Love coffee? We do too. Our entire life we’ve lived in places where coffee is a BIG DEAL. I’m not talking about the regular morning cup of drip coffee, I mean gourmet coffee and espresso. I’m not talking about cafés or the local dine-in coffee shops with a second-thought drive-thru window either. I’m talking about a double-window drive-thru coffee shop on nearly every other corner. I’m talking about everyone having customized coffee cups or mugs they pour their daily coffee into. I’m talking about water bottles covered in stickers from the myriad of local coffee shops. That’s a “coffee culture”.

Coffee culture isn’t unique to the Northwest, you’ve probably seen the eight-car line at your local Starbucks too (BTW, who has time for that every morning?), but that doesn’t even capture it effectively. Imagine a smaller version of that, trading in the dine-in space for another drive-thru window, and having one – with the same kind of line – on every other corner wherever you go.

THAT is “coffee culture”. This culture isn’t limited to small towns either, even in a city like Seattle you’ll find one of these drive-thru coffee shops on every other block. From the morning latte and bagel as you’re heading to work, to the mid-day pick me up that so many of us need, to the evening refresher for those night owls, in a coffee culture you’re never far from gourmet coffee and espresso – simply drive-thru the next brand’s shop on the corner and you’re all set. This was what we’ve been accustomed to our whole lives. So imagine our surprise when we move to Texas and the only option aside from café’s was the one drive-thru window at Starbucks. That’s one window for a community of over 200,000 people. Yeah, if you love coffee like we do you’re already feeling our pain.

Guess what, that’s just the beginning. Never ones to shy from a challenge (and being completely unwilling to forgo our daily coffee routine), we leaned our entrepreneurial spirit and strong business background and started making plans to open our own chain of drive-thru coffee shops in Texas. With our business plan nearly complete we were going to bring the simple pleasures of convenient, drive-thru gourmet coffee and espresso (with the requisite teas, energy drinks, and bagels of course) to our new state. We were super excited to share our love of coffee with the masses. It was going to be great! Then Covid-19 hit Texas.

The business opportunity of drive-thru coffee shops all-but-disappears when everyone is on lock down – as you can imagine. All the diligent market research, designing and pricing the construction of new drive-thru coffee buildings, compiling and sourcing the list of equipment, creating our menu, developing the logo and brand kit, all of it seemed like a missed opportunity that first few weeks when nobody could leave their house and the news continued to get worse. It looked like we were going to be home-bound for the entire year – if not more. Still, we couldn’t live without our coffee – and the K-cups are only a fix for so long.

So what did we do? We decided to make our own “coffee-shop” at home. Heck, we already had the equipment list, recipes, and menu right? Why not, for us it was the perfect solution. Not satisfied with the latest Keurig or Nespresso machine, we ordered our own espresso machine with frother, tamper, coffee bean grinder, flavors, pumps, coffee cups, and we even downloaded a few new recipes. Everything we needed to have our own coffee shop at home. I’m happy to say this story ends on a high note, we enjoyed our coffee culture (well a version of it anyway) and our gourmet coffee and espresso throughout the lock down and haven’t had to settle for K-cup coffee or take on that eight-car line at Starbucks all hours of the day. So what right? How does that affect you?

Hold on – I’m getting there I promise. Recently my wife and I were talking (while enjoying our morning latte and espresso of course) about how long we should wait before picking up where we left off with our plans for our coffee chain. While we weren’t under a strict lock-down anymore, we certainly weren’t back to normal and the overall business climate was still a little volatile. We truly wanted to share our “coffee culture” with others, but was now the time? Opening up a new business right then was still a risk unless it was an e-commerce business. Hmmmmmmm. That just might work.

So here we are, that’s our story. Within a few months we entered the fray of the coffee business and launched Lonestar Coffee Co. While not the chain of coffee shops we planned on starting with, it’s still an opportunity for us to share our coffee culture and love of coffee with you while starting to build our brand. We built our store for other coffee lovers like us and have included all the things we needed to create our own “coffee culture” at home and make our perfect cup. Now you don’t have to go searching for everything you need to the same, from fresh craft-roasted coffee beans from all over the world, gourmet coffee flavors, best-selling coffee blends, coffee gear, and even those accessories like cups, mugs, stickers, and apparel, Lonestar Coffee Co. offers everything you need to find and make your perfect cup. We hope you enjoy your experience and look forward to hearing from you. Until then, thanks for stopping by and enjoy that perfect cup!