From weddings to corporate retreats to private events like baby showers and birthday parties, a mobile coffee bar is becoming a popular feature to elevate the guest experience. For aspiring Coffeepreneurs® who want to get into the coffee business without the overhead of a brick-and-mortar location, coffee catering offers a compelling, lower-cost path in.
All photos in this post are from Texas Coffee School graduates, Sage and Honey and Sayfani Coffee.
Check out our 3-Day Coffee Business Master Class® to launch your own catering business.
At Texas Coffee School, we like to say we’re not teaching you how to open one coffee shop; we’re teaching you how to open four. (Or 10 or 20!) Why? Because whether you have ambitions for a thriving neighborhood hub or a coast to coast franchise, the solid business foundation you create in the very first shop is the same. But what about that second location? The second location can be both an exciting milestone and a unique challenge for business owners.
A coffee cart is one of the most accessible entry points into coffee entrepreneurship available right now. Compared to a coffee truck ($35,000 to $100,000) or a traditional brick-and-mortar shop ($300,000 to $625,000 for a 1,500-square-foot space), a quality cart business can come together for a $7,500 to $15,000 all-in startup investment. With no long-term lease or build-out, a cart offers the freedom to move, experiment, and grow at your own pace.
For small businesses, it feels like no amount of marketing can ever be enough. More social posts, more reviews, more events! If you feel like you’ve tried every creative way to drive foot traffic through your doors, we’ve got an alternative solution for you: coffee.
Picture a trip to the book shop, the garden center, the car wash, the gym, or the hair salon. What would make each one just a little better?
Texas Coffee School Celebrates Women Owned Coffee Businesses
Every March, we celebrate Women’s History Month and the women in our industry driving growth and evolution. This year, the impact women are making in specialty coffee feels especially tangible.
Despite hurdles that have made ownership and leadership challenging, the numbers of women opening coffee businesses are surging. We see this in the data, and we see this in our classroom.