Our Story
The Dream
My dream to open a coffee shop began on a coffee farm in Southern Uganda. In September 2010, my newly wedded husband and I stumbled upon the farm while visiting Sipi Falls for his birthday. We had moved to Gulu for the year to work with a nonprofit that friends of ours started, and we had no idea that our weekend trip down south would shape our future. Walking around the farm opened my eyes to the coffee process. We roasted our own beans that night and drank them the next morning from a French press. I could not get over how magical that experience was. I had studied Cultural Anthropology in school with an emphasis in Community Development and wanted to combine my love of people with my newly found love for coffee. Believing that coffee is the best vehicle for community, I decided I would one day open a coffee shop.
Fast forward to us returning to California in 2011. I worked in three coffee shops over the next four years to learn the tricks of the trade before attempting to open my own. I became confident in the ins and outs of a good coffee program, but the business aspect was still terrifying. I had zero schooling in that area and had only picked up the basics from rad managers and owners who gave me tips along the way. I was just naive enough to believe I could do it and just brave enough to take the risk. My husband gently pushed me to quit my job and assured me that we would figure it out as we went.
Neat Coffee
In October 2015, I opened Neat Coffee in the lobby of a co-working space in Costa Mesa, California. With little money from our savings account and a loan from my generous aunt and uncle, we started with a very lean budget, forcing us to make smart decisions from the start. All of our equipment was lease to own and we didn't spend a single cent on the buildout. But it didn't seem to matter. Although it wasn't much to look at and our unmarked location in the corner of a business park could not have felt more random, Neat thrived.
Our friends were quick to support and the community followed shortly after. I was turning a profit by the end of the first month. Within five months I had built up a regular customer base of business people, college students, local moms, and coffee fanatics. I was running high on the adrenaline of watching my dream come to life and having a blast creating a space (all 200 square feet of it) for people to connect. I had only planned on being there a few months, but as we grew I was able to make tiny improvements to the space, hire baristas, and create something I was truly proud of. I was in no hurry to leave a good thing. Months flew by and turned into three years.
One of my favorite parts about running the shop during that time was buying products and ingredients from local vendors I had met at farmers markets or through friends of friends. Our menu was simple, but I was constantly experimenting with seasonal syrups and new drinks that kept regulars coming back. On Saturdays, we would take over the empty parking lot with lawn games and benches and pop-up shops run by friends of mine or people I met who sold flowers, plants, ice cream, pies, ceramics, anything really.
I learned a lot about business, about my customers' needs and wants, and what I so genuinely enjoyed about creating a space for people to connect. But the dream was always to open in a residential area, to become a neighborhood fixture, to pour back into the community and to be a space of conversation and inspiration. That dream was too big for the lobby inside of a business park.
So we brought on an investor who has become like family, ran an insanely successful Kickstarter campaign that brought in double our goal, and built something beautiful.
1922 Pomona Ave
In 2019, Neat Coffee reopened in a standalone neighborhood building with our own parking lot and everything! It was the dream spot, just two blocks from our house and big enough to allow for growth. In the past six years here, we have become a hub for daily connection in Costa Mesa. Our staff are some of the most wonderful people in the world and we have countless guests who have become like friends and family. We host community events and gather neighbors to chat with city council members and engage in discussions about making our city an even better place. We get together weekly at the beach to dip in the ocean and connect over cups of coffee on the sand. In the summers, we project movies onto the neighboring wall and invite everyone to fill the parking lot with lawn chairs. We've evolved so much and have survived countless ups and downs, including a pandemic. Our community has shown up to support us through it all.
Growth
This recent chapter has held many challenges. The highs were high and the lows were low, and my worth got tied up in our sales. My idea of success got twisted. There were months and even years where I lost sight of my values and my why. I became obsessed with numbers and forgot to enjoy my life because there was always something to do. I didn't even realize that my negative self-talk had become self-fulfilling prophecies. I had not an ounce of pride for what I had created.
It took some hard conversations and wake-up calls to realize that I wasn't actually living. I had my head down, busying myself in the day-to-day tasks, forgetting that I was allowed to enjoy the journey.
Watching my husband go through a transformation of his own sparked something inside of me. He was suddenly bursting with life from taking time for inner work mixed with physical movement in nature. I wanted that for myself and realized that it's actually me who gets to choose how I live. Shocking! I wanted to enjoy every day and feel good about what I was creating. I first started doing the things that make me feel alive and making choices to sit down and connect with people before knocking out my endless list of to-dos. Then I hired a business coach and she changed my life (shoutout Alexa). I slowly started to realign with my values and create a stronger vision for myself and my business. She helped me shift the way I interact with my business from seeing it as an all-consuming burden on my life to simply a job that I can enjoy and set boundaries with. I am slowly getting better at being present and enjoying my life as a whole and mixing work with play.
I have never felt stronger about my vision for Neat than right now. So it makes sense that this fall, I was invited to continue what LUV Collective has created in Sunset Beach by opening our second location there this November.
Sunset Beach
In order for Neat to expand, we need your help. We are not only taking over an existing coffee shop, but we are starting up a roasting program. This will allow us to grow exponentially as we begin purchasing green beans and eventually wholesaling to cafes and shipping directly to customers.
We have seen this community come together to further projects that they believe in, and we have no doubt that we'll be well supported in this next chapter.
This is where our campaign comes in. This time around, we built it ourselves. No platform fees, no middleman. The complete freedom and customization is so fun (shoutout John Choura for building this amazing platform and for his support).
Whether you decide to support through sharing our campaign, making a contribution, or selecting a support tier that excites you, we cannot express our gratitude enough.
Support Tiers
We've decided to offer a variety of support options from limited edition merch to essentially pre-buying gift cards to becoming a Neat member. And if you want to become an investor, we can chat about that too.
Timeline
We are taking over the lease on November 1 and hope to open later that month. Keep an eye out for the grand opening date as well as updates on the paint, tile, and minor modifications we will be making to the shop. There's so much more to come.
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Thanks! ❤️
Ally Garvin, Owner of Neat Coffee