The Café Dispatch #1

How cafés are constantly pressured about their aesthetic, the trend that keeps growing globally, and the café I'm dying to visit

Jan 06, 2026

Welcome to a new format which I’m somewhat hoping you’ll all like because it’s meant to stay. If you do, please feel free to subscribe and comment as much as you want. And also, don’t forget your coffee while you read this letter ☕️

After days of brainstorming, and talking with café owners in Paris and Greece, and London - I wish I could publish my interviews daily, but I realise many of you have come to this place because of one of my notes that went slightly viral over Christmas… which was very much about how I chose to deal with my layoff through writing about cafés and coffee on Substack, but also choosing the route of self-exploration vs full-time employment.

So to follow through with the promise of sharing a bit more about how I work on creating a life that feels right, I am starting a weekly series blending trends about cafés, news you should definitely know about and the cafés I’m hoping to visit ASAP.

Alongside with that, I’ll start each of those series with a mini-editorial paragraph about how I’ve been approaching the week. In fact, after a long chat with a new friend yesterday evening, I’d like you to take the time and space you need this week to figure out where you work best. We’ve been brainwashed to think a desk and an office is what gets our brain juice going but I’m not so sure..

I’ve discovered in the past 6 months that any writing, any real great thinking always happens for me in a café, brasserie or place where people come, sit, chat and go. It’s how I get inspired and actually do my best work. I may not write the entire thing in that space, but I’ll come home after an hour or so feeling full of energy to tackle absolutely everything I am meant to get done. Voilà.

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The best coffee in America might be hiding behind a Shell station (and I think this is definitely a click-bait title) but, I love what it actually means. It means that coffee is more than a pretty coffee shop we’ll accidentally scroll over when on instagram - it’s about the ritual meeting us where we are.

And I cannot think of a better place in the world to illustrate this concept than Italy - one of my first road trip from Switzerland to Italy was with one of my ex-bosses (yes, he’d just bought a Maseratti and it felt way better for him to drive over to Milano instead of taking the train.. suggestion I regretfully regretted while driving over… I thought I was going to die - at least twice) anyhow, the thing is, highways in Italy have gas stations with incredible coffee below 2€ (!) and it is because coffee is so deeply a ritual in Italy, it is as important as bread is to french people - it is a human right. And honestly, who wouldn’t love that.

And apparently, a few places have caught up (I doubt they did on the price point side of things, but they’ve realised that good coffee sold in loads could benefit them and attract a lot more drivers) hence, The Flower Shop Coffee Co. in Denton, Texas, serves lattes in a yellow food truck. And even Kentucky’s Elliott Coffee transformed a former one-pump service station into a neighbourhood gathering spot. Why not - my café, The Blend, was an old mechanic workshop!

Smart move for sure - as they have lower rent, built-in foot traffic, and visibility without fighting for it, adding delicious coffee on the menu is a win. But more importantly, they’re proving that when you can’t rely on being in the “right” neighbourhood or having the perfect Instagram interior, you have to be excellent at the actual coffee and service.

Meanwhile, the cafés that are surviving the current economic reality; volatile green coffee prices, climbing operating costs, impossible margins on drinks alone all while continuously innovating in order to get more people into their doors, are the ones who see opportunity in selling quick, easy food with coffee.

Japanese sandos, umami-forward flavors, protein-packed breakfasts, simple but elevated toast menus - in fact, Hakone Coffee whom I interviewed earlier this winter, sells sandos and it works! High-quality, simple preparations that can be executed perfectly during morning rush is such an easy way to add some extra cash in your cash register, because when you’re slammed at 8am and have a line out the door, complexity, pressure and noise will kill both; speed and quality.

“Simplicity is often undervalued,” says Zsuzsa Kerekes of Madal Café in Budapest. “A high-quality, simple toast menu is better than having something too elaborate that you can’t execute correctly and consistently.”

It’s the same lesson as the gas station cafés: excellence in execution beats aesthetic perfection (almost every time, even if mainly to please milenials).

I might repeat myself, but café culture - or 3rd wave culture has become an Instagram phenomenon and look, I’m not upset because I do enjoy seeing the kind of place I’m going out for coffee - especially when it’ll cost me nearly €7 for a flat white… but isn’t there also magic in finding the cafés you didn’t plan to visit?

Because of social media, the metrics café owners use have now shifted from “Do people feel at home here? Is the coffee their focus and do they care about our local roasters?” to “Does our place or latte art photograph well enough to go viral?”

And with that shift, everything became pricier for café owners; designing and commissioning architects for their cafés, getting the right porcelain to pour their coffee in, finding the perfect barista with the best latte art skills and then meanwhile to pay for all this, get the best location with the most amount of foot traffic to ensure that they can cover their expenses… and sadly many don’t. It’s a bit of a negative spiral all to please Instagram… don’t you think?

But some cafés out there, have decided to offer more to combat their faith... so they can charge more and, in different ways. We’re seeing a surge since early 2025 of “Multi-format Cafés” term coined by Sergey Baburov. Cafés that will be your yoga studio (Slowe Café in Paris), your coworking space (Georgies in Lower East Side NYC) and your specialty coffee provider. It’s fun but it’s mostly strategic. Gone are the days where your margin on coffees only could cover majority of your expenses and thus, opening cafés that offer everything, if well managed is now a much better alternative.

Think what you want, this trend is not vanishing anytime soon. Just like all other cafés, many are working hard on nailing their concept before opening their doors and they should, our addiction to socials is making sure we’re continuously feeling excited about the next café… yet, I promise you I’ll die on that hill, I will always feel more at home in a café like Dreamin’ Man or Grave Café in Paris…

Currently obsessed with: The Coffee - it doesn’t photograph well because it is pure minimalism on display, but never have I been disappointed with my flat white or cortado order - it’s quick and tasty, and often the ideal stop when I’m in a hurry for good coffee. Besides, they’ve mastered the art of scale IMO, all while continuously improving their coffee and keeping it high quality.

What I’m brewing at home: when in Paris, I’ve been using a Bialetti Moka, and trying different cafés from Café Richard, and Café Joyeux. But I’m ready to buy yet another espresso coffee machine… stay tuned (and if you have any good tips, let me know).

Worth the trip: Candle Kids Café. A place vetted by a few local friends, who confirmed the coffee was exquisite (obvious as they’re serving Fève - a local boutique roastery) but also, the place is warm and their banana bread rocks.

Growth at all costs. It’s a very US narrative - scaling - in order to be successful but here in Paris, though some cafés seem to follow that mindset, many are honing in on their current successful cafés and figuring a way to attend more trade shows or be better at social media to attract recurring coffee lovers.

Staffing is still the defining challenge. The cafés reducing turnover aren’t competing on wages alone, they’re creating actual career paths, offering flexible scheduling, and treating baristas like skilled professionals. Lower turnover means better consistency, which means better customer experience.

The Blue Bottle acquisition is not going well. Is that a surprise, do we really need it to be saved? I might upset some of you but I’m excited about the next wave of independent cafés that take more space instead of buying directly from mega coffee chains.

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Julie Hanell is a RevOps and GTM Strategist and Café Culture analyst based in-between Limassol, Málaga and Paris. Want to see more? Check out Instagram and LinkedIn.