My Introduction to Hipster Coffee

When I walked in, I thought I’d gone into the wrong place. I did a double take, poking my head back outside the door to verify the sign did indeed say Coffee. It did. I shrugged and click-clacked my way across the barren seating area to the counter where a guy in his forties looked at me with an annoyed expression. 

“Hi. Can I get a small cup of coffee to go?” I asked.

He literally rolled his eyes, took a deep breath, and evoked the courage to interact with me. “What kind of coffee?” His tone was filled with condescension.

I took a pause because, in my head, his follow-up question was answered by my initial order. I just wanted coffee. Whatever kind they had would suffice. I quickly scanned the wall behind him in hopes that there was a menu that I’d missed the first time. The wall was completely empty. “The house blend will be fine.” This had to answer his question, right? 

“We don’t have a house blend. We only do single-origin coffee.” His shoulders slumped forward in defeat. I guessed that his response to me wasn’t really about me. 

“Oh, I see. Something dark? I don’t really know anything about coffee except that I like to drink it, so I’ll just defer to whatever you think would be best.” I was sure this response would help move this interaction along and get coffee into my hand faster. I was deferring to his expertise, which is what I thought this whole place was trying to accomplish. 

He didn’t exactly roll his eyes, but he didn’t verbally respond either. He just turned and walked off, I assumed to pour me a cup of dark coffee. I didn’t see any of those big carafes like most coffee shops have, so I guessed they must be in the back, where he disappeared to. A few moments later, a younger girl emerged, probably in her late teens, equally trendy, and as annoyed as that dude. I smiled and she looked through me. 

“Can I help you?” she asked in a tone so flat that the only way she could have made helping me seem less appealing is if she wore a shirt that read I don’t want to be here.

“Oh,” I said, a little confused. “I think your co-worker is getting my coffee.” 

“He came and got me.” 

“What? Okay. Never mind. Dark coffee. Black. Whatever you have,” I said, trying to avoid a repeat of the same song and dance I had with the first guy. 

“You have to pick the beans,” she instructed with a nod of her head in the direction of some glass jars that each held beans that all looked exactly the same. There weren’t signs. I thought they were just decorations when I previously noticed them. 

“So you don’t have any coffee brewed already?” I asked. 

If anybody has ever looked at me like I was dumber, I don’t remember it. “No.” She took a deep breath, exhaled as much of her annoyance as she could muster, and then explained, “You pick the beans, I grind them, and then we do a pour-over.” She was apparently content with her explanation of the process because she gave me a look that indicated there was no chance I’d have a follow-up question. She was wrong. 

“What’s a pour-over?” I asked, genuinely.

This was apparently too much. Her jaw dropped at this notion. She explained the pour-over process. 

“Wait, so you make coffee, the same way the machine does, but instead of letting the machine pour the hot water over the ground beans, you do it by hand?” 

“No!” she blurted. She then went on to describe what I just described to her, but used words like “artisan” and “craft.” 

“It sounds the same, just slower.” I was pretending to be confused but I was really just poking the bear at this point. There was no way I was giving these people my money or waiting for them to un-automate a perfectly automated process. 

After another explanation, she once again looked through me. 

“Um, you know. I think I’m alright. Thanks anyway.” I turned and headed back through the empty space to the door. 

“Ugh.” She groaned, making no attempt to hide it. I could hear her stomping to the back. “Can you believe…” she trailed off as I opened the door and stepped out into the sun. 

I stood on the curb for a second trying to process that whole scene. I got on my bike and shook my head, thinking a coffee shop like that will never make it. Little did I know these guys were just ahead of their time.