Great Lakes Coffee Bar Opens in Midtown

[glc]

We feature artisan producers with an eye on quality and excellence. As coffee roasters this has been our passion for over 15 years and it is in this spirit that we now open our first coffee shop right here in Detroit. And what better place than in Midtown.

Coffee | Wine | Beer | Cocktails with over 80 seats in the house along with an outdoor covered patio.

Great Lakes Coffee
3965 Woodward Ave. [[Corner of Alexandrine)
www.greatlakescoffee.com

[Brich]

Good luck to you my friend. I will visit next time in town.

[Lowell]

Good Luck glc and welcome to Detroit and Midtown!

[DetroitPlanner]

I am not seeing anything about the new location on the website you posted.

[corktownyuppie]

I am not seeing anything about the new location on the website you posted.

Stopped by last week. Good coffee, great place.

[KJ5]

Hope you do better than Thistle, or any of the other coffeehouses that have come and gone over the years.

[Gannon]

Hope you do better than Thistle, or any of the other coffeehouses that have come and gone over the years.

Weak encouragement, if that. Geez, why don't you 'warn' them about the apparent curse on that corner, too?!


Great Lakes Coffee is a totally different beast. They roast their own beans. Only one other shop in town does that, from what I can tell. I know of no other with a license to sell drinks with alcohol, either.

James is a fine businessperson and even better neighbor and civic leader. I expect great things from Great Lakes at this site.


Cheers,
John

[corktownyuppie]

Weak encouragement, if that. Geez, why don't you 'warn' them about the apparent curse on that corner, too?!


Great Lakes Coffee is a totally different beast. They roast their own beans. Only one other shop in town does that, from what I can tell. I know of no other with a license to sell drinks with alcohol, either.

James is a fine businessperson and even better neighbor and civic leader. I expect great things from Great Lakes at this site.


Cheers,
John

I think Great Lakes has a few things going for them that will be to their advantage:

[[1) Coffee in the day, wine at night. By having half of their revenue model coming from nightlife, I think that will be better for them in the long run and make them less susceptible to market fluctuation.

[[2) Better demographics. My friend owned the Java Exchange near the New Center. For years he operated, just waiting for Dagleish to get converted to the new police department, knowing that revenues would go up as soon as it did. He was just a bit too early. Fast forward to 2012. Midtown is not a speculative trend. Now it's just a matter of how fast it will continue to grow.

[[Note: Midtown is a perfect model of how Detroit can get into growth mode. You say you can't cut your way to a balanced budget? That you need to shed waste while growing? I agree. Midtown is an example of how the growth side of the equation could look.)

[[3) Lower rents. I can't speak specifically to the owner of this establishment. Data shows that generally speaking, people who negotiated their rents after the 2009/10 crash are able to get much lower rental rates than pre-2008. In that sense, the crashing real estate market has been bad for the owners, but great for new renters as their minimum structural costs are significantly lower and don't need to sell as much in order to survive.


I'm speaking in general terms here; your mileage may vary.

[stasu1213]

We feature artisan producers with an eye on quality and excellence. As coffee roasters this has been our passion for over 15 years and it is in this spirit that we now open our first coffee shop right here in Detroit. And what better place than in Midtown.

Coffee | Wine | Beer | Cocktails with over 80 seats in the house along with an outdoor covered patio.

Great Lakes Coffee
3965 Woodward Ave. [[Corner of Alexandrine)
www.greatlakescoffee.com

I am glad that another coffee house had opened in the area. Midtown as well as Detroit need it. Have small medium and larger size paper cups instead of just one size

[BrushStart]

Best of luck with your new venture!

[AGinthe313]

I was out on my bike this past weekend – and took a few pics of the outside of the building.

[dmike76]

Here's some good interior pics from Curbed Detroit:

http://detroit.curbed.com/archives/2...rstatement.php

I'm looking forward to trying this place out!

[stasu1213]

I love the rustic ambiance that the place hold. It reminds of of Caribou Coffee with it's rustic look. I am still waiting on a Caribou to open in the Midtown or downtown area. I would love to see more coffee shops such as Great Lakes, 1515 Broadway, Astro, and others. I would love to see Java Hut in Ferndale open also in Detroit

[Detroitdave]

I went last week and it was great ! I went with a coffee snob and she loved it also.
I travel through the area often and this is a plus. I love Astro, but sometimes it's a pain to travel all the way over to Michigan.
I believe GLC will do very well, they are in a great location and they've done an amazing job on the space !
I don't think we need a caribou coffee to justify midtown has arrived . The hop factor is all the unique places , let everyone else catch up to midtown ! :-)
All the best

[French777]

I've been twice already! Its really great you should check it out, the neat looking interior is enough of a reason to go. Only thing I will say though, is $3.75 is a little steep for an iced coffee, its excellent coffee, just a little steep. But, Its local business so I don't mind as much, as if it were a Starbucks etc.

[poobert]

Great place, great location. I bring people there and tell people about it. Blows the lousy chain coffee shops out of the water.

[glc]

Thanks Brich!

[glc]

Hey DetroitPlanner, We have a new website lauching this week that will include the Coffee Bar. We hoped to have it up last week, but working out a few bugs.

[noise]

I'll try to stop in the next time I'm near the med campus.

I wish there was a good coffee shop on Cass, Warren, or Anthony Wayne adjacent to WSU's campus so I could quickly and easily get a nice cup instead of relying on Starbucks.

[Hypestyles]

...do they have good mocha espresso? hot cocoa?

what's the parking situation near there.. i'm not expecting free but I'm just wondering in general.. curbside?

[socks_mahoney]

dude. over priced yuppie shit. not even a hipster shop. I stupidly ordered a beer assuming that it would cost, you know, what a beer costs. Instead I got a half a pint of beer [[half!) for 8 dollars.

I hope the coffee is less expensive. I would like to say I'll be back, but I dunno.

Bring back the Thistle!

[Pcm]

I wish there was a good coffee shop on Cass, Warren, or Anthony Wayne adjacent to WSU's campus so I could quickly and easily get a nice cup instead of relying on Starbucks.

There is a new Tim Horton's on Cass at Warren.

There used to be an Einstein on Anthony Wayne [[not sure if it's still there).

The Bottom Line has been threatening to open in the basement of the Beethoven for months. It's expected to open soon.

[Detroitnerd]

The Bottom Line has been threatening to open in the basement of the Beethoven for months. ...

Don't you mean years?

[Downriviera]

“It is inhumane, in my opinion, to force people who have a genuine medical need for coffee to wait in line behind people who apparently view it as some kind of recreational activity.”
― Dave Barry

[Danny]

Great Lakes Coffee will be a jumpstart to yuppify Midtown and a increase competition against Starbucks and Panera Bread. Detroit needs exotic mom and businesses to provide art and culture. Let's hope GLC can boost up its image. Welcome to the ghettohood.