Our Story
Our restaurant journey started at a very young age. All four of us began waiting tables at 15 years old, and as always, we were a package deal everywhere we worked. We have always loved this industry, but we love working together even more. However, life took us in different directions in our twenties, and our foursome split as we pursued our individual college goals and aspirations, but we couldn’t stay apart for long. In the summer of 2005, we all found ourselves back under our parents roof, and before we knew it, we were all working together again. We realized this was what we were meant to do, and the journey to open our cafe began.
With over ten years experience each, we began to write our business plan and develop our concept. We sought out investors, locations and leases. We were confident in our business plan and knew exactly what kind of restaurant we wanted to open. From the menu, quality of ingredients, vendors, decor and service, we had every detail thought through, but we quickly realized upon securing financing and a lease that this venture would not come easy. Every bank turned us away for a business loan, every investor and landlord told us it was too risky of a business and turned us away. We got our hopes up countless times as we would secure an investor and then lose a lease and vice versa. To be honest, for eight years, it was like a dog chasing its tail. However, we just couldn’t put the dream to rest no matter how much adversity we faced.
In 2011, everything in our tight nit family changed in the blink of an eye. Our amazing father, the rock of our family, our biggest cheerleader, was diagnosed at the young age of 55, with terminal brain cancer. Life as we knew it stopped and it would never be the same. All of us girls rallied around our sweet dad as he battled 11 months for his life. We said goodbye to our dad in January 2012. Heartbroken, defeated and unsure of what life had in store for us, we decided to lay our dream of opening our restaurant to rest as well. We closed the book and buried it.
In the spring of 2012, our broker called and said he had the perfect location for our cafe and really wanted us to consider the adventure one more time. We were reluctant, but decided to give it another go. We sent our business plan over to the landlord and crossed our fingers. We went to the location and agreed with our broker, it was perfect for us. We had lunch together, just the four of us, that day and scratched our heads about how we could get a loan or investor on board. Our hearts sunk a bit, as we found ourselves in an all too familiar place. We had a promising lease in front of us and once again, no investor.
We met again the very next day to get the ball rolling and our mom asked to join us. Our beautiful momma, whose prayers were endless about our business, joined our meeting that day to tell us that right before our dad passed away, he told her that if the right place comes along for the girls to open their restaurant, to give us his life insurance money, because he wanted to be our silent partner. With tears in her eyes, our mom told us that if wanted this building, we finally had the money to open. Three months after we lost our dad, we found ourselves hopeful and excited as we embarked on a whole new journey together, and we had the full support of our parents through it all.
In April 2012, we signed a lease and this long lived dream became a reality. We knew this was it, this was the right place and the right time and our dad was in it with us. Despite the peace we had moving forward, we still faced many ups and downs along the way. The hard work really began. We cleaned every nook and cranny of our restaurant ourselves, painted, figured out how everything worked and what all we needed to do. From hiring a small staff, to the execution of the menu, we worked and worked and worked. There were tears, laughs and a lot of quesadillas had next door at jaliscos. The cafe slowly took shape and all the pieces fell into place. We had our grand opening in October 2012. We came out of the gates running that day with full support of the community, family and friends lined up out the door to join us and such has been the case ever since. We are so humbled and grateful to be here today, together and doing the dang thing! Our hard work paid off and we owe it all to the prayers and support of our incredible parents for getting us to the finish line. Our restaurant means everything to us. We think it’s safe to say our dad is beaming with pride from heaven.