If you’re a java junkie, you know that your favorite local coffee shop provides more than just a daily caffeine fix. It’s also a place to congregate with friends, meet neighbors, work on your screenplay/novel/business plan/app idea, and generally experience a sense of community. But when COVID-19 forced coffee shops to close their cafes and dine-in services, owners had to scramble to figure out how to adapt. Fortunately, many of them were able to innovate in ways that have, in some cases, allowed them to keep generating pre-pandemic levels of revenue.
This week, Gravity invited several experts from the coffee industry to discuss some of the most creative solutions they’ve seen and share strategies that other shop owners can use to thrive during—and after--this time. The conversation was moderated by Angie McKenzie, a food and beverage consultant, and the panel included Nick Martin, CEO of the mobile-ordering app joe coffee; Dane Atkinson, CEO of Odeko; Andrea Ramirez, trends and insights expert at Torani; and Dan Price, founder and CEO of Gravity Payments.