(Introducing) Introducing BLK Coffee

So, it’s 2017. When the hell did that happen? To say the past twelve months have flown would be an understatement, and also a bit facetious, but flown they have! In fact, make that the past seventeen months…

You see, seventeen months ago, I opened my own speciality coffee shop, BLK Coffee, in the Newcastle-upon-Tyne suburb of Heaton, and it has been non-stop ever since. Starting your own business, especially a physical one like a coffee shop or restaurant, is like jumping on a moving train - once you’re on, you’re on. There’s no stopping, no slowing down, no leaving things until the last minute. The train just keeps rolling.

Now, in reality, the closest I’ve ever come to jumping on a moving train is jamming my guitar case in the Metro doors in order to prevent the thing from leaving without me, but, hear me out: BLK Coffee has been chugging away for almost a year and a half now and, while I’m hardly an expert, I suppose I must have some insights. (Anyway, the only other analogy I could come up with was that “starting your own business is like taking the ball and running with it”, and I really don’t want to bring balls into this if I don’t have to.)

So, back to the point. After starting your own business, it is important to keep momentum up, especially in the first year. A great opening week is just that - a great opening week. But what about the week after that, and the week after that, and the week after that? You know that train I keep banging on about? Well, it’s more like an old steam train than a bullet train. Yes, it is constantly moving, but it’s hardly a short trip. And it is only now, seventeen months in and having had my first real break, that I am able to recognise this phenomenon. It is exhausting, exhilarating, maddening and rewarding. Welcome to life as a business owner!

I suppose the whole jumping on a moving train thing is my (characteristically convoluted) way of explaining why it’s taken me so long to write this post. After all, BLK Coffee opened in August 2015, so why am I introducing it now? Surely the time has passed? Well, not for me. I was on holiday last week and, when I wasn’t devouring books or developing gnarly sunburn, I was thinking. Just thinking. And, because you can never leave these things behind completely, I spent a lot of time thinking about BLK Coffee: what it means to me, what I want for it, what other people might want for it, etc. Someone, I can’t quite remember who, once told me that “it’s hard to work on it when you’re always working in it.” And it’s true that, when you’re so deeply entrenched in something every day, you can easily lose perspective. Fortunately, getting away has helped me to regain mine. For perhaps the first time since opening, my thoughts are coming through clearly, the ideas are flowing, and the mental fog has all but cleared.

And so, without further ado, allow me to introduce BLK Coffee...

This piece was originally published on blkcoffee.co.uk in 2017.