Inspiring Conversations with Nicole Thieme of The Coffee Stop

Today we’d like to introduce you to Nicole Thieme.

Hi Nicole, thanks for sharing your story with us. To start, maybe you can tell our readers some of your backstory.
I moved to Colorado in 1996. I started college at Colorado State University in 2003 and have been in Fort Collins ever since. I got my degree in technical journalism and mass communication and worked in the newspaper industry for about a decade. Back in early 2015, I was working as a newspaper designer and editor, but was eager to finally start something new. My fiancé, Mike (now husband) has always wanted to start his own business, so we started brainstorming ideas. Mike’s brother a while back had the idea of a mobile coffee truck, and he gave us his blessing if we wanted to pursue that. The more we talked about it, the more we loved it.

So after a lot of research, we bought a short school bus from a Nebraska bus dealership in April of that year, drove it back to Colorado, gutted the interior and turned it into our mobile espresso truck, The Coffee Stop. We both had restaurant experience during high school and college, but this was our first stab at anything coffee-related. I enrolled in a three month online coffee education course, and we learned as much as we could about the food truck industry and small business ownership as a whole. Our first serving day was Sept. 21, 2015. More than five years later, we are still at it.

I’m sure you wouldn’t say it’s been obstacle free, but so far would you say the journey have been a fairly smooth road?
Most of what I’ve learned and executed since the start has been a lot of trial and error. We figured out quickly places that were good for our business model and what didn’t work. Our day-to-day operations involve working with office parks to cater to their caffeine needs in a convenient, on-the-go model. We’ve been very thankful for our loyal customer base over the years, but I also love meeting new people every day!

Thanks for sharing that. So, maybe next you can tell us a bit more about your business?
The Coffee Stop is a barista on a bus! We travel around Fort Collins and northern Colorado and offer a custom-blend espresso, iced and hot coffee beverages, assorted teas, smoothies and light bites. Our usual route includes offices and office parks, but we also do private and public events, employee appreciations, etc.

Contact Info:

• Email: nicole@fococoffeestop.com
• Website: www.fococoffeestop.com
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/fococoffeestop