Just a Bit of Our History
Carol and I opened Cambridge St Coffee House in 2022, but that was not our first venture together. In 2018 we started a dining services business, operating out of the Philadelphia Energy Solutions refinery in South Philadelphia. Here, we served breakfast and lunch to hundreds of refinery employees every day. We really loved that spot, I remember thinking to myself often that it was too good to be true. Well turns out, it was.
And in June of 2019, we lost the business much more quickly than we got it.
We spent the rest of that summer scrambling to figure out what to do next and find a place to do it.
After, literally watching everything I had built go up in flames and being worn out from decades of pizza and sandwich making, I wanted to create something that I was going to enjoy doing every day. I found Francisville by the end of that summer and didn't hesitate.
My mother (Carol) had owned an ice cream parlor for years when I was younger and ran a seasonal cannoli stand at the Philadelphia Christmas Market, so when I decided I was opening a coffee shop, I dragged her along to handle the desserts.
During the process of getting the shop put together I went back to making making pizzas to cover some of the costs, where I was given some unsolicited business advice. Apparently, to be relevant, my logo needed to have a dog and be circular. The final draft of Cambridge St's logo is a direct result of me absolutely rejecting that advice.
Here are some early drafts of the logo I drew on paper plates while making pizza.
Comments