The Dorm Room Coffee Shop

Everyone has a few weird quirks they are known for. Freshman year of college, my quirk was that I was the girl with a coffee shop in her dorm room.

I was a barista at the time. I had been working at the coffee shop through high school and decided to buy a little $400 espresso machine to support my addiction. When I took the espresso machine to college, I often had new friends ask me to make them lattes or teas. I liked my friends but also realized the costs of milk, coffee, tea, and syrup were starting to add up.

I put out a jar, asking people to give a dollar or two when they got a drink so I didn’t end up in bankruptcy as a college freshman. This worked well. I actually started having more people come to my dorm room requesting coffee. I think this happened because normally a stranger would feel funny about asking for a latte, but when they could give couple bucks, it was less weird.

As the word traveled around my building about my little coffee shop, I started expanding. I wrote a menu on the dry erase board outside my room, set specific prices, and got a Square reader for credit cards. Business was great and I loved it.

I kept my coffee shop open through most of my freshman year until the espresso machine stopped working in April. Operating a coffee shop out of my room was one of my favorite experiences in college. I learned lessons about entrepreneurship, resourcefulness, and most of all, making the best out of whatever circumstance comes my way.

“It’s not about ideas. It’s about making ideas happen.”
-Scott Belsky, co-founder of Behance.