Tackling My New Workflow

Good Evening! Happy Saturday! It’s been an alright week, I’m drinking some plain seltzer water and listening to Endtroducing by DJ Shadow here at the cafe, trying to get pumped up for the rest of this weekend! It’s been busy and i’m seeing a lot of new faces! I had some highschoolers come in at 7am sharp Friday and remembered “oh yea, I almost never see this demographic with my current hours unless it’s the weekend.” I wonder how much that’ll change now that school is going again here. I’m also hearing success stories from regulars! and regulars learning each others names! It makes me feel like we’re accomplishing our mission here and that rules!

This week I put out a sign for the weekend too! I’m ready to get busier! I’m less burnt out! I want to talk about how I did that! How i’m etching time out for myself working full time here. Since as a mostly solo operation i’m responsible for a lotttttt of checks and balances.

Mastering opening and closing

One of the biggest things i’ve been losing time and sleep over is opening and closing the shop. I tell myself to get here extra early to do things like dial in and sweep/mop if I put that off the night before. I’ll tell myself to stay late and clean up because I’m hesitant to pre close or put up chairs, in case I get a rush or people think we’re closed. Suddenly I’m at the shop until like 7pm and i’m working a very physical 14 hour day. Which becomes a ridiculous 84 hour work week. I was writing these closing task lists and pre closing/opening goals, that weren’t totally perfect and so they didn’t really get used.

So I stopped using the guides, and just started trying new stuff. Pre closing in ways that made sense, staying late every day to figure out the best way to do things. Coming in with less time to force myself to sleep and do things as efficiently and quickly as possible in the morning. That worked, I figured it out, now I’m pre closing quickly a half hour before close but leaving myself space to make drinks. I’m making sure dishes are done, then putting chairs up in the last ten minutes and making room to quickly sweep and mop.

I’m making things that take a ton of time, less chaotic; For example i’m writing an inventory/shopping list and trying to shop just once a week when possible. Something else that just took some time as I tried to figure out how much I needed and when. Time is such a valuable resource for my mental and physical health, that by being efficient I’m making all this way more sustainable.

Mastering and teaching barflow

I struggled early on with all those guides because I knew I needed them but thought I had to write them before really understanding the shop. So my paper is telling me one thing and my instincts are telling me something else as I actually put plans in action. Working behind the bar for awhile and getting a feel for everything has made all that so much easier. For example, we had a whole argument about whether espresso needed to mix with syrups in cold cups before adding milk/ice. We were worried it wouldn’t dissolve without it, but didn’t want hot espresso going in plastic cups. Turns out the syrups all mixed with cold milk totally fine and it was a non-issue;

My advice would be to still write those guides, especially as a team. You just have to understand that plans change, and be clear and concise with everyone about it when they do. If you fail to communicate effectively then you’ll have conflicting information on the table. Even at this tiny level i’m working alone so much that i’m forgetting to communicate decisions. I try and recap with the team in person and on a free team app like slack, where when a shared cloud document changes. everyone is aware.

Mastering financial restraint

So I set these sales goals shortly before opening to give me an idea of whether we’re making enough day to day. We often hit these goals but there are plenty of days we don’t. I’ve found myself impulsively spending money anytime we’ve gone over our sales goal for the day, rather than saving it to account for the days we don’t hit our goal. I had a vague idea that every dollar counts, but it’s only now as i’m seeing this money stretch out over a month that it really makes sense.

I’ve been struggling to keep up with expenses, and saying out loud to myself or my partner that “I shouldn’t have done this” or that. If I had been consistently cautious and responsible with every dollar of the business, I would have squeezed by this month without being late on any bills. I’m fortunate that this is happening to me now though and i’m not making more than my goals so consistently that i’m not keeping track. It’s forcing me to pay attention, and feel every mistake.

So i’ve been getting better about allocating money responsibly, updating my guides and systems, and opening/closing in a way that doesn’t suck all my time away. I’m being confident but honest here, it’s tough. This is a step in the right direction and I feel like i’m making progress. All I need to do is etch out more steps as I find my way.

Thanks for reading everyone, enjoy your weekend : )

Settling in, Working Towards Profitability

Good Afternoon! It’s Wednesday, it’s hump day, mid week for most and day two of six for me! I’m drinking water, listening to a house music compilation ep called “Stratford Ct. | Delector”. I’m taking a break to write, it’s been a pretty steady day until now but I’m always slow around noon-1pm. I used to write blogs on Saturday, but since those are now my busiest days of the week I haven’t had time. So I’m going to answer the question I’ve been getting most this month. Today!

How’s it been? Have you been busy?

Well it’s been pretty good i’d say, all things considered. We were pretty busy in the first week or two, then slowed down for a couple weeks, and now we’re somewhat steady as people settle in to their schedule and add us in! My interpretation of that busy period, was that a lot of people were checking us out for the first time. A lot of those people left large tips that seriously helped out and made up a large portion of our income. The following couple weeks were others checking us out who drove by, and some people from the neighborhood peeking in. We had a few of our first regulars with laptops stop in to work for a couple hours here and there, them buying multiple drinks also helped out a lot.

We had to pay 1 of 2 big construction bills right after the throwdown/fundraiser, and that hurt. I spent more than I should have all at once, but it was what I needed to do. Plus! Following that, the last couple weeks were slow, but I was scraping by! I’m finding it difficult to buy enough back stock. It’s crucial that when you buy, you buy in bulk. This is to get a better margin and not waste time shopping so frequently. (Time has been crazy valuable as one person.) When you’re making just enough and then you need to buy a ton of anything it can be hard! I’m getting familiar with where to buy things locally in a pinch, and how to save money at home. Hopefully I can better handle stock going forward.

Another small thing i’m balancing financially is weekend help, even when it’s slow i’ve always had morning rushes on weekends. To make sure everyone has a good experience i’ve had help during those few hours. First it was from my partner Dakota, who with some coffee experience was able to help me take orders quickly. Dakota already had a full time job so that quickly became unsustainable. More recently i’ve had Ty who’s got a great personality for talking with people up front, but is taking some time to learn about coffee behind the bar. I hope that like with Ty, I can continue to fit people in who can afford to work the hours I have with such a positive outlook.

I’m trying not to get impatient.

I have one more big construction bill hanging over my head, all my credit is maxed, all my bills are about as big as they get, i’m working every day of the week. The thing is, this is the worst of it, probably. Once I’ve paid off that big bill and some of my debt, it will be easier. Once I have steady help, it will be easier. I just have to be there putting in the work to achieve my goals. Remembering to sleep and eat alright. The community and the neighborhood have been really positive about the shop, and I’m confident that with time we’ll be very busy.

I’m really fortunate that right away i’m making enough money to pay my own bills, many shops start completely dead. I’m fortunate that the bottom of this ladder is as high up as it is. It’s easy to look down from here and get depressed, but it’s not that low, and as the face of the shop I have to maintain my posture. I chose this to be a positive and uplifting coffee shop, so that’s what i’ll represent. This might have been easier if we were a typical drab and dark place haha. I could just look sad all the time and no one would notice. But that’s the point! I’m here to knock it out of the park with high spirits! I’ve got great people around me! I’m meeting great people every day!

That’s how i’m feeling today, thanks for reading everyone. Have a great rest of your week, - Elias

Post Party, Now 100% OPEN

GOOD AFTERNOON! Happy Tuesday! It’s the first day of my work week here and it’s been alright! I’m drinking some espresso from Social Grounds, it’s a 50/50 washed colombian ethiopian it’s great! All the crazy processes are cool but a solid washed is outstanding! Thankful they saved me with this after the Saturday rush, should have Valor back on spro tomorrow morning. Listening to homeshake, testing out some house vanilla syrup. There’s so much to say! It’s been a crazy last couple of weeks! Let’s get into it!

Party Recap!

About the food/drinks! As I told everyone in person leading up to the event, I expected around 50 people. I tried my hardest to secure free food and drinks, I tried to get lots of prizes together, for those 50 people. We ended up with wayyy more people! Like 100+ all night! But! We pretty much had enough food and drinks for everyone. I was able to stretch it by doing some vegan pizza and some booch, encouraging people to try both and take the free lattes coming out. We barely made a dent in the beer, mostly killed the kombucha pizza and lattes that went out! It was awesome. I think people were excited about tasting the latte art even if it got wrecked transferring to a paper cup.

About the giveaway! I was worried about having both enough stuff for all the guests, and enough stuff for all the baristas. I was also worried about complying with FL raffle laws. So for the guests I stressed that paid entry was optional, and threw out some free prizes. We had a ton of clothing, and it seemed like we got prizes to most of the people that entered! Plus we had a ton of raffle entries regardless! As for the entrants, we hand printed shirts for everyone, and was able to include a couple of additional random small prizes. The guests who filled spots for no-shows also got shirts because I kept some backups!

All in all! Everyone got stuff! The atmosphere was really exciting the whole time! People were stuffed out the door and laughing and having a great time! Even through the rain! I’m sure that everyone who got to go will remember the event! It was great! Better than I could have hoped! It ruled! Best throwdown I’ve ever been to! And I’ve been to a ton! all over the states! Of course I’m biased but still!

Thoughts on the actual competition

We could have had a lot more people, though I don’t know if it would have worked as well in the space or for the atmosphere. We had a lot of people asking to enter after the spots filled, and people telling me they entered too late. My goal in capping it at 24 was to keep the party tight. I wanted to have at least 30 people there as we wrapped up, and we did! I wanted it to take 2-3 hours and it did! I’m sure the free stuff and giveaways helped.

What happens at a lot of comps, is everyone shows up, and then as their friends get out or they’ve seen the space, they leave to go get food or do something else. Especially if they came in from out of town. They want to go see the city! So to try and keep a captive audience, I had some free giveaways and free food. Tables inside and chairs outside. It worked out great for keeping the party going.

The quality of pours was consistently solid too! What can happen at these events, is you have a lopsided bracket of those who pour really well and those who don’t pour anything or spill. I was able to keep the scene mostly local and without any bracket snipers, by not having a cash prize, and personally reaching out to a lot of local shops immediately. If you announce a cash prize and focus on rewarding the top three only, it’s not a very fun or consistent bracket.

I just want to say that i’m proud of all the baristas in Jax,you guys did really well. uncommonly solid.

What the party cost

I intended the $15 cost of entry, assuming we got at least 20 entrants, to cover the shirt production, and most of the milk/coffee we used. I was going to buy some pizza and water bottles out of pocket. I was also going to make some tote bags and other prizes / merch to sell and fill in the gaps. Things like logo shirts in addition to the entrant shirts.

Somewhere along the way I decided that if throwing a fun party was so important, then everything should be free. If anyone can have fun, everyone will have fun. My solution to this was bothering everyone I could find for free stuff, a lot of people offering to help pay, and a “pay what you want” raffle ticket system. I didn’t have confidence this would make enough money to help us much, but it would be something to maybe help a little. In case it did make money, I let people know the money would go towards construction bills, which was true, those bills are all I could think about.

So I sold tickets a few days in advance online, and then in person. It didn’t feel responsible selling tickets further out, since it was an in person giveaway. Turns out though, a lot of people bought tickets just to support the shop, and didn’t care whether they won prizes. That was very cool and we ended up making a few hundred dollars, which was just enough to help us pay for construction bills yesterday 7/25.

So what now?

We’re totally open, we did it! It feels great, everyone has been really positive and my body is holding up to the 60-70 hour weeks well enough so far. I’d like to maintain pace and keep growing. The difficult thing is having patience and squeezing by financially. I know that i’m doing well for a new business and I should be grateful, but it’s expensive to run a business! haha.

I’m also concerned about being a good boss now that I have someone shadowing weekends. more on that, next-week-ish. gotta keep making money to pay them for now!

Thanks for reading! Have a great week! - Elias

The Week Before the Throwdown

Good Morning! Happy Saturday! We’re a week before the throwdown and between Saturday craziness right now! I’m drinking a vanilla oat milk capp that was a messup order, drinking some water, listening to Two Door Cinema Club. Dakota my BF (he painted the coffee cherrys on our wall) added it to our playlist and is helping out today, which has been awesome for ensuring a great guest experience so far. Having two people on bar keeps things fun! I’m putting some last minute stuff together for the throwdown, pizza merch etc, it’s gonna be great

The throwdown sold out!

Which means I was able to order everything I needed, like prizes pizza and more! The whole party is going to put me a couple hundred back but i’m hoping that things like raffle sales and food the day of will help me catch up! I’m trying to throw an awesome event that does well for our name and for the community! It’s been cool to see it sell out and people get hyped up! I hope I can do it justice and everyone has a good time :^)

I had a rush and now it’s not morning anymore :)

I’m super tired! We just doubled our sales goal and i’m so thankful for Dakota coming by. I’m going to hopefully have a friend start training to help out on the weekends. It’s really nice stress testing the cafe a little bit, it seems like the systems we have in place are working alright. I have two positions, bar and front counter. Front counter is taking orders, marking cups, and filling syrups. depending on volume, the front counter also stires in milk andice to cold drinks. Front counter can grab drip or other ez drinks, and if bar is on pour overs for special cups, front counter takes over the whole line. On bar is me, who is doing spro and finishing drinks, as well as talking to people who are waiting. We’re doing a really good job of connecting with everyone despite the craziness, and that feels great!

Now I gotta get back to work!

I’ve gotta prep for close then begin working on merch items and other quality of life stuff for the shop! I need a syrup list, a brb i’m in the bathroom sign, a merch shelf guide! I also need a real tip jar, the plastic cup is looking a little dinky haha. I’m overwhelmed but in a good way! We keep selling out of baked goods in the first two hours! While I’m tranining this is perfect. I can stress test on the weekends and do paperwork during the slow times on weekday!

It’s been amazing

Is basically what I wanted to say, thanks for reading, have a great weekend! You make this possible! Stay hydrated! But stay dry! My lawn is very not dry. It’s overgrown and I have given up, but that’s okay. :^p - Elias

Announcing the Throwdown!

Good Morning! Happy Saturday! I’m listening to George Clanton’s “100% Electronica” and drinking some drip! Our Drip here at Tetherball is an 80% Brazil 20% Ethiopian Worka right now and it’s really nice! Mellow but fairly interesting. This mornings been a steady little stream of drip coffees and lattes, throwing out a lot of latte art! Speaking of which!

We announced our throwdown/grand opening for July 17th!

I originally planned to have the party a month after our opening, and it’s not too far off! Getting sponsors involved was easier than I expected, but it did take a little time. Our sprudge.com feature was actually hugely helpful for sending out emails and getting brands interested that we already worked with! I could say like “hey! We’ve got your product up on sprudge for our build” and they were happy to help. The sponsors are mainly for giveaways to help drive traction to a raffle, which we’re doing to get locals involed who aren’t pouring art, and give baristas who don’t win the comp something else to hang out for!

I want locals to show up and party, so we can meet the community!

I also want them to try some great coffee! Good latte art has a really unique and tasty texture, where the milk is velvety and a little sweet, it’s killer! I’m going to be buying pizzas and doing some cheap seltzer draft drinks too, so we’re not all dying of hunger or dehydration. But overall I think that anyone who shows will have a great time, the coffee community always blows these events up!

Why I want noobs to compete!

For one thing the Throwdown is a coffee tradition! And for the last couple years, new baristas haven’t gotten to compete or go to one! A couple years is significant in the lifespan of a typical barista, so that’s a serious gap! PLUS! It’s not about being “Good”, everyone is working on new equipment and is going to kind of suck, I promise. It takes a really special type of person to show up and rock brand new gear, and it’s unlikely there will be many at our event unless they’re traveling real far. I’m not offering cash prizes, just trophies, so I don’t thinkkkk we’ll get sniped by a pro, but we’ll see. I want all the coffee perople in the area to come down and have fun, I want everyone to try to pour that can!

What you should know

Please buy a ticket, show up early so you can practice, and maybe eat a little something first, if you’re competing. If not, same deal! Don’t be grumpy, a slice of pizza is not a meal. It’s fun to watch pours! It’s fun to pour! Come support your local baristas, come support your friends. By showing up for anyone you’re making the difference!

Okay i’m getting slammed at the shop here, gotta go!

Have a great weekend everyone! Come try some of our new boxes on drip, come get some coffee heralded as ”good” by the locals :^)

If you have today off, chill. if you don’t, have fun! Enjoy yourself, smile, you’re as happy as you want to be, and no one can stop you! not even you, because i’m making you? Idk : ]

There may be spelling mistakes, I can’t check this one, gtg !!!!

Hard Open So Far!

Good Morning!! I’m drinking so much good coffee, I’ve been pretty busy, did like half our sales goal in the first two hours! Just did some prep work on IG live and that was a pretty fun time. Just had a little run club run through. Oh man, it’s been steady! I’m listening to The Spinners, “Second Time Around” album. Very fun upbeat Pop/soul/R&B music. I feel like to be honest and constructive I’ve gotta be a little negative first so let’s get that out of the way.

I’m BEAT!

I put in my two weeks at my second job, but i’ve still got one week left and it’s rough. I’m up at 5am taking my vitamins, i’m stretching, I’m heading in to work with ENERGY! But my second job is immediately after, physical, and sometimes as late as 10pm. I’ve gotta do it for the money, I’m thinking long term, I’m excited to sleep next Sunday when it’s over haha. I’m super grateful that i’m getting basically the perfect volume for my situation, not too crazy busy and not too dead. It means I can put in my two weeks and not just do this forever.

It’s been really good at Tetherball again this week!

We had banana bread and chocolate cake during the week and sold out one day! We’re gonna have that back next week. We got some more coffee in, and had just enough to squeeze by every day with espresso pour overs and retail! We had a few days well above our sales goal, and a couple that were under.

Super positive still!

Last week I talked about how positive everyone has been, and that’s continued! I’ve heard “this is the best decaf latte i’ve ever had” which is super awesome, I love blowing minds on the really nice decaf we have here. I’ve been selling a ton of our vanilla caramel “hopscotch” lattes and getting lots of instagram tags for those. Pulling people from the neighborhood and people from instagram pretty consistently. I’ve been putting most of my focus on IG so that’s been good to see. I’ve had a lot of returning guests from both sides!

We were featured on Sprudge!

We submitted the shop build well before we were open, and kind of scrambled to get those pictures ready in time. Sprudge would have been the first people to see the interior, and the shots turned out pretty good if a bit dark, so I was so so stoked to see our article go up with everything intact! I talked a little about this in the IG post, but i’m a big sprudge fan so that was like the peak of what I hoped to accomplish in the “scene”! Nobody told us it was going up, so it was really weird to get a congratulations text before finding out haha. It would be pretty incredible if that post made it on to their IG, i’m sure we’d see a lot of traction from that.

The next project is to party!

I’m gathering sponsors for an event in a few weeks, and I’ve got a lot of people on board so far! I’m kind of worried it’ll be too big of a party for our space haha, but it’s nice to know so many people are interested in putting it together. Anyways, look forward to that announcement next week! Thanks for reading! -Elias

Soft Open So Far

GOOD MORNING! No more writing blogs at noon, I’m out here at 6am dialing in, at Tetherball Coffee! It’s been an outstanding week so far. We opened on Tuesday secretly and it blew up, we’re now open for real on Wednesday-Sunday 7am-3pm. It’s been absolutely wild, i’ve gotten to listen to so much music, drink so much good coffee, and talk to so many awesome people who’ve been following the blog or us or whatever! Let’s talk about it!

Day 1

So we announced our opening as Wed-Sun, but came in Tuesday to hang out and invite friends/family. That got some social media peeps talking and we were pretty busy! it was a good way to break things up and set the bar for expectations. I was struggling to keep up a little bit having to actually run bar, but everyone was cool with the wait. I was flexing my vocal cords a lot more than usual too, and being a sort of awkward guy I felt like I landed on my feet there. Overall I felt like we did a great job for day 1, and we exceeded our general sales goals by a good bit.

Days Since

The next few days have been slow and steady, I don’t think i’ve ever been off bar for more than 30 minutes. It’s been a good mix of people from online and around the neighborhood, lots of either “I’ve been watching you guys online forever” or “I’ve been staring at that “opening soon” sign forever” haha. It’s true! I had to put that sign up when we first started and i’ve been at it for about 10 months since last August, but honestly it’s worked in my favor! All that time has let people know that we exist, and formed a sort of mythos around whether or not we’d even open. It’s like i’ve introduced myself for better or for worse, and made myself part of the community.

Speaking of Community

It’s been pretty unreal how supportive and excited everyone has been, I’ve heard so much “this area never had a good independent coffee shop until now.” I’m just like “me, good?” Lots of joggers and people with dogs. Lots of people on there way to work or on lunch stopping by real quick. It gives me hope for local guests in the long run! I’ve heard lots of “i’ll definitely be back!” too! I’ve had one or two “i’ll be the judge of this place” type guests, but hey it seems like they enjoyed the place, and I’ll keep pushing my positivity forever!

& Sunlit Vibes!

When you come in at like 8am, you get the sunrise through the windows and it looks incredible. All the colors in here are super bright and positive, I’m ditching the typical all black barista look, I’m pushing the uplifting look! It feels good in here, it’s somewhere I want to be every day and it’s somewhere I’m hoping employees will want to be every day. It feels like the ideas have translated and people get it, it’s sweet! I’m getting a lot of “this shop looks cute” and “how did you come up with these colors.”

I think cool is subjective, and like, the all black “cool” is a race to be the edgiest which feels like kind of a losing game. If I can just be myself and do something I like, and that happens to be unique and get people talking, that’s my best case scenario. That’s what I’m gonna do. Next week we’ll have pastries, see ya then! - Elias

Starting Menu Photos

Happy Saturday! We were super close to being open this weekend again! More on that in a minute, right now I’m drinking cold brew at Spring Park Coffee in well, Spring Park Florida. the drive here from south Jax is beautiful, and the atmosphere in here is always super nice. Spacious and comfortable with that high ceiling whether it’s loud or quiet, one of the few places I don’t mind taking my headphones out and just chillin’. This week, we got a signature from the city to open ahead of our final bit of construction, but since we got it on Friday we weren’t able to open this weekend.

So what’s left?

That’s a pretty constant question about the cafe, but one I’m pretty happy to answer right now. We just have to replace the current bathroom fan with a better one, and add another exhaust above our mop sink. Since neither are required to make the cafe safe, and they’ll be done soon, I’m pursuing an early occupancy while we wait on those materials and work to be done. To early occupy I need a signature from the city mechanical inspector, and our city building inspector. I have one signature, I was supposed to get the other on Friday but there wasn’t enough time. So I’ll be back on Monday morning and hopefully then we’re all good.

It’s not usually that easy, but if it is this time, I’d like to be open on Wednesday or Thursday.

What else has been happening this week?

Well i’ve been working like crazy at side jobs, putting in hours and popping in at the cafe to photograph our menu. I was able to give out some of those picture perfect drinks to our neighbors, and got some super valuable feedback. I noticed what people gravitated towards, and how they understood or didn’t understand the phrasing. I was told “hey this isn’t sweet enough” on a drink that had no sugar and was like, “oh yea not everyone drinks black coffee.” I reworked that drink and brought them new samples, then got the thumbs up. I made a few other drinks that people were blown away by, and that was really encouraging.

I’m mainly taking pictures to accompany our “how to make” booklet for employees, something that was partially inspired by an old UK Kitchen Nightmares episode. I’ll also be making a story thread on instagram for our menu, and maybe adding it to our website. We get a surprising number of people checking our site from desktop, so that might work well for them. Here are a couple of those pics.

Talk to you hopefully later this week! have a great weekend everyone, -Elias

City Plan Revisions

Good Morning! Happy Saturday! I’m eating oats and drinking water, no coffee until later at work. Not really listening to anything, just starting my day by writing quietly, next to my cat who is screaming. It’s been a productive week. I was able to communicate the goal of getting a signed temporary occupancy form between the city, my original engineer, and my new HVAC guy. It seemed like we had it in the bag to complete and turn in on Friday, but the city inspector didn’t approve.

The city doesn’t believe our plans will work and would like another revision.

Our plans as drawn originally had us drilling through the roof to install a new bathroom and closet fan, which we wanted to avoid. So we planned on connecting these fans to the existing exhaust instead which would be much simpler, but the city believes our fans would overpower the existing pressure and push bad air back inside the building.

We don’t think this will be an issue, but playing telephone in a trade I’m unfamiliar with is difficult. Another major problem is that I’m working with our original drawings that have outdated information. Since our hvac guy and engineer still believe this will work, we need to better communicate how. So our goal this week will either be to draw new plans, or somehow communicate our intent in a way that satisfies the city.

The good news is

Once the city understands our intent or we’ve created new plans that satisfy them, we should be good to open. We’re food safe and generally safety safe, our air system is working now, we’re just trying to show that we have intent to update the air system in the near future.

Here’s hoping we can quickly get this done and open soon, have a great weekend everyone. -Elias

PERSIST! 1 YEAR OF BLOGGING!

GOOD MORNING! I did it, I’m up and writing early, I finally got some sleep this week. This might come out later today but hey! Drinking house seltzer (gonna save so much money on lacroix here) and lIstening to the new album by Wet Leg, “Wet Leg”! It’s good, very tiktok but with some substance, female powerpop. would recommend. the big single is Chaise Lounge but there are some good and less horny songs on there also. Anyways, we signed a contractor to take care of the city mechanical work yesterday! It was much less than it could have been, I put in some due diligence to talk to a lot of people and alter the plans to be a little less crazy intensive. Hopefully we get rolling and are open in a week or two, but i’ve been saying that for weeks hahaha. I feel great though, we’re gonna do this we’re gonna make it happen.

Today makes a year of blogging! 52 weeks!

Time flies! I really thought this would take like 6-8 months, but it’s been 15 months now. I planned to blog until we opened, and it just kept getting pushed back. There were weeks when I struggled to think of anything to write, and there were weeks when I had so much to say! I probably missed a lot of details. In the end I hope that this stands as something to help shape the companys past and future, inspiring DIY and the possibilities of persistence! I really want that Idea to be there for other people and have Tetherball do the same!

You really can do anything you set your mind to!

My boyfriend of over 4 years, says that i’m the type of person who says I’m going to do something and does it. It was really nice to hear that recently from someone who’s known me this long, because I try to embody that, but end up doing a lot of trial and error! It can make me feel like i’m flaking on ideas, but you have to put yourself out there to accomplish things and grow! Over the last year on this project, i’ve had to do A LOT of trial and error with a goal in mind.

Just know that no matter how far your goal is, by taking steps in any direction and being true to yourself, you can make progress.

Lets revisit three major milestones!

The first couple things I did to get started 6/5/21

In this blog I outlined what I thought was necessary to begin opening a coffee shop. I said that I read a lot of books, I wrote a business plan, a cost estimate sheet, and I got a lawyer.

Books huh. If you have cafe experience, that’s all you realllllyyy need to get started. Books are better for understanding your role as an owner and manager, broad ideas that can shape your character. They may also help you organize yourself financially long term. I think I would have been better served by reading those same books slowly over the next 6 months so I retained them. I did read more later! But there was no rush.

A business plan is good to have. If you’re going with a big leasing conglomerate to rent a space, they’ll want to see it so they know you’re serious. For you as an owner it helps define the brand and goals of your business, things that will help you make important decisions later. Just know that these ideas will change, and try to write those changing ideas down again.

Cost estimates, oh man. My actual cost sheet was changed hugely by two things! Construction, and minimum orders. Depending on where you live, where you open, and what you need for your menu, your construction may vary. It doubled my estimated business cost! I’ll leave it at that. Get quotes from contractors before you assume too heavily. The owner of Lobos Coffee in Orlando told me I probably couldn’t build out for less than 75k, and he was right! As for minimum orders, custom cups may seem comparable to unbranded cups, but doing custom orders means ordering $thousands$ to get started! Don’t be afraid to change your mind and think critically about your priorities!

Lawyers were nice because I had a business partner initially (just me now), and we put together agreements and organized our LLC with help. If you’re flying solo, they may not be necessary! Google everything and get that LLC started with paper and pencil!

Leaving my Day-Job and Taking Out a Loan 11/27/2021

At this time I was convinced that ordering equipment would be my final big expense, and that I had enough money to sustain myself until we opened in the next month or two. I really did not like my job, and so I quit. I would recommend this if you don’t like your job :^) but I’d also recommend getting a new one. Work to secure a safety net until you absolutely can’t do it anymore. This process has been slow, steady, and surprisingly expensive at every turn.

I also noted in this blog that the contractors asked ME for a timeline, this is now how it should have gone down. I should have had them sign on a proposed timeline, because they estimated 6-10 weeks in late December and it’s now been more than double that. I was able to secure a 5 month no rent period from our building that ended in January, meaning I’ve now been paying rent, some equipment leases, insurance, etc for 5 months.

I had to learn the hard way that keeping a source of income and focused mindset throughout the entire project is important, it’s something I didn’t emphasize then because I was going through it, but really want to highlight it now!

Framing, Prepping the Walls and Floors 4/2/2022

At this time we finally finished concrete, framed the bars, and had a space where I could begin my portion of the work! I was hesitant until now to be in the same space as my contractors because the floors were dusty and covered in spare hardware/equipment. It was difficult to tell what I could work around and what I was waiting on.

I said “there’s not much left to do” which was pretty funny, but probably how I saw it then. The contractors took 4 months to complete the concrete and frame everything, and I was convinced I could do the rest in a week or two. The reality was that with working a second job and having no experience, each individual task from the ceilings to the floors would take me at least a week. I was mostly able to keep in step with our contractors but it was super exhausting, even now a couple weeks later i’m a bit groggy from so many late nights and early mornings.

A lot of the blogs through April and early May ended up being super short as I rushed from one job to the other, I wish I would have spent more time explaining my process of taking on the work. Something I probably mentioned a lot on social media were my many trips to the hardware store. I bought a lot of the construction materials back in November when I bought everything, before I had done enough proper research on what I would need. Since it had been 6 months, I couldn’t really return anything and had some wasted money here and there as I bought the more appropriate equipment. Realistically I could have bought just about everything but the ceilings on the day I needed them.

Blogging takeaways

Blogging has been like journaling with expectations. The site gets something like 400 page views a month now, with 130+ unique visitors. That’s more than 10 times the traffic of 6 months ago. It’s been difficult on weeks when we haven’t made much progress, but setting those weeks in stone has still been worthwhile. Getting to look back on the previous week when writing a new blog is a reminder that we are still taking steps forward! It inspires me to continue and it pushes me to do more each week.

Almost every day I’m here working on the shop, someone new comes by to say hi from the neighborhood. They walk right through the papered up doors like we’re already friends, which is always surprising and pretty cool. They usually come in to make sure this is still happening, and give me ideas to advertise nearby. They seem genuinely concerned for our long term well-being, and often are willing to have a nice conversation about coffee.

I think of this blog a lot like those doors for people who aren’t quite as bold, but who’d still like to check in on us. I keep this blog going to keep those doors unlocked even while the paper is up, and it seems like people are still willing to walk in.

Thanks for reading everyone

Talk to you next weekend, ~Elias

We were almost open today

Happy Saturday! I’m drinking some super smooth cold brew at the cafe, listening to Blank Banshee’s first album “0”. All I have left to do on my end is fix a couple letters on the menus we made, and unpack the boxes here. From there I’d test the menu, take pictures and confirm the written recipes, then be ready to serve. This week we also finished the paintings and murals, got everything hooked up, and finished the work outlined by our general contractors.

But the city needs mechanical changes

Meaning changes to our HVAC, which is fans and air ducts. Since the premise was to be delivered with working AC, I didn’t intend to do any serious HVAC work, and neither did our general contractor. When it came time to inspect, turns out there is some work to bring us up to code.

It’s pretty minor work from what I can tell, movings fans on the existing system and adding a bathroom fan that vents out. Kind of annoying since I already installed a new bathroom fan, and I’d do this new one myself too If I could, but it needs to be done by someone licensed. I’m hoping that with the shortage of workers in JAX it’s not too difficult or expensive to get this done.

The most frustrating part isn’t the money or time this is going to cost us, it’s that no one in the last 7 months of permitting, thought to bring up that there was work left on the table.

So now it’s time to get this done.

I was on a no sleep marathon trying to get ready for this weekend, so when I found out it wasn’t going to happen Friday night, I slept in today. Now I’m up and getting back to work. I’m going to get this cafe to 100%, and find an affordable AC guy with availability, hoping that these changes are as minor as I understand them.

On the bright side

I do have a half keg of great cold brew from weekend prep, and I have a working cafe in general. If I’m legally allowed to do door service, uber eats, pop ups, anything! I’ll see if we can throw something together ahead of opening to make use of the space. Wish me luck everyone, and have a great weekend, ~ Elias

I want to be open by this time next week

Good afternoon! Happy Saturday! I miss getting to say good morning, I need to start writing these earlier again. I’m drinking an aeropress americano with beans from Bandit coffee roasters and listening to Luxury Elite’s “World Class” album, the maybe best album by a definitely excellent vaporwave artist. I’m writing this on my phone at the shop, working on tying up the smaller construction projects now, and then moving on to the finishing visual touches later this weekend. After that it’s approval with the city and equipment installations.

If you follow my personal account @elias.tetherball

You’ll know the compromises we made around the sink area to get an above ground grease trap in post-concrete. It’s still pretty ridiculous we even have one imo, especially at this size, but we’re making it work. I’d like to cover that with some sealed plywood, and do the same on an overhang shelf in the bathroom. I also need to patch another hole in the ceiling area that our contractor opened up doing electric.

Visual touch ups are the main focus today/tomorrow

We have paintings and menus in progress at home, I’m re-cutting some ceiling panels at the shop to be more aesthetically pleasing. Then I’ve gotta start washing all this dust off the walls from construction and seeing how clean I can get this place. i may want to do some plastic quarter round in certain floor areas, and who knows what else if it’s not up to standard. So far though, it’s mostly a very visually pleasing and sound build.

So then what NEEDS to be done before we open?

Really it’s just a couple more city inspections and we’re golden, assuming everything is done right. We should have the product and and equipment needed to run our soft open menu by Monday or Tuesday. Maybe a day or two of testing would be a sound investment. Idk, this whole thing is full of surprises, but I’d like to say we’re very close. If we are, then I’ll either soft open for the weekend on Friday or Saturday. That is not a concrete announcement, but it is my ideal announcement. When it’s time, you’ll know.

looking forward to meeting everyone who’s been following along on here, back to work, have a great day! - Elias

Beginning Inspections

Afternoon! Happy Saturday! I can’t believe it’s May already, this year is flying by as I put in all my daylight hours to the café, part time job, or household responsibilities. Today I’m drinking some tea, and we just made our tea order with Hugo, who do some absolutely fantastic tea. I’ve got to hold myself to our basic menu necessities here as our wire is down to the budget, but if I could I’d be ordering one of everything haha.

This week it’s been all hands on deck

We’re wrapping on installations for everything behind the bar, in the bathroom, and even in the ceiling! So I’ve been there to direct where things go and give input, pivoting as needed. I’ve also had to buy a few small parts as my plans from over a year ago show cracks here and there. For example, the handles I bought for my 3 compartment sink, don’t fit! So I had to run to a few different hardware stores to make those connections in time for our plumbing inspection later that day. Then Sometimes wires cross between inspections, but they still go one at a time. For example we need hot water to be compliant for plumbing, but we need electric to complete it’s portion to have that hot water! So that pushes things back as we coordinate between hands.

That said, it’s been super productive.

We’ve now got the bathroom 90% complete, we’ve got shelves below the bar, we’ve got running water and drain lines, we’ve got a working mop sink! I haven’t had a mop sink in most places i’ve worked at until now, we’ve had to use the regular sink or the outside ground! Which is gross! So I’m stoked about that! I’d say for the most part, everything we’ve planned has came together as expected, and even though it’s taken a long time, we’re nearly there!

So this week, we’ll pretty much be done.

I can’t say for certain whether we’ll get through inspections, but so far so good! Back to work! Talk to you next Saturday! Or maybe sooner! - Elias

My First Couple All-Nighters

Happy Saturday! I’m drinking a nice Colombian from Passenger Coffee, I’m up later in the day because I’ve been staying up late all week. I thought i’d be able to get painting done and finish the floors over last weekend, but no! Painting took all weekend, and just the wood flooring pushed from Sunday night to Tuesday night in no time. I had to skip some part time work, I had to skip some sleep, but we’re doing this!

To Do Something Well Takes Time!

AND HEY! I’m trying to do a good job! Most of this work is only going to be done once and I don’t want the place falling apart. So I’ve been going slow and steady, using the right equipment and method for the job. That means tons of trips to Lowes, tons of trips to the gas station for energy drinks and bathroom breaks, and endless youtube videos of older guys explaining things to me in 240p resolution. Each of these tasks adds 30+ minutes and before you know it you’ve spent the whole day on one or two simple projects.

So far it feels like that time has paid off, everything is turning out at the level I was expecting when designing this place about a year ago. It’s strange and incredible to see what is essentially an art project, come to fruition so much later. It’s rare that I go so slow and learn so much new stuff so quickly, I’m grateful for living in this internet age where knowledge is so accessible. Now that we’re making end game progress at a steady pace. If we complete installations early this week we’ll be wrapping very soon.

So Stay Tuned!

We’ll be soft opening in the next couple weeks without a doubt, it’s just simple installations and inspections from here. I’ll continue to share progress pics where I can and i’ll be ordering our wholesale coffeeee/teeeea, Tuesday I think. See ya soon, - Elias

Painting and Flooring

Good Afternoon and happy Saturday! Hope you’re weekend is off to a great start, I’m taking a lunch break at home and making some matcha tea, getting ready to head back and keep painting the café! This might be the busiest week so far in terms of transparent physical work on the building, and it’ll only ramp up throughout next week as we complete the floors and bring equipment in.

At the very least, we'll look open by the end of next week.

Assuming we complete painting tomorrow morning, and I can get the floors done by tomorrow night or Monday. From there I’ll finally be clearing out my garage and bringing in a bunch of the big equipment, and as the counters arrive early next week we can start installing everything. I think what I’m most excited for is putting some tables and chairs down to get an idea of the seating space. I’ve had this designed since last summer, actually getting to sit in it is going to be incredible. A lot of people visit as we work, at least once per day someone will peak inside or ask when we open. They’ll often want to input ideas too, “you should sell this or try that.” Shout out to the genuinely really nice woman this week who told me she didn’t like my brand and that she’d be happy to suggest some new colors, with a big smile haha. It will be nice to let people peak at a space that more closely resembles the final idea, instead of the piles of rubble they’ve been seeing since December.

That said, I’m not sure it’ll be possible to open until early May.

every step takes a day or two, and every weekend we touch is a couple days of no work. Our countertops are now late, but they’re going to arrive exactly when they’re needed next week. A couple things that really slowed us down this week we’re doubling back on some water proofing, more ceiling grid repair and city mandated stenciling. I’m now feeling a bit under the weather and called out from my second job, but I’m going to power through this weekend to try and get things done.

Now’s the time to really sprint

In a podcast from Valor Coffee this week, they noted that opening a café is a like running a 5k, where you have to jog at pace all the way, and then sprint at the end when you’re most exhausted. I’m definitely feeling that, especially because I’m a little sick haha. It’s time to get back to work, thank you all for reading and have a great day! - Elias

I’m Writing This on Our New Website

Happy Saturday! I’m eating some veggies and drinking some water at home, no time for fun stuff today or the usual weekend café trip. We’re now in mid-April, probably the busiest we’ll be of the whole project as we push to open (hopefully) later this month in 1-2 weeks. As usual it’s really up to the city, and shipping time on some final materials. I thought now would be a good time to launch the website and open a mailing list on our home page, I’m going to plug that with a header here below.

if you’d like to be notified when we open, enter your email on the Home page of tetherballcoffee.com

The home page will look a little bit different once we actually open, but for now the website is totally functional. I’ve moved the blog from blogger to this newer paid site, and brought back a contact page. I’ve added all of our brand fonts and colors, and had some time to look through the site options. I’m hosting monthly right now, so that If we do online merchandise in the future it’ll be easy to adjust. I’m happy with how it looks and I hope I get a few people notified about the opening here soon!

This week was mostly ceiling work.

I finished patching last weekend, so this week I started by playing with speaker placement and material. I went with the harder generic black and white cork ceiling for the speakers, which support them better and seem like they’d have stronger acoustics. It was slow and tedious, but eventually we found a nice balance using fans and chairs to adjust for noise and guest experience. Right after that we had the Wifi setup, and with all the ceiling cables accounted for, we replaced the majority of the drop ceiling with plain white insulated panels. Cutting these covered me in itchy insulation, and even with a mask flannel and goggles, I was pouring water in my eyes from all the fiberglass fluff. Glad to be done with that!

& While I worked, so did our contractors.

As we make the final sprint we’re working in tandem to get everything done. I’m grateful to my neighbors for putting up with the noise, and my contractors for mostly working at night until now. They’ve all been awesome to work with and looking forward to visiting the shop, so here’s hoping we get open soon!

Back to work! have a great weekend everyone!

Ceiling Patching!

 Good Afternoon, Happy Saturday! This week I'm listening to the guitar heavy folk punk band "walter mitty and his makeshift orchestra" while sipping some cold brew / lemonade from Brew downtown. I've been up early most days this week working on the shop, and it's been really nice to be doing work so consistently. Until now it's been every few weeks, while going back and forth with the city. Now I'm chilling there early, re-listening to some audio books and drinking good bevs. 

This week has been steady!

Patching the ceiling turned out to be a real project, and I just finished that today. I had my ladder balanced on some shelves for the super high up spots and had to make tons of runs to Lowes and Harbor Freight as I purchased and installed drywall, wire patches, caulk and spackle. There was a lot of loose wire going nowhere that I pulled down, and some ceiling panels to pull and throw away. I also cleaned up some areas that had just been torn apart by the prior tenant, and primed that brown paper too.

The contractors should be doing the remaining drywall and bar framing this week, which will allow me to start top to bottom on the ceiling, wall painting, and then floors. I think I said that last week too, but there's really not much else to wait on so hopefully it gets done! 

What held us up among other things was some back and forth on the counter and sink height as we thought about the grease trap, and the taller fridge dimensions; We did saw off the top of the fridge, but kept the original wheels for ease of cleaning underneath. The last real obstacle is the arrival of our countertops, which we'll find out the lead time on Monday. 

This month will be stacked!

I said this last week too, but it's possible that we get open this month if I keep hammering out the little things! It's been an awesome learning experience, with every mini-project taking time and effort. There have been so many things I had no context for, and now if I do this again I'll feel equipped to make it happen. Can't wait to wrap the shop and write a lookback blog next month!

People are keeping me going!

Every time I'm in the shop, someone new comes in to check if we're open! We've had that "coming soon" sign up for 6 months now and people are still checking on us, saying hi with some serious enthusiasm. Wishing us good luck and saying we've got a great location! Thank you to everyone, we'll see you soon!

- Elias

Framing, Prepping the Walls and Floors.

 Afternoon! Happy Saturday everyone! I'm up, I've been busy since 7am, starting with some sbux, now drinking a tiny oat milk vanilla latte from Setlan Coffee near san marco Jacksonville. I'm listening to Boards of Canada, some ambient electronic classics while I get in to construction! Until now it was mostly up to my contractors to lay the foundation, concrete and framing. 

From here I can begin the finishes

Right now I'm advising on the layout, and prepping the walls for painting. The prior owners left some serious cleanup for me as far as flooring and wall adhesives. I bought an electric multitool and I'm doing my best to clean things up with that, and then  by hand as needed.

We found that the giant under-counter fridge that I hadn't yet unboxed, had a 4 inch lip on the back/top that was going to raise my whole bar counter to accommodate. This was a miscommunication between me and the architect, because I designed my own plans there were a handful of atypical quirks in sizing. So since I own the fridge, I had a friend come over and we sawed off the lip, then I sanded it down with the multitool, after failing to do so by hand haha. Tonight I'm going to seal that, and then see if I'll also need to buy smaller wheels to drop the fridge a little lower.

From here I'll continue to clean up the walls, patch some holes and calk other areas. I'll also need to even out the floors where concrete adhesive was left, using the multitool. I had done most of the floor removal and evening out by hand with a crowbar and hammer earlier this year, which took hours of slow slow slow work. It also seriously messed up my shoulder. So now that my shoulder is better, I'm playing it safe.

Once the drywall goes up on the framing later this week, I'll also knock out our flooring and bring equipment inside, finally clearing my garage up a little bit! 

Gosh I'm excited! We very well may be open this month if counters come in quickly.

There's not that much left to do, mainly because it's on me now and i'm going to put every hour I have in to this for the next three weeks! 

Thanks for reading everyone, your support is amazing, have a great week! - Elias

Opening Timeline Mini-Blog

 Hey all happy Saturday! It's Saturday afternoon and I didn't make it out for coffee today, only had time to make some for my partner haha. I'm rushing around drinking a green smoothie listening to animal collective's jumpy jam record "strawberry jam."

We began above ground construction on Thursday. 

The contractors begin framing our new walls for the bathroom and utility closet this week. We also began framing the the main bar, and cream/sugar bar. Completion time from framing to drywall and everything in-between is about two weeks (so early April), but there's still some unknown time when it comes to sourcing the countertops at the size we need. The countertops may even change material depending on what we can get, which is a frustrating result of the supply chain. I personally really prefer laminate over hard granite because glasses breaks easily on it, from espresso shot glasses to iced lattes, I've seen it happen a lot.

So I pressed for a timeline based on what we do know, because we're wrapping on March and I would really like to be open in April!

It seems like mid to late April is doable if everything goes well. Beyond the contractors, on my end I'll need to lay floors and patch some holes in the ceiling, then replace the ceiling tiles along with some with fitted speakers. Following that is painting and getting everything fitted beautifully based on our goals and aspirations for the space.

My big approval will come from the dept. of agriculture reviewing the total layout, which means waiting until everything on the counter is installed. They're coming from Tallahassee to do this, but they make it sound like there's not much lead time. 

All in all, it's happening next month! that's the goal! have a great weekend everyone! - Elias

Concrete Filled In! Getting Restless!

 Good Morning! I'm drinking a Nicaraguan Coffee from Perc in Savannah and listening to the new Charli XCX album. I've been trying to try this coffee for a few weeks, and meaning to listen to Charli again since the Vroom Vroom EP in 2016. It's hype music, I'm enjoying the coffee and hyped to be typing almost normally today. I had a hand injury at work last Saturday and was worried it'd affect the café build out, but it seems to be healing alright if a little bruised.

The Concrete is filled in!

Last week I noted I was waiting on our property manager's approval before filling in the concrete. He did so on Friday, I found out on Monday, and it didn't get done until yesterday! It feels like everything takes a week! It is done now though, and we'll be moving on to redoing the bathroom walls next. The current bathroom is pretty small, so we're making space for accessibility. We'll also be moving the water heater to a newly built supply closet. I want a clean bathroom build!

I have been led to believe that the build out is pretty fast from here since it requires less back and forth, so now that we've spent our entire time frame estimate on the concrete, I'll be pressing for a completion timeline on Monday. I would really like to be done this month! 

I've been polishing our values guide.

Like I talked about in a previous blog, I designed an employee guide with some examples and explanations of core values. I've been using my time at this additional job to think about what values I'm actually putting in to practice, and what's annoying me that hasn't been outlined. Two that stand out are patience and defaulting to positive. 

I had to deal with some kids who were out of control with good intentions, and some coworkers that were quick to assume the worst in others, that reminded me to be patient! Then I had to cooperate with a coworker who does their work fine, but is always super negative, and it just reminded me that this attitude sucks! It needlessly brings the whole team down and no one really knows how to respond. I want to instill some positive disposition in to our core values! Your vibe attracts your tribe.

Now I'm ready to do some work!

My "two weeks out" physical tasks and admin tasks are all lined up, but I can't get started just yet. We're on the cusp! We're almost there! I've been working to cover my butt, I've been reading to keep my mind focused, but I'm ready to open this café!

Talk to you next week! *boxes air* - Elias