Thriving With Coffee: The Story Of Our Local Coffee Shop
This past year, while many businesses struggled to adjust their operations, move online, and navigate many restrictions and mandates, a few thrived above the expectation for a brick & mortar business.
Vereda Central in Oakville was one of these businesses.
Having opened the doors of their flagship store in Kerr village in 2018, Juan and Laura threw themselves into their community and brought freshly roasted Colombian coffee to the heart of Oakville.
This year, when a large chain location (think mermaids…) pulled out from its longtime home in the Upper Oakville Shopping Centre, Juan and Laura found themselves with the opportunity to expand their business and grow into a spot that already had the demand, while offering a significantly unique take on the typical Oakville Café.
We sat down with Juan and Laura to discuss how they are growing their business and how it impacts their community.
How does Vereda differentiate from the big coffee chains?
“We are an independent coffee roasting company concentrated on working directly with coffee growers all around Colombia. These growers only produce specialty coffee beans and once shipped to us, are roasted onsite in Kerr Village, freshly every week.”
How do you source and pick your beans?
“We travel the country and go to specific regions where coffee is harvested, we take samples to our lab in Bogota from many different farms, where we test the beans and taste them so we can grade them.
Based on the grade they get, we directly pay the coffee growers quality bonuses. We do this every harvest season and it's an important way we can help support the local economy in Colombia as well as here in Oakville.”
How did you grow your business through the trials of the last year and a half?
“We were lucky to already have a base of customers that were fans of our coffee, so when the pandemic hit we had our website up and running already! Thankfully, it was easy for our customers to go online and purchase or order for curb-side pick up.”
What's the hardest part about being an entrepreneur?
“The endless hours you pour into your project with absolute no certainty that you are doing the right thing. The everlasting uncertainty of not knowing whether or not you are going to be able to make it that month. This is why a regular job is so appealing, regardless you will have your pay in your bank account. For us, the joy of what we do has been a pretty great reward to compensate for the insecurity of it all.”
What's the greatest joy you get from running your own business?
“When you look back and remember all you have been through and see that people today enjoy your hard work and happily come to you for their morning coffee or their business meetings.”
What's one thing you want all of your customers to know about you?
“How much we care! We would want them all to know just how much we care for our business, how much we care about our coffee growers, our staff but most importantly, how devoted we are to our customers, we will go out of our way as much as possible to make them feel amazing, at least for a few minutes of the day while they drink their coffee.”
This year, don't forget to purchase some locally roasted Colombian coffee from this award winning cafe and coffee roaster!
Throughout this transition and growth period, our team at Small Business Ontario has been thrilled to help Juan and Laura develop their brand and create effective graphics that support this growing business.
