Maureen Wallenfang
Appleton Post-Crescent
Published 10:44 AM EST Mar 2, 2020
A couple of downtown Appleton coffee shops are brewing up a lot of changes.
The small Acoca Coffee is expanding in a big way.
On the opposite end of the Avenue, Lou’s Brew Café & Lounge was temporarily closed for a week while it dealt with staffing challenges.
Their stories:
Acoca Coffee
Acoca Coffee will more than triple its size by summer.
The homegrown downtown Appleton coffee shop and coffee roasting business is at 500 W. College Ave, across the street from the Fox Cities Performing Arts Center.
It has a small satellite project opening first — a coffee outpost inside Tandem in the river flats — that will be ready at the end of the month.
Next up will be the big project, the expansion and remodeling of its College Avenue coffee shop. It has started work and should be ready around July.
Owners Bill and Kim Wetzel will combine the current space with a space next door, build a new kitchen, create more seating areas and put in ADA compliant bathrooms.
The coffee shop will remain open during remodeling.
The expanded Acoca will have a larger food and drinks menu. Appleton’s plan commission approved its special use permit request for beer and wine sales this week, and it now goes to Common Council.
The whole undertaking will cost “north of $300,000. This is a long-term investment for us,” said Bill Wetzel, who retired from Bemis to focus on Acoca. “I’ve always harbored this desire. I want to say I’ve fulfilled a long-held dream.”
The Wetzels have been investors in Acoca since 2007, and became sole owners in 2015. In 2018, they purchased the building, which includes Acoca’s existing space and the larger now-vacant space next door.
Acoca started out as Beaners Coffee Haus in 1997, but its original owners changed it to Acoca when they learned their coffee-inspired name was also a pejorative term.
The place has an earthy, hippie vibe with plants, matchstick blinds and homegrown art. Wetzel wants to keep the warmth of an artisan look, but update it with industrial design elements and skylights for more natural light.
The shop has had limited staff turnover, and most of its eight employees have been there for at least two years. They know many customers by name.
“We do pour-overs, which take three to four minutes. It’s not about turning out a drink every 15 seconds for the drive-thru,” said Wetzel.
For the record, it doesn’t have a drive-thru.
Lou’s Brew
The Loukidis family temporarily closed its Lou’s Brew Café & Lounge for a little more than a week at 233 E. College Ave. in downtown Appleton. They’re now in the process of reopening.
According to its Facebook page, it is open today hours today until 3 p.m.
“Over the past 6 to 12 months, Lou’s Brew has encountered many problems with hiring and retaining employees that have the same vision and mission as we do – excellent customer service and a superior product,” the family said Feb. 19 on Facebook.
They said the temporary closure was done to “restructure, rehire and retrain a new team.”
The four-year-old Appleton coffee house has struggled with hiring and retaining staff for the last few years. The family shut its Oshkosh location in 2018, citing staffing problems.
Co-owner Laura Loukidis said at the time that small businesses like theirs can’t afford to offer benefits, and that job hopping, wage competition, college students leaving and even poaching from other businesses were constant challenges.
Contact reporter Maureen Wallenfang at 920-993-7116 or [email protected]. Follow her on Twitter at @wallenfang.
More: Is Amazon, the e-commerce giant, coming to Greenville?
More: The Buzz: Catalpa leases former Sears Outlet building in Grand Chute
More: The Buzz: Rico’s closes in Kaukauna
Let’s block ads! (Why?)
