coffee mosaic in Chicago's Near West Side neighborhood. In our conversation we explore the feelings of self-doubt, get to the starting line, identifying what truly differentiates your product, and more.

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[Music]

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welcome today i've got george davis uh the owner of mu's coffee shop here in

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chicago how's it going man everything's good man thanks for having me i appreciate it

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so uh just a little bit of introduction you've got a coffee shop um here near west side of chicago

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great music great vibes great art from chicago most importantly great coffee

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um where did you find your passion for coffee how did that start

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interestingly enough um i actually found myself

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with a much stronger connection to coffee shops before i even liked coffee on that level

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um and i i would say the seed was probably planet and undergrad um i went to clark

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atlanta university um and when we were out there you know we we

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share a library with the spelman and morehouse and you know i mean it gets cracking in that i used to call it club

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foodie uh a lot of the little restaurants that was right there on campus you know they

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perfect for you know those those late night you know food runs and all of that but like i

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used to always think man it would be dope if we had a coffee shop you know what i'm saying so we go

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study talk um but it not be

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you know as restrictive as the library or as chaotic as you know some of the

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restaurants or little hangout spots would be you know what i mean yeah yeah so it was something that i would always

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think about but but really just in a very abstract type of way right

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and then once i really started to drink coffee which wasn't until grad school

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um it started as like gas station coffee just you know having something that

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wasn't an energy drink wasn't a red bull but you know something that that would keep us up for the study study groups

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you know what i mean related study sessions or whatever and um you know i would i would get the coffee

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and dump so much flavor creamer and all types or whatever just so i thought it'd be palatable you dig right

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and from there kind of just grew to like all right well let me let me see what real coffee's supposed

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to taste like you know no disrespect to gas station coffee but you know it

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that's kind of what it what it what the interest was sparked and then when i started to check out coffee shops like i said it really was more of a connection

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with the different spaces that you know i would go in um and less of a of a desire to really

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you know i got i never had never gone into a place and was like all right let me i'm gonna try everything on the menu or

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you know let me let me taste this coffee and see how it compares to the other coffee that i've had it really would be like man this

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space is dope you know what i'm saying me thinking like what what would my

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space look like you know what would my story be you know once i had an opportunity to to

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kind of get on that side of it so that's what that's where it was sparked and then that's kind of how it

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evolved man no that's awesome so so

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you you fell in love with the idea of just a cool spot that served coffee i know that's that's

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really cool tell me about your as you were thinking about what your

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space would look like what what what were your goals like what were the things that

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you were super passionate about the space looking like how did you create your vision honestly

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for me it was less about what is the space gonna look like and what what is this space gonna make people feel

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um and so a lot of it would be you know kind of like a mental pinterest

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board you know what i mean like we and my wife would go to a spot and be like man this is dope but it's missing

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this and then i'll kind of make a mental note of it or and that's fly but if if if i was doing it i would do it like

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this you know what i'm saying and i make a mental note on it and then you know it got to a point

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where i had enough of that kind of just up here and then again it's just

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wanting to tell my story you know what i'm saying and share the things that inspired me and

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that really was the the biggest piece of it you know what can we what can we put in the space

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that um really speaks to [Music]

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what what inspires us creatively and by us i mean you know my wife

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my kids my guys that i grew up with you know what i'm saying you know

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my family you know anybody who has touched my journey in any type of way you know what i mean

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like that's what i think about and so it's like what what kind of space will we enjoy

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what kind of space um what could we put in a space that we would want other people to engage with

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that we want other people to experience you know what i'm saying and so that's sort of how we built it and it

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was it was kind of from like the experience out yeah how how do we want people to feel when

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they come and how do we want people to feel when they leave yeah and then we just kind of put the pieces

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together from there how would you because i i've been in the shop i love

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the space i was telling you the other day i want to try to come in there on a weekend where i can sit down not after i got

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killed by my trainer and he can barely walk but um

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how would you describe the shot to to to the listeners to people that have never been there

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um man how would i describe mu's coffee studio

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it's it's an experience it's um for me

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it is both sort of a piece of art and a blank canvas you know it is

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uh the intersection of you know the music the art the

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the books the um you know all the things that sort of inspired me

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and then the blank canvas piece of it is like you know what when you come in

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with your colors you know what i'm saying like what what is that gonna look like once you

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experience you know space you know what i'm saying what what

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how is how is that going to add on you know what i'm saying what what when you come on that weekend and you sitting

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there and you're like man okay i could see i could see this happening

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you know what i'm saying and you start to get some ideas going right you know what

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i'm saying and it's it's so many customers who come in and they're like man i got this thing that i don't even

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use at the house anymore it would be perfect for here you know what i'm saying people come through

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um customers like yo have you ever heard this song last time i was here you was playing

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this artist that reminded me of this artist you know what i'm saying are you familiar and they put me on stuff you know what

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i'm saying so awesome from that perspective it's like you know it's a

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it's an exchange it's a conversation you know what i'm saying is it's me

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and and my piece of it and then yeah and your piece of it you know yeah

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no i love i love the fact that you you've been so intentional about the feeling that people have

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and it's not a one-way feeling right like you're you're

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you're allowing your customers to influence your experience of the of the studio itself too so that's really cool

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that's really i haven't heard someone talk about their business and

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their space in a way so that's that's really cool um so so let's you know this podcast is

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really focused on um entrepreneurs what it's like to start a business

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how do you get over those fears those challenges um the things that you don't expect so

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kind of as you had this vision of what it felt what you wanted the space to feel like

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right um and it being kind of centered around this experience where people could enjoy

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coffee and do their work and exchange ideas what was your first action

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to turn this into a real business i really the

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the audacity to believe i could

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what did that look like for you that was you said what what did that look like for you

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man so you remember i said i it was something that i thought about and then talked about enough that it it really

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was abstract and so yeah that first action like the first real action was

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sort of grabbing all those abstract pieces and actually saying all right

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you can actually do this what i'm saying this is something that could actually happen

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if you stop treating it like it's abstract and actually eat it like it's something that that can

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materialize and so having having that

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sort of confidence from the beginning was helpful because along the way

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you know i bumped into so much self-doubt just in terms of like you know you you hit one milestone

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during the process and it's like okay you know we we got from a to b

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cool but then you start looking at you know p q r s down the road and you're like

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man getting from point a to b felt felt easy

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or felt or felt like all right i could do that but then you like you

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got a lot got a lot of more steps to go and so you know

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starting from that place of like this this can happen this can be a real thing

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and you you can do it right that i feel like that was the first step

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because without that i would still kind of just be talking about it as like a yeah i'm gonna have a coffee shop one

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day yeah yeah i'm gonna do that one day you know what i mean yeah yeah what um so as you as you got

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through action a b c and you're kind of riding that wave because because everything is

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momentum right so so that's snowballs rolling what was the first rock that you hit

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what was that p or q where you're just like oh you start looking around um

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so you know we we had the extra challenge of doing this

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during the pandemic and so when we initially started our build out

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process we were scheduled to get started maybe the third week of march

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2012 uh yeah okay and so

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we had been planning we had you know submitted our drawings to the city

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you know rocking and rolling yeah and then everything shut down like literally

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a week if that before we were you know before the guys were supposed to get to work

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right build out and so you know that was the first thing i was like all

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right what's what's gonna happen yeah and you know the reality in that

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moment was that like we had we had come too far to stop you know what i'm saying yeah cert

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checks had already been cut you know yeah already paying rent

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so you so you guys have already signed on the space you were paying yeah yeah and so

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it was like all right well let's let's let's just kind of stay close yeah closer than you

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know we would have and and pivot where we need to pivot adjust what we need to adjust and so

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you know we we included a pickup window which wasn't a part of the initial plan and because of that

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you know that that meant that we had to add a bar that wasn't a part of the initial plan right um right

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which took away from space that we initially thought we would have for seton but again it's a whole pandemic so

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we don't even know if people won't be able to come inside anyway so who needs to see you understand yeah exactly uh

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and so i would say like that was the first like

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whoa moment yeah right there yeah i mean it's it's it's so fascinating like you have this

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once in a lifetime once in a generation once in a century event right

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that literally shuts the world down how i'm just

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thinking about where my mind would go how did you did the thought of

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is this a sign ever pop up in your mind where it's like is this a sign that we gotta stop

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like did you ever have any any doubt that was kind of so macro or meta

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that that that made you rethink things honestly

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i again for me in that moment it it it wasn't so much

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is this a sign we should stop it really was more like

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we've come too far and and and you've invested too much

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energy yeah into into getting to this point right here

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and so you know i knew it was a race to the start line you know what i'm saying like we weren't even

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racing yet you know what i'm saying like this was us trying to get to to the start

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um and so it was like it certainly

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was an obstacle and it certainly was was scary but at the same time it's like

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for me personally because i you know i'm i'm naturally an introvert i'm not you

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know i had never worked in coffee before you know what i'm saying so

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the fact that i had gotten to the point to where i was making real progress on it

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it took a lot to get there yeah and so i i would say the fact that we had a

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space that we actually could build out on was signed enough that it was supposed to happen yeah that running

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into that first bump and and running into the fact that man the world could be shut down like

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at that point it just was like we doing this yeah let's let's let's just let's put

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our dancing shoes on you know what i'm saying and figure out figure out how we gonna do this but we definitely gonna dance because yeah

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we are we already at the party yeah so so you talked about the work to even get to the starting line like what

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how did you guys land on the location um how did you even find the space yeah

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again to to you to your last question you know all of these things were just lining up

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to where it was hard to look at

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some of the obstacles as science to not do it because again we had gotten

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to where we were yeah first place and so we live

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maybe about six blocks away from um where the shop is

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yeah and our our realtor who you know we have been working with

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for [Music] six seven eight years and i'm saying he he is the one who helped us find our

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house and we had talked to him about it and so just was like you know keep your eye

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open for any you know space um if anything close comes because

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when we were talking to him about it again it was still abstract it was still just like you know

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gassing yourself into thinking you're making progress by just saying out loud like yeah we want to open a coffee shop

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let us know if anything is available right you know what i mean and so when he would send stuff over we

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would be like all right it's worth checking out and we would look at it and be like you know that's when that self-doubt

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started to kick in and and the things that were abstract that are

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now a reality because you're standing in the middle of a space looking at it and you you're looking at actual numbers or

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like what it's going to cost to right to be in that space

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and it's so easy in that point to be like nah it's not it's not time yet it's not time right

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and so the fact that this this space just popped up on the market you know

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what i'm saying after we have been in this neighborhood for so long um and we went and checked it out and

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you know it looked like what we needed you know what i mean and we had some back and forth

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conversation and you know decided that okay we'll we'll we'll wait

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we'll wait about you know six months give it half a year let's see where we are

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yeah and then a couple months after that the agent who showed us the spot

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reached out and was like man i've always wanted to get into gallery space where you guys were here i know you were talking about

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you know you know in the coffee shop let's let's let's

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share the space you know what i'm saying i can do my art in the back you do your thing in the front we share

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the little area in the middle um for half the half the rent

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i'm like it's hard to beat that you know what i'm saying so you know again

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all these things just kind of started to line up in a way that was just like

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hard to hard to ignore or minimize in that way right

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right so at that point it's like you you either gonna do it or

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or you're not yeah and i love i love the the idea of

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sometimes those casual conversations even though they're abstract just those casual conversations with people

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those people are taking you serious so those people are going to be your

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your allies that are just saying oh yeah there's a space that popped up you know they see an article and be like oh i

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think this would be really cool to hear you know a garage sale and they find something

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that's really dope that aligns with what you said the the power

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of that being momentum i think can be underestimated sometimes

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absolutely awesome so so let's so you got the shop open um you got through the pandemic right um

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what was those first couple weeks those first couple months

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what uh what surprised you what things what what things did you not expect what what challenges arose that

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you were just like didn't know that i'd be dealing with this again it's it's weird

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because you know the the whole time you know you're building out

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because that was my first time dealing with any of that kind of stuff when you're in the thick of it you know

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what i'm saying like your head is down you're kind of just just doing it yeah

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so it's hard to see it when you're doing it yeah so by the time i actually was open i i

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hadn't even really had a chance to to look up to be like man i'm actually open you know what i'm

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saying kind of like a continuation from

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building out and getting stuff ready to actually serving coffee

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yeah so that first week those first couple weeks it was mostly me

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trying to shake off the the anxiety of like

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you know are people going to be able to tell that i've never had a job in coffee you know

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what i'm saying is this yeah is this a steam one gonna be so loud

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on this milk that somebody's gonna be like you don't know how to do that

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you've never worked in coffee sir uh so

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a lot of that first couple weeks was me you know almost like looking over my

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shoulder while i'm making drinks to see if you know and like

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do they do they know that are they judgmental you know what i'm saying and then serving people and then kind of just

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trying to watch to see how you know how they react when they when they're experiencing the drinks

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um and so yeah a lot a lot of those first couple weeks was

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me really trying to balance that that that fear

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and and have it balance more with like

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the confidence that that i i actually do know what i'm doing

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yeah yeah i think you so what's so fascinating to me and i think it's

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it's pretty dope to think about is like you said you hadn't really worked in coffee

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before but in your mind the vision for this business was the space so in many ways

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the value prop is the space right yeah and and you're you're you're kind of learning

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developing the coffee aspect of it but at the end at the same time

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and i think you see me do this like while you're waiting for your coffee you're just kind of looking around you're like oh that artwork is really

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cool yeah i think i think the other day i asked you about a record play that you have there like like it's it's

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it's i can understand the self-doubt creeping in

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but what you built this around was really what people were focusing on

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at the same you know at the end of the day and that's kind of fascinating to me well because to to me

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coffee is a commodity you can get it anywhere yeah from the gas station to you know

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what i'm saying the big chains to all of the local spots

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um and so by no means am i saying it's a side dish

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right but you know if you have a coffee shop and you don't have that piece right

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forget about it right right right i mean and so yeah obviously i wanted to make sure that

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i got that part right right yeah but in my head it's like once you get

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that part right that's that's it's done that's yeah that is

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covered you know what i'm saying now you have to really focus on the experience because

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what's going to keep people coming back um

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because i'm i'm i'm not delusional to think that you know what i'm saying i got some

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magic cup of coffee that's gonna you know what i'm saying change the world but i know i know i know our stuff is

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good don't get me wrong it is yeah very much so you know what i'm saying like yeah yeah

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nella latte yeah yeah everybody got that you know exactly

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everybody don't have our playlist though everybody don't have you know the art that we have everybody doesn't have

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um just the the vibe that we've put together and so that's the part where i was like

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all right where do we want to get our beans from our first stop was the place that was

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was one of our favorite places you know what i'm saying so we we reached out to them um it's metric we get our beans for

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metric um they were easy to talk to they were

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responsive they were you know what i'm saying very open to sharing information

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in a way that was just like i just met y'all and y'all telling me you know

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out the gate just being very transparent and so it was like i'm not going to keep looking and

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confuse myself or you know what i'm saying overthink it like this is working all right what's the

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next step you know they work with me on kind of building out what the menu should look like

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we put some drinks together people tasted them and said

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do it and so i'm like all right that track check you understand yeah

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yeah repeat repeat that process every time somebody orders this and then that part is covered you know what i'm

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saying so it the the to me it really was about

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how can we make this space a place that people want to want to come back to

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yeah it can't just be the coffee can't just be the coffee yeah so so

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i like how you say you know coffee is a commodity right um especially in chicago you can find it

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you can find a coffee shop every corner right i used to go to metric before i discovered your shop because it's on the

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other side of my house right right um so

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how did you approach attracting people to your business and kind of just

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building a customer base given the fact that people that usually make coffee runs

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already have a coffee shop that they go to yeah i mean a lot of it is the community a lot of it is the people who live in that

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area who just walked by saw that we were there walked by maybe heard the music

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came in you know what i'm saying um social media is a big part of it

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people stopping in posting about us tagging us you know other people seeing

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a lot of word of mouth um and then like i said that

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and being able to you know it's a it's just it's it's a small shop

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and so being able to have conversation openly with folks and and really

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have that immediate feedback in some instances um

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good or bad you know what i'm saying because if somebody comes in and they're like man

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that mirror is dope i'm like all right we did that right yeah

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okay yeah got it got it you know somebody's like oh man where'd you get that picture from

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that's one of the homies you know what i'm saying you should check them out and in the back of my mind all right got

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it got it yeah so if if i'm if i'm able to see all right

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people really like the art then i know all right what other art do i need to you know

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incorporate into space how can i how can i kind of continue to

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um elevate those elements and so in the almost nine months that we've been there

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you know we've added some pieces uh and every time we add something people

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notice it and so it's it's it's really that

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that opportunity to say all right what have the people

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been appreciating about this space um and noticing okay that's what's bringing

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them back you know people like people like the lavender i i didn't i didn't know that lavender

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was a big deal like that you didn't understand until people were like man this this this is jamming

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and so now i'm like all right well how else can we keep using the lavender you know what i'm saying so we

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put it with put it with the matcha put it with the chai you know what i'm saying and just kind of

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continuing to evolve and and kind of build off what people are already appreciating

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um and then that just creates that organic you know word of mouth

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like i can't tell you the number of people that's like they'll come in

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man people been talking about this lavender latte all along the facebook group let me get that

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all right cool let's do it you know what i'm saying like yeah somebody come in man my cousin been telling me about this

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space i live right down the street even though y'all was there so like i haven't i haven't even really had to

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do any marketing yet um because we we've just really been focused on that organic growth and

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making sure that you know what we have is not only enjoyable but sustainable

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because the minute we start really pushing it like that and we start really getting a

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bunch of foot traffic in there and a bunch of people in there you know we we have to be able to sustain

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what what people enjoy because that's again that's what's going to keep

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people coming back yeah and i love that i love the fact like [Music]

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in like the tech startup space people always talk about traction traction traction and and get listen to your

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customers and i think it's no different from you know brick-and-mortar shop right like a place where you walk in i love

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that you're listening to customers and whatever form of feedback that comes

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you're translating that into okay i'm gonna do more of that i'm gonna do less of that and that kind of

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brings people back because it shows that you're listening um so now that's that's awesome so so

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talk to me talk to me a little bit more about kind of sustaining right like you said

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you said you want to make sure that as you implement these things one you listen to your customers your customers

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are liking it you want it to be sustainable what does muse look like five years from now

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man that's a good question i think um

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honestly because i people people have asked um you know would i be interested in

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opening another shop somewhere else or you know opening a second location

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austin nine months in and crazy as cool as that sounds

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we put so much of ourselves into this spot it's hard for me to even wrap my mind

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around how to recreate that somewhere else because i you know i

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what makes it special is um how personal a lot of a lot of the stuff

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is and so you know in five years

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i i don't know if it's another location or [Music]

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just you know i i could certainly see doing like a coffee truck um and having

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the opportunity to be mobile in a way that you know you don't have to recreate that same space but have something that

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allows you to carry some of that that um carry some of that personality from the

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shop around the city you know what i'm saying i could see um five years from now having a

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sort of a larger piece of the the the merchandise pie um

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doing more collaborations um to where you know we were able to work with

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different artists different um musicians different different creators to kind of just build

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more on the merchandise side um maybe

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putting ourselves in a position where we can have you know certain things in-house you

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know a studio or something like that where people can actually come create yeah um

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you know maybe maybe we five years from now me and you doing our own podcast or something from yeah

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right there in the front you know what i'm saying so yeah i really wanted in five years to be able to

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continue to just add branches to you know what we've planted right now

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um continue to grow that in a way that we can like i said branch off to start

33:49

doing more more of the creative stuff that that the space

33:55

sort of exists to inspire if it right no no that's no that's

34:02

that's dope i i i i love the idea of the evolution of the space right and what because it's still

34:09

centered around the space um you talked about how personal the shop is

34:18

but at the same time it's your business it's not you right so

34:23

how do you manage the separation of those two things how do you integrate the hectic lifestyle of an entrepreneur

34:32

with family life but then also keep it separate so that when you have a bad day at home doesn't mean a bad day

34:38

of business a bad day of business doesn't translate to a bad day at home um

34:44

honestly because i i

34:49

it's funny you say that the hectic life of an entrepreneur

34:55

because honestly i i honestly thought it would be easier

35:01

to wear that badge you know of an entrepreneur but it

35:08

like i said i i've i've been so non-stop that it it's hard to even really look at it like that and so

35:16

it really just feels like i'm getting up to go to work not necessarily

35:21

you know what i mean like obviously i know i don't have to go in and clock in or or

35:27

ask anybody can i leave or anything like that you know what i'm saying but it still it still doesn't necessarily feel

35:34

like um what it is if that means at all so

35:41

in some ways it's easy to to have that separation because i know

35:47

um i it's time to get up trying to get dressed trying to go to work when i'm in there you know i i'm

35:54

experiencing it the same way you are so you know i come in i cut the cut the

35:59

music on i'm feeling better whatever you know what i'm saying like if

36:05

if it started out as a tough morning you know by the third song

36:14

um uh you know i i make myself a cup of coffee you know

36:21

what i'm saying now i am feeling a little more on point you know what i'm

36:27

saying and so you know i'm i'm looking at the art i'm you know thumbing

36:33

through some of the books you know some of the magazines uh and so

36:38

from that perspective i'm experiencing the same thing in the same way that everybody else is

36:45

um and then when i leave i go straight to pick the kids up

36:51

so it's easy to say i when i leave here i'm gone yeah you know

36:57

obviously there's times where i have to you know order inventory and do you know stuff

37:03

that i wasn't able to do while i was at the shop because i'm you know serving customers and so i couldn't just lock in

37:10

on a computer to do some of that sort of administrative stuff some of that stuff you know i get back

37:16

to at the end of the day or you know just really make a note to get it done when i get in

37:21

the next morning but it's easy to disconnect when you got two kids telling you they need to hear

37:28

you know some kids pop jam uh

37:34

one of them want apple juice the other one one you know sour worms or something like that like

37:41

i'm not thinking about the coffee shop at that point yeah i'm trying to keep these kids from

37:47

driving me crazy and so you know from that perspective it's easy to have that separation because

37:54

when i'm when i'm when i'm out of there i'm all the way in you know dad mode

38:01

husband mode um and then

38:06

once once we get them down you know i can maybe tap back into

38:12

shop owner mode you know right start getting some more stuff done um and so from from from that

38:19

perspective is i've i've managed to kind of make that

38:24

in and out transition fairly easy yeah no it's

38:30

i love what you said in terms of you're enjoying this space just as much as i am right like

38:35

you know you're getting work done in your shop because you enjoy it right it's it's

38:41

that that's that's that's awesome like i'm gonna be real with you one of my biggest fears right now is that

38:48

somebody i'm gonna end up on somebody's instagram story dancing while i'm you know putting a

38:54

drink together because sometimes you really do get locked in and i'm you know getting the drink ready

39:00

and i'm i'm um you know uh outstanding something to come on this

39:06

thing man oh you know what i'm saying

39:11

i'm all the way in i bet you the customer would love it too it's nothing better than some coffee

39:17

made with love i'll be having to catch myself sometimes like bro you got to relax like

39:23

yeah keep it together kind of in this experience i was becoming an entrepreneur doing you know

39:30

doing coffee for the first time what's something that you would say you wish you knew

39:36

before you started what i wish i would have known specifically is

39:43

um how much or how quickly i would get to the point where i felt

39:49

like i definitely need you know the extra pair of hands around it around the spot um because again

39:58

at the beginning i'm so heads down just trying to just trying to keep the ship moving

40:05

yeah um that i it it's hard to see

40:10

all of the waves you know ahead of you because yeah you know i'm just

40:16

sure staring the ship um yeah so once we really got to rocking and

40:22

rolling you know again it that felt like it just melted into

40:28

[Music] um waiting for the permit getting the permit and the license and

40:34

then literally three days later i'm serving coffee

40:40

yeah and then you know that was really supposed to be kind of a soft opening

40:46

and then you know again the word of mouth and the people posting about it and you know somebody's

40:52

like oh he he opened all right we we up there and that that kind of just melted into just

40:59

like we we open when people like it they love it everybody everybody's welcome come

41:04

through and then next thing you know it's october so it's like

41:09

um if if i would have known at the beginning like all right

41:16

you're gonna be here every day you might want to start making sure you have yourself in a position that you can

41:23

have help you know um that would have been clutch to know that

41:30

but yeah everything just kind of was moving so fast and it still is you know what i'm

41:36

saying that by the time by the time you look up because you feel like you're drowning

41:41

um it's like oh wow it's you know we open january 18th officially

41:50

you know snow outside it's cold whatever next thing you know it's

41:56

april yeah like okay wow it's about to be our first summer

42:01

you know what i'm saying next thing you know it's august summer

42:07

all right well let's let's see if we can figure out some some seasonal drinks what are we gonna do for this the next

42:13

day you know it's you know already middle of october and so things move so quick

42:19

that by the time i look up you know that's just another thing to to just navigate to say all right now you

42:25

know you need help how you how how are you gonna find it because again

42:31

everything has been so um

42:36

so so personal just for like a better word i know i keep repeating that but you know when people come in and they

42:42

ask about certain pieces you know i know the answer because yeah i know where we got it from i know why we put it there i

42:49

know what it means and so that that's not an easy thing to just pass off to somebody else

42:56

yeah that makes a lot of sense and so that that that part gets a little tricky

43:01

you know yeah yeah no that's no that's a that's a interesting point especially given how

43:08

personal it is i can imagine bringing a new person on

43:13

that's hard because you can't replicate that passion yeah um

43:18

and and and in some ways you know in some ways that's like

43:25

i think about like mcdonald's right like if you watch the founder movie they talk

43:30

about how the original brothers didn't want to franchise because they thought the quality was going to go down yeah

43:35

and it's the same thing it's like that experience of being able to have a conversation and explain the story behind a piece of art

43:43

you lose that um that's an interesting interesting problem like i didn't even i

43:50

hadn't even thought about that no that's very interesting um all right so so what is this

43:57

i'll hit you with a couple rapid fire-ish questions um but feel

44:02

free to expound or take your time with it um because they're probably hopefully they'll make you

44:09

think and and rack your brain a little bit um

44:14

what's as a as a

44:19

entrepreneur that's kind of been through not only starting the business

44:24

going through the process but then also going through a once-in-a-lifetime pandemic

44:32

what advice would you give someone else who's thinking about or is aspiring to

44:37

be an entrepreneur what helpful advice would you give them i have the right people around you

44:45

um people that are not only going to hold you accountable but also

44:51

um offer you [Music] the type of support you need when you need it

44:56

because sometimes it's not the resources sometimes you just gotta vent you know what i'm saying and you need them people

45:01

around you this will let you just talk your yeah and then tell you all right

45:08

you're done get back to it you know what i'm saying

45:13

um having having the right people around you that will not only allow you to you know

45:21

get out what you need to get out but are also willing to pour back into you

45:27

um that that that's clutch

45:32

yeah because it is one thing to to believe in your vision

45:37

it's something completely different to have other people that believe in you what i'm saying yeah

45:43

i can't i can't tell you the number of times that you know people people like

45:49

yo what are you doing where are we at what's what's going on what you need

45:54

yeah nothing all right so what's up what you doing exactly yeah yeah it humbles you but it

46:02

but it also it also pushes you to keep going so i would say

46:08

keep keep the right people around you yeah okay i like that

46:14

um what coffee are you making yourself or are you ordering if you're a customer

46:22

man if so it's interesting because

46:30

every day it could be something different if if somebody comes in and orders

46:36

you know the lavender matcha by the third time i'm making it i'm like

46:41

i need one of these you understand i need one um it's that's that's one of those

46:48

drinks that after a minute i can't keep making them and not have one myself yeah if it's

46:54

just if it's just me and i'm coming i'm probably getting the the buena gente

46:59

which is the brown sugar latte okay um because it's it's simple

47:05

it's not super sweet um it has the the the right amount of

47:11

you know what i mean razzle dazzle i think i might have to order that the

47:17

next time i'm in the shop i gotcha um what's your favorite to make my favorite

47:24

to make for a customer honestly my my favorite is probably the matcha just because

47:30

people are always surprised to see me doing it the the traditional way you know what i'm

47:36

saying my little whisk in my little bowl you know what i'm saying and so uh

47:43

you know i i it's it's weird

47:48

and interesting and i have my own little thing in my head where it's like man i'm i'm in here dressed like a rapper

47:55

listen up matcha you know what i'm saying i i i enjoy i enjoy putting those

48:02

together what um favorite album

48:07

i'll be easy i won't say song favorite album to make coffee too

48:13

ah man if i had to say album probably

48:19

the roots do you want more

48:25

because it has it has it has the a nice little balance to it you know what i'm saying yeah

48:31

either that or um hiatus coyotes last album

48:37

what type of entrepreneur would you be most interested in listening to on the podcast i probably would be most

48:43

interested in hearing um i so again

48:50

i hate to be long-winded about it but the whole thing the whole thing behind muse

48:56

um in itself is just my particular appreciation for the process

49:01

and so i am borderline infatuated with what with inspiration in general you know

49:07

what i'm saying i'm i'm the guy that loves the song

49:13

but i want to see the studio session i want to see what went into

49:19

getting them lyrics i want to see what went into you know producing

49:24

the track who said that why they do that you know what i'm saying and so i think for me

49:31

i would really be interested in hearing um

49:37

hearing an entrepreneur talk about just their process you know what i'm saying whether it's somebody in fashion

49:43

somebody um in in music you know i i love hearing those types of stories

49:51

yeah all right i like that um we've got uh

49:57

i've got i've got i've got an episode coming that i think you might be interested someone that owns a

50:03

uh a fashion store um so yeah i'll definitely when i'm

50:10

supposed to record it next week so i'll once it's out there i'll i'll direct it and i'll send it to you

50:16

um all right last question uh and i'm still listening i see you got the trap golf going on

50:23

i would love to hear his story yeah i absolutely love to hear his story

50:29

um i gotta find my way to him i gotta find my way to wayne

50:34

yeah i would love to hear that how that came about um that like that's the type of stuff that that

50:42

keeps me locked in you know what i'm saying how how how does one land on trap golf you know what i'm saying

50:49

yeah that's fine um all right my last question and i'm gonna steal this one from all the smoke

50:55

um the the uh podcast with uh stephen jackson and matt barnes um

51:03

who should i have on on the podcast and of course you gotta help me get that person on the podcast

51:14

um so since i've since i've been open you know i've

51:19

been able to meet a lot of dope people um in the coffee space

51:24

just in the in the in the creative world um

51:30

specifically uh this this group uh the grocery run club

51:36

okay they do great stuff um in the in the community with um

51:42

and i think they got their start doing the pandemic tool um really just making grocery runs for people who

51:49

who need it oh that's awesome um yeah continued to grow you know what i'm

51:55

saying they helped manage a couple community gardens um so i i think they would be dope

52:01

um to to have a conversation with and then one of the homies who's just been a a

52:06

huge resource um for me since i've been in this space uh melissa

52:13

who does everybody's busy [Music] crazy with the um

52:20

just with the not not only in the coffee space but

52:25

like her product line yeah bananas what i'm saying so i think

52:30

she would be dope to have a have a conversation with just to tap into you know what goes into

52:37

creating creating a real brand identity you know what i mean i love that no i i would love to have

52:45

them on the show and i'm uh i'm a big oh i'm gonna bug you to get them on

52:52

or broke an introduction at least yes no man uh no this is incredible man i

52:59

really appreciate the time this was uh just a lot of gems a lot of nuggets man

53:04

i i can i can see all the the content and the quotes coming coming together man i

53:10

appreciate it and i appreciate you for uh for having me yeah for sure

53:16

[Music]

Full audio interview: https://tinyurl.com/yhnn32k5

Full video interview: https://youtu.be/ckvUtWi6V0o

Connect with George: https://www.musecoffeestudio.com/

More helpful content: https://www.behelpfulpodcast.com

Start Your Side Hustle: https://www.yencil.com

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