Coffee By Thirty

Dear Tom Hanks,

Rumor has it you are planning to star in the movie How Starbucks Saved My Life. Admittedly, I know nothing of this movie other than the fact you play an ad exec who loses his job and ends up working at Mermaid Land.

Still, with a title like that, I can’t help but feel that you’re selling out to a grandiose marketing scheme. Just like Ray Charles’ last album.

Of course, you can do whatever you like; you’re a multi-academy award winning actor and generally known as a swell guy. It’s just that you, sir, have made some powerful films in your career (and you were hil-arious against Dan Aykroyd in Dragnet).

I guess I just wish better things for you than a hour-an-a-half latte commercial.

As I cleaned out my digital camera this morning, it occured to me I hadn’t posted this image.

Back in mid-February, I visited the kids from Intelligentsia Coffee for some espresso training. For those of you who aren’t familiar with Intelligentsia, they’re well known in the industry for both the quality of the beans they roast and the baristas they train. Pulling shots with Intelligentsia was both an honor and piles of fun.

We worked on pulling shots, steaming milk, and latte art. One day of hands on work taught me more about the craft than all the study of espresso had thus far.

This is what I made.

Those of you who know better can laugh; it’s really a dinky example of latte art. But I made it, and I like it.

Even though I’m not quitting, I still needed a timeout.

Everything came so close to coming together, only to have it swatted out of my hands. The whole process has taken a serious toll on my career, my family, and my well being. With nothing to show for it, I opted to take a little time to put ducks in order. No blogs. No forums. No trade journals.

It’s kinda funny - I didn’t blog for a month because I was too busy with coffee. I didn’t blog for the subsequent month because I was doing almost nothing with coffee.

Shop progress was humming along quite nicely for a while. I had a location, financing sounded promising and vendors and service providers were lined up, ready to spring to action.

Yes, Coffee By 30 was about to open. Until one morning in lake February, when I got the phone call that sent my bullet train to small business ownership crashing through a brick wall.

Keep reading The Brick Wall. »