Tony and Pablo of Lobos Coffee Roasters

Meet Tony Villalobos and Pablo Sierra—childhood friends and co-owners of Lobos Coffee Roasters. Since 2020, the Lobos Team has been elevating Orlando’s coffee scene through their personalized approach to purchasing directly from coffee farms, finding the perfect roast for each origin, and creating exciting new drink recipes based on seasonal flavors and customer tastes. Visit them online at https://loboscoffeeroasters.com

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Transcript

Intro: 0:12

Hi friends, thank you for joining us for another episode of Hello APGD, a neighborhood podcast about the Audubon Park Garden District in Orlando, florida. I'm your host, Michael Lothrop, and today we'll be speaking with Tony Villalobos and Pablo Sierra of Lobos Coffee Roasters at 3000 Corinne Drive. If you can't make it to their coffee house, you can visit them online at LobosCoffeeRoasters.com or on Facebook and Instagram. If you'd like to be a guest on the show or if you'd like to be a sponsor, please feel free to message me on Instagram at helloapgdpod. Thank you for listening. This episode is brought to you in part by Trevor Brown, Audubon Park resident and trusted Central Florida Realtor, with Fanny Hillman and associates, proudly serving their clients for over 40 years. For listings, market trends, helpful home buyer and seller tips. Email directly to Trevor at fannyhillman.com or find him on Instagram at Trevor Brown Realtor. 

Michael:

And with me today is Tony Villalobos and Pablo Sierra of Lobos Coffee Roasters. Welcome, guys. Hi, thanks for having us. Absolutely. Thank you for being here. I can't do justice to your last name, can you say it? You say it so well. 

Tony: 1:29

No worries. No worries, it's Tony Villalobos. Tony is actually my nickname. It comes from Antonio, my first name is actually Roryn and I'm junior, so there's two of us out there, okay. So if you see an older gentleman, it just looks like me. I'm going to look like him in about 20 years. 

Michael: 1:45

So Roryn Senior lives in the area as well. 

Tony: 1:48

He lives down in Miami with my mom and my sister, so that's kind of where we grew up And you guys met in Miami as teenagers. 

Michael: 1:58

Is that right?

Tony: 1:59

We did. We met at what we call CAP or Civil Air Patrol, kind of an offshoot of ROTC, and we became close friends really quickly. We found out that we actually live blocks away from each other. We actually went to different high schools And my closest friends are actually from that Civil Air Patrol organization. I keep in touch with them today and they're like my closest friend, so for tour, this is a very great organization that we were able to meet up at. 

Michael: 2:30

So you did not meet in high school but you went to, you lived in a similar area but different high schools. I actually have a friend, a similar story, that we didn't meet until our 20s, maybe 30s, and he lived a street behind me, but since he went to a different high school, we never met. And it's just amazing, all the similar experiences that we had and yet, like our paths never crossed until they did, and, as you say, fortuitously. 

Tony: 2:59

Yes, yes, I actually went to a magnet program down in Miami for a hospitality class where I was technically supposed to go to high school. I was supposed to be with Pablo, but I ended up in that magnet program. But again, fortuitously, we found each other at CAP and we became friends, best friends, and we're here now to this day. 

Michael: 3:18

That’s amazing. And you have Panamanian roots. We were just talking a little bit. My wife also grew up in Panama, moved here when she was a teenager, so you are the second Panamanian citizen that I've had on the podcast, officially. 

Tony: 3:34

Very nice. Yeah, I love my country. I love to go back and visit. Unfortunately, I left when I was young so I'm a bit of a tourist now, but we still have family over there with close ties to the country and to the land. My family and my grandmother, particularly from my father's side, has a coffee farm. She's along with us so it's in the family. So that's kind of where the roots of the whole idea, where we started off with in coffee and in that coffee world. It really didn't develop until later on in life the coffee passion, But that's kind of where it started. We love to go visit, we love to go back. It's a beautiful place. I actually went for one of our birthdays before the pandemic and I took Pablo for the first time, wow, and we ended up going. We have a burger, my cousin pretty much. He lives in the city and he ended up taking us to San Blas. And what an amazing trip. I had my sister, my brother-in-law, Pablo, his wife, Alex, his wife. It was just a nice group to go to and it was just a part of the country I never visited. Glad that I had my friends and family around me. It was just an amazing trip. So if you've never, definitely recommend to go Yeah. To some panel in general. 

Michael: 4:50

I have been once, and we were unfortunately there for a hospital visit, so we really just stayed in the city. We didn't get to travel too much outside of the city. So what area did you grow up in, or were you when you were younger? 

Tony: 5:07

So a funny story is that we, my family, my direct family we grew up in a region called the Vichitiki And that's kind of saying the bread basket of our country in Panama. Kind of saying like, oh, you're from California, but back in the day, and even still now, baseball is very, very popular over there And when I was a kid, the pressure of playing baseball and growing up in that atmosphere, but there was always a rivalry between sections of the country, the city, las tablas, vichitiki, all these wonderful places that when I grew up and I started going into hospitality, i remember one time I was working down in Miami and had a general come up and he was checking in and he gave me his passport and I see and I say, oh, you're from Panama, or what part are you from? And he tells me he goes like las tablas, and once someone asks kind of like that particular question, they kind of know where you from, are you from Panama? Like how do you know? You know it's not a, you know it's not really a random question. And I told him I was born in Vichitiki And, for whatever reason, always, always, always, I always get, ah, you're from there, because there's such a rivalry with our part and the rest of the country that it's always ah, you're from over there. 

Michael: 6:31

It's going to always be that way. 

Tony: 6:33

No, matter if I was 12 years old or 40. Now, it's the same thing. 

Michael: 6:38

I love it. 

Tony: 6:39

So yeah, your wife will probably say ah, you're from Chitiki. 

Michael: 6:44

I look forward to traveling and seeing more of Panama. What I saw was beautiful, but you know the city, the traffic was kind of mind blowing. I just had not seen where there are not really lanes and people are just kind of like they know where to put their cars, but I would not want to drive there. A two-lane highway becomes a five-lane highway very quickly at five o'clock, and an intersection too, which like I just, I couldn't stop watching it because I was like how are they not crashing into each other all the time? But yeah, I mean beautiful beaches from what I could see from where we were, and the food is amazing. Obviously, the coffee culture is, you know, above and beyond. So you do have coffee from your grandparents' farm. 

Tony: 7:32

Not right now. Unfortunately, with the elevation and how climate is changing, it's not at the elevation that we wanted to have it And it's not really a level of production. Unfortunately, since my grandma passed away and she was a little bit older, she was kind of letting it go little by little, although it's still in the family. It's still not at the level that we would want to have it. But luckily enough we've had and we have connections, family ties. My father worked in the industry with farm and agriculture when he was there, when he was younger, when we were living there. We were actually able to go last year or actually no, this year if I'm not mistaken, and we were able to be introduced to Jensen and his farm, which has award-winning geisha, which is tremendous around the world. The coffee culture, the coffee industry in Panama has really developed. They really put a lot of emphasis in their coffee and exactly where it's coming from, how to cultivate it, to which strains they have and kind of really start pairing them off to get certain notes and taste profiles. And geisha is a beautiful story on how that was found. Pretty much They were this coffee being or fruit. It's very difficult to cultivate. It takes almost twice the size or twice the space that other coffees do. So a lot of people started ripping them up and then Jensen had a Q-Grader a Cata Lores, what we call them on there to taste it. And he said, wow, this is amazing. So they send it off to be tested in the sanato market. At the time someone bid on it and no coffee would sell more than $3, $4, if it was really really good. It's. Someone bid on it and they wanted to pay $10 per pound. This was they first thought it was a mistake. They checked their equipment, they checked everything and no someone actually put in for this coffee. And that's where the lure came from, because it's very hard to cultivate. It's not a big production, so obviously economy of a scale. You have something so fantastic, people want it And 20 years later, some of these award-winning coffees that they have over there, with the family connections that we have, we're able to bring some of the best coffees from Panama over here, especially from the Jensen family farm, and they were fantastic. They greeted us, they hosted us, we sat down with them. It was an amazing time. We feel that that's kind of like the connection that we have and the ability that we want to go to a lot of these places and go directly to the farm, talk to them, see what they're doing, see what special things they're doing there and try to bring that coffee over here. We feel that Orlando's growing Coffee culture, I mean, if you've seen a map of Orlando and all the coffee roasters, coffee houses, coffee shops that are in Orlando. 

Michael: 10:43

Even just in this neighborhood right, I mean it feels saturated. But I love coffee so much that I vary my coffee origins. I mean, stardust is usually my go-to because it's just the classic spot. But lineage has great stuff. You guys have great stuff. There's B3. Stumptown is offered at P is for Pie, and SugarDough now has coffee as well. So there's no shortage. 

Tony: 11:09

Yeah, Salty Donut does in Tallahassee. So we know that there's a great coffee scene, coffee vibe over here And we also feel that all boats, the tide rises and going on. Two years now when we were able to get this location And we saw also Salty Donut opening up. When I talked to Pablo, he told me this is the community that all other communities want to be like. In Orlando, the New Milk District, the Packing District, all this was just the one and it was just amazing that we were able to find it. Well, testament to him, he worked on that part. It took us about a good year and a half to really find a location and we were so glad that we're here in this community because it's just been amazing. It's been. You know, we have our ups and downs with COVID and all that stuff. 

Michael: 12:03

You started construction during the pandemic and you converted a gas station slash national food mart it was called and they had separated it. There was something going on that they were trying to do and it didn't really pan out. There was a lot of ideas for that space And I remember at our board of directors meetings for the Main Street Organization, just kind of hearing updates of you know I think they wanted to put a laundromat there at some point and then maybe a frozen yogurt place And the build out that you guys did is tremendous. I understand there were some cost overruns and some schedule overruns, which is not uncommon for construction jobs. My wife actually works in project management now doing, you know, overseeing construction, but you guys really had your work cut out for you in that space. Tell me about how that went. 

Tony: 13:04

I think Pablo Crippoli handled that question better than I, because it's a whirlwind for me. I was just, you know, there was. 

Michael: 13:13

I think I saw the parking lot be redone one time because it wasn't graded quite right. 

Pablo: 13:20

I'm so sorry to bring up all these sort topics and we can gloss over it. 

Pablo: 13:25

But yes, it's way in the past It's like a whole team Back then. I just think this day would ever come. 

Michael: 13:33

Of course I can imagine how scary it would be investing Well before we get to even the construction. 

Pablo: 13:39

You guys knew each other from college days before college middle school, high school days, several or we lived close to each other And, yeah, i didn't even know what UCF was. To be honest with you, interesting It was either FIU or Bust. For us It was just culture in Miami. And I'll never forget we were big UM fans at the time and they were playing FSU one weekend, same week in his orientation for Tony's new school. I'm like, yeah, i'll come up with you. You know, that's cool. That was the first time I ever sat foot at UCF and realized, hey, if he can do it, i can do it too. Nice. So I was on the eight year plan. 

Michael: 14:19

He was But he's also older than me. 

Pablo: 14:26

By the time I came around and really got going to UCF, i really couldn't wait to move back to Miami. It still didn't click that Orlando was such a cool, vibrant up and coming town. And this is around 2009. I met my wife in 2010 and at that point. 

Tony: 14:43

I was not alone. I take credit for it. I pushed them to come up to UCF. 

Michael: 14:47

Excellent I was one of the only ones, maybe enough, yeah, wow, yeah. 

Pablo: 14:53

Long story short, i said I'm not going anywhere, this is where it's at, and you know what a great, great decision it was And I always had Tony just reminding me of what's possible. It's like, hey, if I did it, you can do it. You can get through this. As hard as college was for me, you know. He really did help motivate me through that. And then at the time he was working with a big restaurant group in the area helping them open new restaurants and move to Ohio. He'd move back for a month or two and stay with me and then he'd move somewhere else Chicago, i believe. He came back and stayed with me again and eventually he said hey, i want to set my roots down here, and that I want to say about 2015,. 2016 was when Lobos first came up as an idea. He was living with me and kind of showed me his business plan And I you know, i was studying economics at the time So really started, you know, catching my interest and just coaching him on. Hey well, this is what you need if you want to make this happen. Fast forward. Six years later, we finally got to open the doors on what you guys see today, But it was definitely a road of many challenges. Like you said, we started with one budget and ended up having a scrape under the couch and figure out, because you know there's a certain point once you've gone so far, there's no turning back, right? Like you dip your toe in and your foot in and then, before you know it, you're like just breathe. 

Michael: 16:14

Yes, we're trying to swim anyway, and what a weird time too, because I mean during the pandemic, managing a construction project and getting workers on site and all of that. There's all of these question marks about what the future holds. And is this like would? 

Pablo: 16:33

you ever leave their house again. We started construction on this side. I want to say it was the last week of February and lockdown happened maybe two, three weeks later, I want to say mid-March. I mean Tony, just looked at each other and said, dude, what do we do? Like is the world going to end? Or at that point it was just like there's no turning back. We got to make this happen. 

Michael: 16:53

Well, i'm glad that you didn't turn back, because the space is beautiful, your coffee is incredible, you guys are doing awesome And, like I just always see, the parking lot is full. People are always in there, just like. 

Pablo: 17:08

I don't get to see much of it, unfortunately. Is that right? Yeah, okay. 

Michael: 17:14

You've got your day job and this is your side hustle, is that right? 

Pablo: 17:18

Yeah, It didn't really start out that way. It was just like hey, Tony, you need some help. And eventually, i was swimming with them, so I pulled them into the board. 

Michael: 17:29

We were swimming together Like a friend does. 

Pablo: 17:33

That's a small business in America right now, anywhere. It's just it's stuff to get by and margins matter. And you know you're getting hit on one side And you know, in order to even make it through the summer, we made it. Even though it's busy, you get stuff, you know. you want to make sure your employees are paid on time. You want to make sure your costs are covered. And at the end of the day, the less I take from the business, the more likely it is to survive right now. So I try not to spend much time there. When I am there, I'm usually, you know you'll see me wiping tables or, you know, sweeping the floors, but I don't officially have a title there, except for being Tony support system when he breaks down. 

Tony: 18:08

And I break that a lot. It's just, you know, small business, you know, when I got into it and running an establishment is different than owning, obviously because it all falls on you And everyone's always said, if you're lucky you could maybe see some returns three years, four years, five years. And in the business hospitality and restaurants and whatnot, you know, most places closed down in the first year, half of that closed down in five, half of that closed down in ten years. So it's not easy. 

Michael: 18:41

Those are not great odds, are they? They're not, they're not. 

Tony: 18:45

And you know we've reinvested in a couple other items to ensure that we're viable and that we can move forward and build the business. You know, if everything goes well, hopefully we'll have another location somewhere. We're strategically planning for that. But right now our baby is this and we want to make sure we fine tune everything, make sure we perfected it before we decided to go just willingly, right. It's a learning process, right, And it's your brand too right, And any deviation from that greatness can be so detrimental you know And we hopefully have plans for that and ideas to curve those items, because obviously we're not the big boys where they have billions of dollars in capital and then you know a store could do well or not do well. 

Michael: 19:40

We don't have that option, You're basically competing in an industry where you have Starbucks and then you have all the little guys right And it's kind of a weird dynamic And we're not the only ones that are fighting in this good fight. 

Tony: 19:56

You know there's, especially after the pandemic Not even I think we're still in it, but during the pandemic, where are we going to get the guests back? Then, all of a sudden, a year later, inflation and skyrocketing prices. And you know we're not no different than anyone else. We also feel those items there And we try to also balance that out with costs for customers because again they can go somewhere else that has bigger budgets that they could just say, well, we're going to buy us a bulk and kind of keep our margins down or keep our prices down. For a small business like us it's very difficult. You know, if a cup costs last year 50 cents and all of a sudden it costs $1.25, that's a big increase and might not sound big and all one cup. But when you're ordering cups and cups and cups every month and you know so it's just an example We've, you know we talked about sometimes saying are we done to do this or are we like, how are we doing it? You know, at the end of the day we look at it as if we're not going to do it someone else. Well, so we need to figure it out. 

Pablo: 21:08

Which is why it's so important that we're going direct to source our beans, you know, because that way we can see the impact our dollars make back home. and whether it's Panama or Nicaragua or any of the other countries that we work with, we want to be able to, you know, secure our source number one and make sure that we're able to leverage our economies to work those costs down for us. 

Michael: 21:28

That's the best way to do it right And to guarantee the quality and that you are. you're sourcing with the thoughtfulness of getting the product and roasting it the right way. I you know, I'm very familiar with lineage, coming to figure out their formulas and their different origins, and beans and roasts and things like that. So I think that you guys do a very similar thing and you are roasting in-house there at Lobos, Yes, yes. 

Pablo: 21:59

Any time we can be named on the same list is any of those guys. Totally. 

Michael: 22:03

It really is. 

Pablo: 22:04

Those guys did great work and you know I mentioned earlier to learning process you know, when we started. We have a way different quality today than back then. You know what I mean, because we've learned. We've learned what to what, not to do, what works, what our customers like. So and it hopefully it'll continue to grow and continue to get better because we keep, you know, testing new things and new cupings and just new strains and things like that. 

Tony: 22:26

That's huge And absolutely you know, and what I like doesn't necessarily mean that that's what the customer likes. So you're gonna start off doing dark roasts. We sat down with our roaster and really the fine, because we've had a lot of people come in and say you know, do you offer dark roasts as an example? And we fine tuned it. You know our darkest roast. So we go as a French roast, you know, and there's a difference between a French and Italian roast and we could get into all that, but one's darker than other and we just feel that that's gonna be the best roast for the best essence for this particular coffee And we pick certain strains and certain origins that hold up to it. But it takes time, it takes practice, it takes tasting, a lot of jittery days sometimes But it's fun, and especially to see the end product, when I literally have customers come in and say I'm not, i can't go to the airport and have the coffee over there before I go. You know Where I have people that move the way and they'll still order online from us and we ship it out to them. So you know it makes a difference. Coffee's fantastic at the end of the day. I'm not sure how many people are into coffee, but you know it gives you a nice little buzz, it gives you alert. You know, you look back in the history health benefits it's a fantastic product. But when you're able to do it right and really get that essence and the flavors out of it, and when I come to realize, like I said, i got into coffee later in my life, when I was living in Tampa, i found a local roaster and I tried their coffee. I needed to get out of the house, i didn't know anyone and I wanted to do some work. Do you remember who that was? 

Michael: 24:10

I do Buddy Brew in Tampa you know I give a shout out to them. I'm familiar, okay, cool. 

Tony: 24:14

Yeah, so they're fantastic. I haven't met them personally but they were a big inspiration Because I saw them built from a small retail shop to what they have now, which is like about five or six around Tampa and the airport. But it was I remember the first time going over there and I remember just adding sugar and adding a lot of sugar. And then I go sit down and I try it. I'm like this is sweet, overly sweet, and then just a little thing in my head kind of clicked and why was it so sweet? And then I kept going back and I kept on adding less and less and less to a point where they didn't have to add sugar Because the quality of the coffee, the roast, how they prepared it made the massive amount of difference. And at the time still am health conscious And I wanted to eliminate the sugars and I wanted to eliminate all that wonderful stuff that adds the pounds on It? 

Michael: 25:06

does it? does? I like to get my sugar from other places too. I love my coffee black and I love my sweets occasionally. 

Tony: 25:14

Absolutely So. It enabled me to do that And that's kind of what really sparked the interest and kind of revisited the idea of my family and the farm and whatnot. But yeah, once you have a really, really good cup of coffee, we had one in Nicaragua with the owner in Nicaragua and we just sat down there and we just started chit chatting. He makes a brew and we're sitting there like I think this is better than what we get. This is fantastic. It was black, beautiful, aromatic, it was amazing. And for us to be able to open up, hopefully, some people's eyes you know Maxwell House and all those again, they paved the way. They're great, yeah. 

Michael: 26:06

For what it is. it serves a purpose, But I challenge you to drink that without sugar or something. It's a different experience. It's not as comforting. It really is kind of jarring in a way It is. 

Tony: 26:20

So it's people run on coffee almost every day. So if you're able to just minimize the intake of those sugars and whatnot, at least for me it's important And I love it. People come in and ask me all the time what's your favorite coffee? Like I'm listening, i'm not gonna lie to you. It's a latte. It could be 100 degrees outside, whole milk and espresso. 

Michael: 26:43

That's all I do. 

Tony: 26:45

It's just you know again, if you prepare and make it right, milk has sugars and lactose, obviously that you know. If you steam it right, you know, and get that frothyness out of it, you can unlock those sugars And that's what gives us sweetness with the coffee. So yeah, it's amazing. It's just the little things that you kind of pay attention to. Obviously we're in the business and we're in the industry, but hopefully at the end of the day, when guests come in, they could just taste that automatically And that's what we hope, that people can understand when they come to our shop. Definitely. 

Michael: 27:19

Yeah, and it's interesting. You know the pumpkin spice latte trend and how you know it can be very polarizing for people And there's an acronym for it, psl, which I didn't know until recently, and it is very popular And I know that that is. You know, that's kind of what keeps people going back to Starbucks, that it's just sort of that like overly sweetened, just too many things. 

Pablo: 27:49

We don't want to take that away from people, right? I know? I know I don't mean to dog on it And I had a couple PSLs. 

Michael: 27:55

We were on vacation and Gabby was kind of making fun of me because I usually only drink my coffee black, but I really wanted to treat myself. 

Pablo: 28:03

Sometimes you just want that, You know it's. 

Michael: 28:05

there's something very comforting and I do understand it. 

Pablo: 28:09

I try not to make a habit out of that, but it's funny you say that because the other day we were working on a van and I just looked at Tony and said can I just have a latte today please? And he looks and he goes oh, you want to enjoy your coffee today. I'm like maybe I don't do this often, but sometimes you do. 

Michael: 28:27

Absolutely. Yeah, there is something, as I said, like comforting, i mean. I don't know, there's probably more ways to describe it, but it's a specific sensation that I don't think you really get from other foods or beverages, and obviously it's very popular. And obviously people. Coffee is not going away And it's great that you have decaf for those that cannot caffeinate. My wife is one of those people and it's pretty heartbreaking for her, but there's great decaf offerings in the neighborhood, which is super important for a lot of folks, And again there might be people who listen to say plass for me, decaf, I get it. I get it, but there are specific reasons That's right. 

Tony: 29:19

But we were carrying to get a little nerdy right now. We were carrying some mantra decaf And we still work with an importer And he was like I may have something a little different for you, one of my favorite coffees. We said Nicaragua is Papua Nuguini, and he had something that he brought in from Papua Nuguini And I was decaf And we sat down with our roaster, we did our thing And put on an expression Like wow, hey, this is what I'm talking about, this is nice, i might be doing a little decaf. 

Michael: 29:47

Yeah, when you have to balance it out, when you've had too much coffee already but you still want to drink coffee, like that's the secret weapon, right there, right. 

Pablo: 29:55

And we try to also. We also got beer and wine. I know I love that. 

Michael: 30:00

That is so good. 

Pablo: 30:01

Yes, decaf or beer, i don't know. 

Tony: 30:03

That's true. So when we were sitting down and thinking about this idea, what is going to set us apart And what we want to do differently I always like to describe our shop as a coffee house, Because we do do more than most on the one roof. Smartly or not smartly to take so many things. 

Michael: 30:23

You do a lot there, for sure. 

Tony: 30:25

We roast, we obviously serve coffee, we do food and bites and then beer and wine. We stay and try to make those connections here in the community. So a lot of the taps beer-wise are all local or hyper local, or at least in the state of Florida. We do have a connection with Tank Brewing, which my brother-in-law works with them And we love their stuff too. They're fantastic. But from tactical to Ivanhoe to Tentan Brewing, like we know all those guys And we've collaborated sometimes on beer and coffee. It's a cool. So we want to give a space where you could come in no matter what time of day. If you want to come in with a group of friends in the morning, or come in and work, or in the evening come in with a group of friends just on wine, we have that for you. Again, i worked in restaurants before And it was always kind of like taboo. You come in, you sit down, you have your lunch or your dinner, but to sit down and do work it's like hey, you're taking that table For us, it's not. We want that space. We've also saw the market where a lot of people are now working from home And sometimes you just need to get out And we want to be able to build that space. But also, if you are going to sit for a little bit, we also have food and beer And you could just enjoy the rest of your day. So all that stuff is very strategic And we have fantastic regulars that come in all the time And we build that again for the community, for a place to really come and enjoy. You know, we were lucky enough to do the night market this past weekend. 

Michael: 32:11

Yeah, Zombietoberfest Night Market. 

Tony: 32:12

It was huge, right It was, it was fantastic. 

Michael: 32:15

Were you expecting that turnout? 

Pablo: 32:17

It was our second time, But this year was much, much, much yes. 

Tony: 32:21

So we, after the first year, which was it was off on our own, i had a fantastic, great, great event. So we knew, this year being already almost open, two years, you know we want to bring in vendors, we want to, you know, have a little bit of more off And, and you know, just give a little bit more vibe for the community. I think, i think we did that. We were packed, i think the place was packed, not just us but the whole. 

Michael: 32:47

You guys did an awesome job, yeah And the board of directors was talking about that too How you really tied the whole thing together, like had a DJ, had the food, had the beverages, like it's very efficient, like all of it, and people were hanging out Like it was. It was awesome, it was so perfect. 

Tony: 33:05

We want to be able to get back to some sense of normalcy Again. it's crazy times right now, but just be able to come out, hang out with your family, enjoy the weekend. It's, the weather is just perfect. 

Michael: 33:16

It is, and you guys have that amazing space out back that you know, behind the plazas and behind your shop. You have, you know, basically this alley. It's a road but it hasn't been activated the way that it could, with the exception of your space, and you have seating with kind of like this lovely fencing you know this wood fence. That just it's very inviting back there And, and right now and for the foreseeable future, my wife and I really are only doing outdoor stuff, indoor with masks, but we have, you know, health reasons that we have to be very cautious And your space is covered. It's inviting any time of day and especially this time of year. I think that that is that such a huge contribution to the culture, because people do want to hang out here And when you have a welcoming space, people remember that. 

Tony: 34:19

So in the back we have five round tables and a couple of individual ceilings that you could also have. Inside we have up to about 48 seats. So total if I remember mistaken, i believe it was like 78, 79, or five. 

Michael: 34:33

It's, it's a beautiful, beautiful shop. And your packaging, your branding, thank you. And I understand you guys are selling your coffee at local Walmart now. 

Tony: 34:45

Yes, yes, that's a pretty big step And so going back into, you know, reinvesting and kind of getting their name and brand out there, we were poised with this opportunity to go into Walmart And right now in 11 of 12 Walmart's there's one more that's not quite ready. Yet We have other items come in than the pipeline. I think another one, another store, not locally, a little bit further out, we do have some wholesale accounts as well that carry our coffee, c3 Church out of Lake Underhill, the French Patisserie and the Molle Millenia 1803 we partnered up with and some other companies as well. So we're trying to expand right and smartly as best as we can, because no one saw the pandemic, no one had a playbook Right. So we're trying to learn from that and be able to be viable if something does happen. Sure, you know again, right now the state of the world isn't great. It's sometimes really really hard to get just product in or paper goods or anything From seed to cup. 

Pablo: 35:58

There's just so many things involved, so many logistical, you know, weather cooperates, the yield on the plants to, you know, even local governments at times, you know, even though there's a lot of the regions we're getting coffee from have pro coffee. You know economies, you never know that can change. Right So you've got to be ready for that. Team mates, finding people to work with us over at Lobos has at times been just. you know this economy, it's tough And you know, one of the reasons why we're focusing on the wholesaling and the retail side is because, let's face it, this real estate market, you know, for someone like me and Tony, is that's nearly impossible to find something that makes sense. 

Michael: 36:40

It's kind of scary to watch it happen. Right It like the numbers don't make any sense. 

Tony: 36:46

We signed and got our funding and whatnot, february and we started before the pandemic, a couple of weeks before. If we were to wait, we hands down with what it had been here And now looking at other opportunities. There's nothing that would be remotely what we found two years ago. It's just skyrocket. 

Michael: 37:06

Right, right, because you're in a. Is it a ground lease agreement? 

Tony: 37:11

Right. 

Michael: 37:11

Like a certain number of years, right OK. 

Tony: 37:14

And that was fantastic. He's worked with us And he's also a small, small business. 

Michael: 37:19

I don't know He owns the other gas or the gas station, i think it's him and the sister. 

Tony: 37:23

Yeah, so they have a partnership. So, yeah, we were lucky, because a lot of places that we want to, they didn't know Lobos, they didn't. We didn't have a triple net rating egg, whatever they're they're called. You know, we're coming in like square one, building a brand, a business, from square one. 

Michael: 37:40

Yeah, In a place that already has quite a bit of coffee too. Right. 

Pablo: 37:43

Right, well, and that's one of the reasons we're so lucky, like Brian, our landlord. You know he, we had a handshake deal and he respected it. And you know, we know that the times that everything was officially finalized and the time we spoke to him, he must have had 10, 20 different offers come his way. And you know him being the type of person he is. He's a partner in this in the sense that he's helped us bring it to fruition and didn't come and say OK, you know other famous coffee shop, come on in. Absolutely So yeah that was one of the challenges when we were looking for a location. This corner was our fourth actual place that we had under contract, so we had the last, of which never really told us no, just kind of kept us at limbo. Oh my God, and I'd call him. 

Tony: 38:33

Be like hey. 

Pablo: 38:34

I read this magazine article that says this other coffee shop is a for sure thing. What's what's going on? And they're like no, don't worry about it, We're still considering you guys. And at that point I looked at Tony. I said, tony, we're not going in there Like we got to make something happen And timing is everything. Everything happened And luckily it happened like that was the day that I, you know, I got on the Landlord again. I was like, hey, come on, let's figure something out. Like we got to make this happen, or else my friend's dreams not going to come true. Yeah. Because we were at the point. I mean, like I said, it took six years and we were just at the point where six years for us talking for me, it was right. I mean, i'm planning, through and following through And eventually it was like, if this doesn't happen now, like I'm giving up. 

Michael: 39:16

you know yeah, not even a pandemic could stop you guys. 

Pablo: 39:20

Well, that had it happen, Yeah. 

Michael: 39:21

I tell you that was one of the. 

Pablo: 39:23

You know, I say, I always say, if we were, like is this a sign? Yeah, we would have been dead in the water And luckily. you know, everything happens for a reason. 

Michael: 39:32

Yeah. 

Pablo: 39:33

That happened. So happened to be the day that they came and took the gas pumps out. He's like you know what We got out of the gas contract, So if you're still interested, come on down. I was like I'll be right there. We did consider like well, there's a lot of coffee on this corridor, but at the same time it's because we all feed off of each other. It's not just coffee, It's coffee and food, It's fresh roasting, It's, you know, the amazing co-working space that we have here at East End. Like you, just you couldn't picture this anywhere else. It just hasn't happened. So we're very lucky to be a part of it. 

Michael: 40:06

Absolutely. You're such a perfect fit here, and the timing of your opening up with the school also around the same time, if not like exactly the same timeline, and the traffic of parents dropping kids off, inevitably you're right in their path. Yeah, so which is? 

Pablo: 40:24

why we feel it so much come summertime. We're like yeah. 

Tony: 40:30

Hey, like summer classes. 

Michael: 40:32

But like that school is always going to be there, so you'll always have that sort of built in customer base, just based on the traffic pattern right And out of all part. 

Tony: 40:42

They've been a fantastic partner with us. We've partnered up with them from Palmville to other events and they just yeah, the PTA and the PTA. So they've been fantastic. It's just, it's been great, it's. You know we could complain, but to be honest, you know. No, no, listen to us, i get it. 

Michael: 41:00

No, i mean as you, as you alluded to earlier, like running a small business is really difficult. It can't be overstated having to dip into your own finances, not really pay yourself. Like people that are not small business owners are not familiar with that, You know. they just see a successful business and they must get it all the time Yeah. And and and they're like you guys must be just rolling in it, right, and it's like, well, we're paying things off slowly And then we have a viable business and we will make a profit, and you know that comes with. 

Pablo: 41:36

my wife gets it all the time because we both work like full time and she just started a new job and she doesn't like telling anybody about logos because you know she just feels awkward about attention. 

Michael: 41:49

Okay, Did she grow up around? 

Pablo: 41:50

here. No, she's actually from Gainesville. Oh, cool And anybody who walks into Lobos and says that looks nice, chances are she put it there because the whole place would be black and white if it was just me and Tony. 

Tony: 42:01

Okay, I'm serious, i'm on the side story. Yeah, i my. I run restaurants, hotels, blindfold. Yeah, yeah, you know how many light fixtures they are in the world to choose from. 

Michael: 42:17

To choose from. I have. I'm somewhat familiar. I have, yes. 

Tony: 42:23

My, my brain Not built for that, no, my brain melted and I and I looked at his wife You're going to pick. Pick one. Please Give me three options. No, i'll pick three options. There were so many lighting packages, but it's not even that. It's like the luminous of how much you're going to get. You want to put it on a flicker. You want to put them on a timer, like it's just, and it changes the whole atmosphere too right. 

Michael: 42:47

It's so important, but it's huge. 

Pablo: 42:50

Us being the people we are. We just we're not good at picking out design or color. 

Michael: 42:54

That's why there are professionals for that sort of thing, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. 

Pablo: 42:58

Thing with the professional is they pick the most expensive one out of everything, so it's not their money. 

Tony: 43:04

No, that is the toughest. Or also like this is the budget And then almost on the like, you know budget. Yeah, you're taking three items to take one. 

Michael: 43:14

you know like it's just, And they want to make it look as best as possible but, it's like, yeah, okay, who's paying for that Exactly? That is like just a light fixture. 

Pablo: 43:23

So finding that balance between you know how beautiful could it be and what our resources could afford. She was great at really picking out, you know, the green wall and the logo, and I mean she hand drew the Lobos coffee roasters wall herself. 

Michael: 43:40

Really Yeah. 

Pablo: 43:43

So a lot of fun times building out the place. But I mean I love it. I think we did a great job with it. But yeah, going back to you know she'll go to work. And when the people at her office found out her husband, his part of Lobos coffee roasters, they're like well, why are you working? 

Pablo: 43:59

And she's like because I got to check in on the same thing. It's an experience. 

Michael: 44:06

Yeah, appearances can be very deceiving, right, but you guys, it is a very fancy looking place. I mean it is. It's very Instagrammable And that's important to a lot of people. But I was so pleasantly surprised to try your coffee and just to have that experience, and drink it black, no sugar, no anything. 

Pablo: 44:34

I know what you had, which one. 

Michael: 44:35

I actually was in yesterday and I had the drip and I didn't look and I should have. I probably had Papa Nuggetni. 

Tony: 44:43

Okay, yeah. 

Michael: 44:45

It was fantastic. I was just blown away. 

Pablo: 44:48

Yeah, favorite And that's off to Tony and Adam, who's our main. I mean, tony's the one that comes up with our profiles and stuff and he's a roaster in his own right. But Adam has really up the level of the quality of beans. Like I said, i'm hardly here, but when I do I'll take a bag home with me And quality control quality control. 

Michael: 45:08

Yeah, somebody's got to test it, but I mean, it was just one day. 

Pablo: 45:12

I was like, wow, our Brazil got a lot better. And then it happened with the PNG, and then it happened with Nick Rhyne. I was like man, you guys are really putting in the work here. 

Michael: 45:21

Dialing it in. 

Pablo: 45:22

It's easy for me to be critical on the back end right. Because I've never seen the work, but when I taste it. I'm like all right, i'll get off his case a little bit, But when that's. 

Michael: 45:31

that's one of the things that differentiates and that's what gets the repeat customers, because I'll remember that cup of coffee forever just because it was so good, you know, and I just it really made me happy that you guys are doing it at that level And that's really. I mean you can have a great looking space and not very good coffee And you are not that at all. And I hate being critical of anybody else, but there's another company that has a lot of locations and I'm not a fan of their coffee. 

Pablo: 46:06

You know everybody has a different way of growing and you know their strategy could be what it is today, but it can change. Our strategy is, you know, maybe we can do what we do in one location and still put out a quality product. Well, that's worth more to us than having 100 locations. That's not as good. 

Michael: 46:25

Right. 

Pablo: 46:26

But that's really hard to do when you're growing in scale. You got to think about things like shelf life, distribution and things like that. that make it really hard. Yeah, And here's the thing I'd hate to perceive quality on one experience. you know, I promise there's plenty of people that have walked in the logo. something like this is the worst coffee I've ever had in my life. Maybe the barista was having a bad day and didn't dial in properly. Maybe, you know, they just didn't grind it right or didn't set the water to the right temperature. Coffee is a very, very particular fruit like. if you don't put your recipe how you're expecting it, you can get all kinds of different flavors out of that thing. So, you know it's really hard. There have been times where I've been to a bad coffee shop and they got it right, and there have been times where I've been to a great coffee shop and they got it wrong. I think, at the end of the day, it's just having that experience of your ambience and there's just so much more to it, right, It's like your morning routine, Having that familiar taste hit your lips, or just you know, just oh, I got some coffee, I got some caffeine in me today. You know I'm ready to be a shark today you know, or whatever it takes, so you know it's hard to be too critical of someone. You know they may be growing at a fast rate, but at the end of the day I've had great coffee there too, so that's good to hear. 

Michael: 47:44

And I do love that they have partnered with Kelly's and they do the scoop shop. So I do just kind of wish that. 

Pablo: 47:51

I'm just sort of like I want everybody to have great coffee you know it's so hard to do and you have that many spots, It's so hard. 

Tony: 47:59

It is And it's very difficult. And you know we have a plan. If we ever get to the ability to grow and we have an idea how to grow, we're still keeping that quality. And again, it starts from day one where we go out to the farm and select and build these relationships Honestly, to have one shop and bring what we bring, which is almost like containers full of coffee. That's a lot of coffee to bring in for one shop. You know we can't do that three, four times for different regions. We just don't have the volume for it right? You know, what we want to do is maybe not look for another location, maybe somewhere where we could actually store our coffee so that we could build in the future but still have that quality right. So it starts from there. That's our competitive edge. That you know. And there are other roasters that do it as well. They cup and they taste and they grow out. But that's how we view it. And again, having family connections and family ties, and how about it as well For the coffee shop, you know, to piggyback on what Pablo was saying, you know we try to strive and tell our staff. You know there are going to be your connoisseurs that are going to come in and they're going to want to talk shop. I want you to be educated enough so you could talk shop. Sure, but there was also a guest that we're going to come in here and say hey, i just need a cup of coffee. Hey, cool, here it is. Yeah, you know, we want to be like right in the middle where we're educating up and know that you don't have to take it to a certain level Like, oh my God, you ordered it wrong. No, no, it's fine, you order how you want to order and we'll take care of it. You know, and that's the the, the sense of community, the sense of vibe, getting to know your name, getting to know what you like. Just right, so you come back. It's really how I grew up in the service industry. One of the primary reasons why we roast is because the last place I worked at it was a steakhouse beautiful, nice, great, massive company that I worked for You could probably have an idea And they dry aged their steaks. You know what are the differences between that particular steakhouse and another one? Really nothing. They just dry aged their steak and they get to show it off to to their customers. That's where the quality comes in, that's where the difference comes in, that's where the taste comes in, and wants to do the same thing. A lot of customers want to see where they're, where they're food, where they're coffee, where their things are being prepped, where it's coming from. Because, again, more, more, more people are being more health conscious. So totally. 

Pablo: 50:29

We also don't want to be that shop that doesn't give you sugar for your coffee. 

Michael: 50:33

Like if you want sugar in your coffee, who am I to tell you how to? 

Pablo: 50:36

drink your coffee, which we have been. I mean there's I know it's changed owners quite a bit since then, but my first time there's one coffee shop on the east side of town that they just didn't have sugar And I was like I wasn't into the coffee scene yet but I was like I need sugar in my hand And then it just we don't want to be that shop. 

Michael: 50:52

Don't deny people. No, absolutely, you want to have something for everybody. 

Pablo: 50:56

You know who are we to tell you how to. 

Tony: 50:58

Yeah, and perfect example with our. We do have a Florida PSL, psl, psl. 

Pablo: 51:05

Ours is a Florida, A Florida. you know What makes it a Florida. 

Tony: 51:08

PSL, it's the orange burgers that we put in there and the recipe that we have I need to try that, yeah. 

Pablo: 51:13

It's not really much therapy there. It's almost like a baking recipe. It's so good, correct? 

Tony: 51:18

So we try to balance out the sweetness and the flavors in it, but it's just not a sugar bomb. Yeah, and again, going back to Starbucks, this is not me, this is the industry, saying that some of their coffees have more calories than a McDonald's burger. 

Michael: 51:37

Right, A legend. Well, they have to list that now. right, That's like part of the deal and it is. It's like really unhealthy And I see people with like the big gulp sized ones And just what, what are they doing with their lives? 

Pablo: 51:52

And much more free zone here. I know, i just, i just think of it from a health aspect, correct. 

Michael: 51:58

You know, i just worry for their insides. You know, that's really. I am an empath and I I base my experience with the world on just like, oh, that's going to be bad for them later. 

Tony: 52:09

Right. 

Michael: 52:11

It would be really bad for me. 

Tony: 52:12

Yeah, but we don't want to take it that way. We want to be able to. You know, we are craft coffee bars where we create drinks, but we want to make sure it's a well balanced drink, right Like. I love to go out and have an old fashioned, but I want it to be balanced. Yes, and it's tasting great. I don't want to be sugary to alcoholic. I want, i want a great balanced drink, yep. So so in that aspect, that's that's what we try to focus on it and provide for our customers. 

Michael: 52:38

That makes a lot of sense, yeah, and I think that the clientele of this neighborhood really do respond to that and they do understand the level of quality And I do hope that from this podcast, people will, if they have not been to Lobos before, they will go visit you and find out just how awesome it is. 

Pablo: 53:03

You guys are just doing such a great job, thank you, if you came and had a bad experience, come back and have a good session. 

Michael: 53:08

See, that's a very good point because I mean, and and really you started out, this is your first location and there was a learning curve. So at the beginning, when would you say that you really had it kind of dialed in and you're like not making those kind of missteps that you might have been making at the beginning? 

Tony: 53:27

So a quick story. Yeah, when we opened up, we we got our CEO or our temporary CEO on a Tuesday. We decided to open on a Wednesday. Even so, again during the pandemic, we don't know if, i don't know if anyone's going to show up. Luckily enough, the community supported us and they started showing up that Saturday. That first Saturday, i call Pablo and I say Hey, listen, i can't talk about any job and a hang up. We had that first day a 45 minute wait just for coffee, just for drip coffee. That's unacceptable, but it was our first weekend. This one comes up. It's like does it really need me? No parking space, there was a line at the door. Yeah, it was. It was scary. Also very like. Okay, this, this may work. Yeah. Because you don't know if every day you're going to have those those lines. But to answer your question honestly, i think we're still fine tuning. You know it's year two, we're getting into other things, but I think after that first year one probably really fine tune six months into it And then after that year we felt comfortable because you could look back what work, what did it? we analyzed, we said we said that on a general manager or our trusted group of people that do our Instagram and whatnot. So we feel like we have a great group that we could bounce ideas off. Ultimately, what we didn't want to do is just kind of throw money at the wall and say, hey, let's see if this works. You know again, for us it's finite, or the finances that we have. So we got to make sure that we do things as best as possible, Totally. 

Pablo: 55:08

I think one of the better lessons that we learned. at first, since we were trying to get people up and running pretty quickly, we started looking for previous barista experience or coffee experience, but we quickly learned that other coffee shops don't do things the way we want to do things. 

Michael: 55:24

They don't execute the way, So we started looking more for customer friendly experience you know, front of house, we don't care Those soft skills that are, you can't teach those to people Exactly. You can't teach those to people Totally. 

Pablo: 55:39

And that goes a lot. I can show you how to make a latte, right. But, I can't show you how to be nice to people. So, I think, you know, as we started bringing people on the team and we started, you know, coaching and just letting them know like hey, a garnish is important because you just paid four or five bucks for this drink, Like, at the end of the day, presentation matters. Right, people eat with their eyes And just having that type of person that won't brush that off and be like oh pop was just crazy. It's hard, yes, i know I am. 

Michael: 56:13

We all are a little bit, if we don't admit it. Those are the ones to really look out for. Yeah, the quiet ones are. 

Pablo: 56:20

So yeah, so eventually, you know, we, like you said, we sat down with Beth and just kind of talked about well, what is our culture? What do we want to see building here? We want people to be nice to people, we want you to be greeted, we want the place to look immaculate when you walk in, and it needs to be clean. And obviously, if somebody's not extremely happy with their drink, let's, let's remake it for them. 

Tony: 56:39

Make it make it, make it different Totally. A cup of coffee is not worth the lifetime of someone that really comes in for the first time or wants to keep on coming. So that's, that's where you know how we look at it. And absolutely, if you don't like a cup of coffee or if you don't like something we've had regulars come up and say, hey, your, your lids aren't fitting in your cup I'm like sincerely apologize, let me take care of that And I'm making excuses. Yeah, although we can't find the cups and lids, and everyone else is in the same situation, they're getting in because they're manufacturing. Everything's just terrible. Yeah, we usually get them from overseas. Now, you only didn't want them to. They don't understand that And, honestly, i don't want to tell them. That's not their thoughts. 

Michael: 57:22

Sure, take care of it, right? They just want their experience to be a certain way and you can't really tell them why. It can't be because you don't want them to think that they can't have it that way. It's a weird spot to be. 

Pablo: 57:37

We like the oranges. My pride and joy is this fresh squeeze orange juice machine. right, wow, we're building out the you know, put the oranges on top and everybody loves to watch the machine pour your juice. I walk in I'm like how come we don't have ours? Because we can't find the ones that have the right size. It's just not not available. What COVID did to orange trees, i don't know, but all of a sudden they're just not available. 

Michael: 58:02

So it's just a little tiny. 

Pablo: 58:04

You know the sign of the times right now that we got to just kind of put out what we can and, you know, still deliver quality product and a good experience. 

Michael: 58:13

That's all we can control, right, correct? 

Tony: 58:16

And there's a lot of stuff in the back end and our side that we've already built in that some guests don't, may not even know. you know you could go around some of the coffee shops here in Orlando or in other places, and I'll give you a prime example. You know we have a difference between, obviously, a smaller, large that's what we're doing Smaller, large or regular or large. And we don't want ever our coffee to taste diluted. So we made a decision if you order large, you get an extra shot. So some people will come in oh, i want a large and extra shot. Okay, our large comes with three shots. You still want four? No, no, no, i think that's fine. Again, it goes back to the balance, the taste. Some of the places just add extra milk and it's you know, there's no taste in that. 

Michael: 59:00

So for us, you know. 

Tony: 59:02

So there's that balance that we've done in the back end To make sure that you have that quality, because at the end of the day it's not cheap coffee. We put a lot of love and effort into that coffee but you're going to get that quality when you order it And that's what we want to do. We build that in. We look for staff members that understand that, that understand if it's not done right, fix it, do it right or get up something else. If we recommend something, i always say if you don't like it, i'll buy it, i'll get you something else, and I really haven't had to do that. 

Michael: 59:33

Many of No, that's great, But just the fact that that is out there, because, yeah, you won't get that at Starbucks. This is just the way it is right. 

Pablo: 59:41

Yeah, i mean, i don't know, i've never tried, but I'm not a fan of Starbucks coffee either. 

Michael: 59:49

Listen, i'm a coffee critic. I guess I didn't realize it, but there are things that I like and then things that I don't like And it's hard to not be honest about some of those things? 

Tony: 59:58

It's sometimes hard. You need your caffeine and there's no other options Yeah. 

Pablo: 1:00:03

But to be fair, my mom comes to visit for Miami and she still brings her old brick of Laiawik Cuban coffee up with her. Oh yeah, Like mom, you know I have coffee. She's like no, it's okay, I don't know to be offended. 

Michael: 1:00:15

It's hard not to be like a little offended, right, yeah, wow, it's just nature, it's just like that's what they're in. That's what she's been drinking for you know, yeah, And we get into those habits and we want it to be familiar, we want it to be the same every time and that sort of thing, and I think also that people that do seek out quality. It's like you have evolved with your experience and you are making a better and better product, which I think is more exciting. I prefer that. You know, i love that at the beginning you were like really trying to figure it out and you might have gotten it right some of the time, but now you're more consistent with it and you're even getting better, and that, to me, is like what it's really about. That's really exciting. 

Tony: 1:01:08

No, another quick story with, for example, our espresso machine was custom built by this gentleman called Salvatore, out in California. And again, like with the life fixtures, that just blew my mind and it melted my brain. There's some other things that I was able to handle, like espresso machines and the roaster, and like I kind of had an idea what I wanted to do. But again, explaining it to my business partner like this is why right? So the espresso machine. We went out to California for a convention and we looked at products. We went to LA having a great time, like listen, we have a meeting two and a half hours north and you know we were talking like well, there's this, you know probably was in the business the espresso machine. There's this one, let's make a deal, this, that and the other. And I'm like no, no, no, i really like this one, let's just give him a chance. Come with me. 

Pablo: 1:01:56

I didn't want to leave LA. 

Tony: 1:01:57

He did. 

Pablo: 1:01:58

I was having fun. 

Michael: 1:01:59

It's so cool, isn't it? He took it as more of a vacation, yeah. We're working. 

Tony: 1:02:06

But we went there after 10 minutes. He's like nudging me Do it, do it, come on a check, just come on a check, because it was like, well, obviously he was on local, but it was craft built. We did our research. 

Pablo: 1:02:20

That's the nicest gentleman, like this sweet old man. You walk in, he's greeting you with just so much enthusiasm. I mean you can tell he put so much love into his craft. He's got a workshop back there and he's, you know, cut sheet metal and doing all this by hand. And you know we came in. He's like look what I already have drawn up for you. What do you think of this and what do you think of that? And I mean I went from saying, hey, which one? with this one, we can just buy this one here in LA and not have to drive two hours. 

Michael: 1:02:51

And. 

Pablo: 1:02:52

I was like, oh no, i'm glad we came because, wow, like this man's story is amazing. This, this a one of one express machine that we got to custom make and is so much more consistent than an electric pump machine, which I didn't get back then. The lever uh express machine just gives you so much more of a consistent shop pool. 

Tony: 1:03:12

It's more forgiving Electric pump. 

Pablo: 1:03:13

Okay, it's also more time consuming, right? So that 45 minute wait that he was talking about earlier had a lot to do with new baristas learning how to use this machine and getting a quality shot out of it, cause people think coffee is just pushing a button and get a coffee shot out of it. 

Michael: 1:03:30

For some coffee machines, it's true, but it's not going to be the quality there. Yeah, right, right, right. 

Pablo: 1:03:36

And it still blows my mind how they can do it, because it's so hard to do even without it. Um just having that, that extra piece of you know artisanship to to our express machine, i feel really really gave us that extra you know just sense of of class and people when they walk in they know, okay, these guys are serious about their coffee, like they care what they're putting out there. 

Michael: 1:03:59

Yeah, i haven't even heard of like a custom built machine like that either. Is that fairly, is it Salvatore? 

Pablo: 1:04:07

does great If you ever have a chance to you know. 

Michael: 1:04:10

Go in and use it. 

Pablo: 1:04:11

The company name of it. Yeah. 

Tony: 1:04:15

The machine is Salvatore Express, so his shop is, i think, express is super store out in California. He is Italian, so these machines are this style of machine actually comes from the south of Italy. That's more prevalent down there. Think about it as a old Corvette, you know, piston driven carburetor, like it's old school manual way to do it. The new stuff is your Teslas of the of the actual machine. Yeah, right, again, they're. They're very beautiful, they're very sexy, yeah, and you can play with it, you can control a lot of things. but there's also just something about the old school For me. I love to drive a manual. Yeah, if I could ever do that, if I could ever get back into you know, it's just that feel that you're in the machine, you're part, you're part of the machine. 

Michael: 1:05:02

Right, that's what we feel that You have more control. Correct, you are in control of the outcome with that machine And it's more consistent too, like we've played around with. 

Pablo: 1:05:12

You know you got an electric pump that goes out in the middle of the day. Your whole shop is shut down. 

Michael: 1:05:18

And this thing is not going out right, It's just solid. 

Pablo: 1:05:21

Well, technically it's three machines in one, two, so it kind of, if one side goes down, we've got two other sides we can continue to use. So that's nice. Wow, you're still going to do maintenance on them, you're still going to tear gaskets and whatnot. 

Tony: 1:05:34

So but yeah, it's a definitely labor love. You know it's a pose, a beautiful shot, but yeah, that's the things that we want, also, like just when we came into it. How are we going to set ourselves apart? We know Orlando's growing. We know the coffee scene is growing. What can we add to the scene? What can we do something differently that no one else is doing? You know. So that's the idea where we want to come up with a coffee house So you have more underneath one roof. So again, we're blessed to be in this community. I actually try to look for a home here and forget it during COVID. It's just shot the roof like oh, he's like man, i love this community, like yeah. 

Pablo: 1:06:19

but just the walk over here was so nice The breeze is perfect. 

Michael: 1:06:23

I love living here. I mean, i bought this house 20 something years ago, so it was a whole different economy than you know, unfortunately. what more power to you, thank you. What? what part of town are you? 

Tony: 1:06:37

guys living in. Well, i live around the millennia area, so when I moved back I was working for the state cost that I was working at before, so I kind of lived close to there, yeah. 

Pablo: 1:06:50

I live in Lake Nona right now, which is not very walkable. There's a couple of nice neighborhoods that have some walking trails and stuff, but for the most part it's a hike. 

Michael: 1:07:01

They didn't really think of that. With the layout, with the planning there, right, i mean, it's a big medical industry and it's growing and growing, but it's a different setup. 

Pablo: 1:07:11

You make it out there recently. When's the last time you went down? 

Michael: 1:07:13

It's been a little while I saw the, the boxy or the yeah, I've seen that. 

Pablo: 1:07:18

Have you been down to the wave yet? The wave hotel. 

Michael: 1:07:20

I have not. 

Pablo: 1:07:22

It's worth it. I think I got a nice sculpture garden and you walk down there. They brought the bull from Wall Street, apparently like the actual bull. 

Michael: 1:07:30

Really Yeah, they moved it, i think there's three of them. 

Pablo: 1:07:34

From what I understand there's several of the same, but the guy who owns Lake Nona or owns Tabastock owns three of them. I heard he literally owns the one on Wall Street, from what I heard, and then owns one on Lake Nona, i don't know. The third one's probably like in his bedroom or something. 

Michael: 1:07:51

That's a small business owner with, like, tons of money. 

Pablo: 1:07:55

That's the different kind of guy And it's a boomer area. I mean, i love living down there. We considered it for our first Lobos, but again priced out of the market. I don't see how any of those businesses can. 

Michael: 1:08:08

And there's got to be some correction with real estate at some point. 

Pablo: 1:08:12

So I think maybe Again, you know there's always gonna be winners and losers. It's good for one person, It's not gonna be good for another of course It's very unfortunate Yeah it could be. 

Tony: 1:08:25

I love. Just a little side note What's going on over here The, you know, the crosswalks and the walking path that they're doing here all over Park is just phenomenal. Right and again it goes back to what I said before, that this is a community that all the other can really strive to be with, because You were able to walk around, you're able to go around the neighborhood's jog, go to the Main Street Markets and you know, by a donut, by a coffee, by sandwich, whatever the case may be, and that's that's what really Attracts I live around millennia. I don't have that. That's at the mall. You know, you only walk in the mall. 

Michael: 1:08:58

Yeah, and you basically drive from place to place there even when you have these sort of like strip malls, you know, in different like plazas and things like that, people don't just like park one place and walk, whereas here that's really what it's about and encourages it even visitors from out of town. It's like it's amazing Just the amount of traffic from Disney Springs When they're trying to get Gideon's cookies and they come all, they come over here, which is it's not that you know it's. It's not a trek, it's like a half an hour or 45 minutes, something like that. 

Pablo: 1:09:34

I can't even get my friends from Miami who go to Disney to come over. 

Michael: 1:09:37

I know it's wild, gideon's can do that It's more power to them. That's awesome. Yeah, it really does. 

Pablo: 1:09:43

They're early, like their times. I'm at the shop early. You see, I'm lining up. 

Michael: 1:09:46

You're like whoa there was an open for another couple hours. I saw. 

Tony: 1:09:50

it's amazing I saw someone I Think it was some youtuber or whatever the case and be he posted, like I am on Waits on the virtual queue to get another queue right, drove to Gideon's Pick the book, a cookie. Yes, and he was still in the virtual queue. 

Michael: 1:10:08

Yes, like what about him? 

Pablo: 1:10:10

That's awesome, yeah, i know what the greatness that Gideon's cookies is. I mean come on. Have you ever seen such a that? 

Michael: 1:10:16

was just there earlier. I'm addicted. Yeah, i got. 

Tony: 1:10:25

You know, for us being in the community, people drive by like, oh coffee, i'll go grab something. You know, and it's happened to us multiple times. We either have people getting Gideon's or getting salt and literally coming across like I don't know, i want your coffee. I. 

Pablo: 1:10:39

Love to see people go get it like a dessert at, whether it's sugar dough or or the salty You know, and then bring it over and and even if it's a pizza from 1803 or something, they come sit in our patio and have you know whether it's a beer or coffee or whatever, and just enjoy the patio. I mean, we love to see it. Um, you know, we want to be a part of the community. We don't care if somebody's going to yoga next door and needs our parking spot. We want to be able to add valley and eventually you we know that person's gonna come in and it gives us that Cohesiveness with our neighbors that, i think, is what makes this neighborhood work, you know yeah. We've we've partnered up with vendors around all the time, whether it's been Hinckley's or, oh oh, the bread company 1803 now, and you know, we just we feel like that's what makes everything work here. That's, even though we may have similar product lines, everyone's different enough in their own way that can deliver a different experience. Start us lineage sugar dough has great coffee in there with Otis, you got you know, like we mentioned before, it's just all All these different offerings of the same product that are all so different. Yeah and and so good. 

Tony: 1:11:48

Yeah, each of them is great in their own right. And just just piggyback off of what he's saying is we have maybe eight Different skews or different regions or different origins at our shop at a time. Each coffee shop could have the same coffee either roughly from the same region, Roast differently, prepare differently and we get different results. There's so much coffee around the coffee belts in the world that we can't have everything Right. So all these other places are grabbing coffee from all these other places. You know we're lucky enough that we have a little bit of Ethiopia left, like Pablo saying. You know There's sometimes the government. We're not able to get some right now because of what's going on in Ethiopia, But it tastes like blueberries, for instance. You know you have something from Kona in Hawaii that tastes like chocolate or cocoa, You know like. So you could have a variety of taste and flavors from each location. Yeah and and again. Like we said, we'd love to be a part of the community When we first open up and then again other sites that we looked at. There were shared parking or parking on Marshall Cushing Street or there were parking wasn't the greatest at all the location like that. This one again was perfect. Yeah but thinking in my mind Hey, we're gonna have 70 parking. I think that's good. 

Pablo: 1:13:05

Google negative comments that we get on Google We don't have enough parking. That's insane. You guys have so much parking. 

Michael: 1:13:13

I'm amazed at how efficiently it's laid out to and parking is so fascinating here because You can park on any residential street as long as there's no parking sign and walk-a-blah and the school Doesn't take much. 

Pablo: 1:13:26

Whoa. A lot of people don't know that right after hours, whether it's weekdays or weekends, The school allows people to park there. 

Michael: 1:13:32

No, they're incredible with that, yeah, and, and people have caught on to that, luckily, and being part of the community is Sharing that and not worrying so much like, like you said, if they, if they're going to the yoga studio, their plan is probably to get some coffee afterwards or some tea. 

Tony: 1:13:50

I've had yoga. You know people come in and say, hey, listen, i'm early, late, can I come back? You know that's fine. 

Pablo: 1:13:57

Yeah, i've had my car towed plenty of times. It sucks, it's terrible, right? 

Tony: 1:14:02

Yeah, i've had my truck towed in my own community because I left it out. I'm like I paid the association. Why are you towing me? 

Michael: 1:14:09

What kind of community is that? 

Tony: 1:14:10

That's rough. Yeah, it's one of those that messes up. 

Michael: 1:14:14

It really does. 

Pablo: 1:14:15

It's really awful Yeah we couldn't have that, like I couldn't mess up somebody's day like that. Oh you know. So, yeah, that's one of the reasons why, you know, with, along with everything else, it just didn't make sense to have the no parking sign until always. You know, at the end of the day works itself out. You know, we have a lot of people that walk to our shop. They buy, they bring their kids. You know, we just we're happy to be here and be contributing. 

Tony: 1:14:41

Yeah, we can't wait until the they finally finish expanding the street and the crosswalks and being so walkable. Yeah, and this community is kind of just elevate everything else. So we're really excited for that kind of plan and that I know. I know the community and and the businesses are kind of going back and forth It's major artery that want to shut it down. 

Pablo: 1:15:01

There's there's some proposed plans, funding that's allocated to it Right and probably not enough at funding anymore because the new prices That's correct and coming up in November there is on the ballot Transportation tax. 

Michael: 1:15:18

So anybody listening, vote yes on that, because It will help fund Corinne Drive, or Corrine Drive, which is so needed. It's been so long overdue and a lot of that was just ownership because Orange County owned it and didn't want to let it go to the city and Finally that agreement has been made so the city fully owns it Can make the changes. So that's that's why it's in such disrepair, because for so many years it was in limbo. So those details have been worked out. The city can do Whatever it chooses to and you know, part of it is to slow down traffic And, as you've seen with the crosswalk, it is a safe way for pedestrians to get across, which is key. It's absolutely key. And the the bump outs for the curbs, and then that Middle Island Helps slow down traffic. That's just passing through. So it's still four lanes, two on each side, but cars slow down a little bit and they don't even have to go over a speed bump or anything like that. It's just that visual. Yes, because these lanes are so wide and it's it doesn't need to be that way. So there will be some some narrowing, some bike paths, like things that are going to make it safer for people to get around And that will just increase customer traffic. 

Tony: 1:16:45

I feel I feel actually safer crossing at that new crosswalk than actually crossing that current drive and Warner Park. to be quite Honest with you, Yes because I do go to 1803, that we just partnered up with them. So I go pick up desserts from them or drop coffee off, or whatever the case would be, and I'm just sitting there like, oh my god, i may just walk all the way down there just to cross. 

Michael: 1:17:05

It is so safe, right? Yeah, it really really does make a huge, huge difference. 

Tony: 1:17:11

Yeah, it's. the community is getting there, i think, and We just love to see the change. 

Pablo: 1:17:16

We're excited. We're excited. We saw that video with the renderings and all that and we were just like wow, could you imagine what this could be? Yeah yeah, in just a couple years time. 

Michael: 1:17:27

Yeah, and luckily with with it being four lanes, they can very easily do construction on one side of it and then have two lanes where it was. You know, just one direction, so they won't ever have to shut the whole thing down At any point because they can always have through traffic. It's just gonna slow things down for a little bit, but that's huge too for the businesses, because you don't want to prevent anybody from accessing because some construction projects It's just inevitable. But I think that we're we're pretty well positioned to where that would be minimized or eliminated. So I'm excited and everybody vote yes on the transportation tax that lives in Orange County, yeah, and and any other partnerships in the works or that you are looking to work with. 

Pablo: 1:18:17

We recently launched our coffee at the Ritz Carlton Golf. Club. Oh, wow So if you anybody's playing golf down there, it's a beautiful course. 

Michael: 1:18:25

Yeah, well done. 

Tony: 1:18:28

Yeah, we made a special plan for them for their expresso, so we partner with them. 1803 also partner with them. We actually have their tiramisu. They actually use our coffee in their ladyfingers for their tiramisu. 

Michael: 1:18:42

I did not know that. That's their problem. They're gonna talk about calories. I want to talk about the good calories like that. Yeah, totally worth it. That's what it's about. 

Pablo: 1:18:58

And you know we're always open. We've done beer co labs in the past and we're both craft beer guys, So cool. Hopefully we got a couple more. Those coming down the pipe Have you worked with sideward, yet Sideward. I have not they do great stuff. Um, my brother-in-law is always bringing me, but I hardly ever make it up down here. 

Michael: 1:19:17

Yeah, I got a four-year-old So well, I'll put the word out to Garrett and Mandy. Yeah, they're incredible. 

Pablo: 1:19:26

They ever figure out what's happening with that hoods up across the street? I know I know a guy that might want to. 

Michael: 1:19:32

Seriously, I think everybody's watching that space. 

Pablo: 1:19:36

Yeah but no, yeah, so hopefully a couple more beers down down the line and, you know, just keep bringing you awesome coffee. We're getting ready to head to Central America for a harvest season now, so this is usually the time of year where we go visit our, our farmers, our partners in Nicaragua. Last year we went to Costa Rica, but we couldn't really close anything. Turns out, there's a big Coffee company that owns about 60% of the farms in Costa. 

Michael: 1:20:08

Rica. I think I've heard something about that Wow So even so, we've we made some great connections. 

Tony: 1:20:15

We met Remy, world champion, barista, coffee master. He actually came up and you know he. 

Pablo: 1:20:23

Celebrity barista. Yeah, it's pretty cool So that was. 

Tony: 1:20:26

It was fantastic just picking his brain and and Seeing what he does, and he's just so open. So, yeah, we have a couple things in the works. We're not ready to, you know, reveal sure, one night. Yeah, because they're not sending stone right now. Yeah, but yeah, we're just partnering up with more people around the community and, absolutely, you know, if anyone has a business or anything that deals with coffee, then by means come by. We could talk, make a special blend for you guys. So you know, we have a lot of options, but again, the community has been fantastic and we just love being here. 

Pablo: 1:21:01

One thing I would like to Curricize me for this. You know we're from Miami. Yeah, I would like to have like a full-on Sunday brunch with like bottle sparklers and like It's not gonna happen. Look at him rolling his eyes, i mean. The weather's been great. 

Michael: 1:21:17

That's such a good idea This neighborhood and your space is perfect for those things. 

Pablo: 1:21:23

It's just really hard to blend those things here sometimes because we have people are really, they are working and studying and stuff. 

Michael: 1:21:28

So but on a Sunday we would do the work and they should be branching right. Yeah, you'd be, surprised. 

Tony: 1:21:34

You'd be surprised, i gotta pull a loudspeaker permit and you talk to the community. It's all Sunday. 

Pablo: 1:21:40

Oh yeah, the people behind it, oh yeah oh yeah. Oh yeah, we love that. It's just a running joke, because I'm always like thinking like, yeah, we can do bottle sparklers and Tony looks at me like No, listen, we grew up in Miami, you know, you know, that's that's different. 

Michael: 1:21:58

Yeah. 

Tony: 1:22:00

You know we're mind you and I'm not sure we touch base on this and both of us are UCF grads and and a little token of our patient, of what UCF has done for us was that we've actually modeled our colors From our university, so that's probably why you see those black and gold. So yeah, but yeah, orlando's home now, i mean Miami. We love Miami. It's a special place in our heart. Yeah, he wants to bring a little piece of it over here every single time. 

Pablo: 1:22:27

But I am much better as a tourist than it was when we were living there. Yeah so much more fun now when I go back. Because I'm staying on the other side of the bridge that makes sense. 

Michael: 1:22:40

That makes sense. 

Tony: 1:22:41

You're working in paradise you know, there's also that it's easier when you're just visiting. 

Michael: 1:22:46

Yes you're not living in it and trying to make it work. 

Tony: 1:22:48

Right, it's, we've had friends, that would that we met in Miami. Uh-huh. Oh my god, i moved on here because I came down for a vacation. It was so amazing And I want to live this life. and then you're later, i'm moving on. 

Michael: 1:22:59

This is terrible Like what I mean it's It kind of depends on where you're based, what kind of experience you have. Right and it does, it does influence that. 

Tony: 1:23:08

He has a four-year-old, i have an 18 month and I am so waiting for the bright line to open So we could just jump on the train and just go down to Miami or West Palm Beach or whatever. That's gonna be huge. Oh yeah yeah he hates the car seat, so whatever I could do. 

Michael: 1:23:24

Well, and that drive isn't. It's not terribly long, but there are parts of it. They're pretty awful, and just to be on a train. I'm excited about the future of transportation in Orlando. And it feels like it's really far out, but I think in the next 10 years like things are really really gonna change for the better, so I'm thrilled about that. 

Pablo: 1:23:47

Definitely exciting, exciting city to be a part of. Oh, look at what's happening across the country and places like Denver and Austin. I don't think you know we're not second to those guys. Like truly, food scene here is amazing truly. We got a thriving university, a thriving technology industry. I I'm lucky enough to work with small businesses day in and day out and and get to see, you know, all this new talent, all these new businesses opening up in central Florida. It's just, it's amazing. 

Michael: 1:24:17

What is your day job? 

Pablo: 1:24:18

I don't yeah, so I work for a large communication company. 

Michael: 1:24:22

I'd rather not okay, sure, sure, they're listening, they're always listening. That's the thing about communications, right Yeah? 

Pablo: 1:24:30

but I'm a business sales manager. I used to be a business sales rep and, you know, work door-to-door here prospecting, and now I manage a team of Sales reps to do what I used to do. Cool, but yeah, we basically sell internet, phone and TV service. 

Michael: 1:24:44

Oh, gotcha, yeah, things that are very needed. 

Pablo: 1:24:47

Yeah Yeah, you don't got to explain to someone they need internet, getting there first and and really just having them take their time. So now I was lucky enough to you know even local business owners here, like sunny down at Dome. We like just to sit down with him and pick his brain before opening lobes and just having that Hour, hour and a half of just knowledge from one of the, you know, greatest local chefs ever Yeah, was so valuable to me. So having that experience, having that know of you, know What areas work, what areas don't you know there are some locations where food and beverage goes to die. Here you know, i mean, i mean. The guys sit down at gnarly Barley are doing a great job with with that spot and you know we visited recently. We loved it, we had a great time, but, man, they're like the fourth or fifth Restaurant to go in there. 

Michael: 1:25:35

It's just like a matter of years. 

Pablo: 1:25:37

Right, that was one of the locations that we looked at and I'm just like Tony, i mean Maybe, but no, like this, not, it's not viable here and they were established, you know, at another location Yeah, they had the bottle shop and you know that they had that following the culture, but so did seven bites right. So, that's real, it's had the great following and they do great quality. You know we talked about quality restaurants. That just you know. So it takes a lot to make a business work. It takes a lot to have the, the Location, the parking and the product and all that and even, just you know, getting lucky with people liking it too, because what I like you may not. 

Michael: 1:26:17

And right, just takes one Google review. Hopefully not anymore With a grain of salt, it is. 

Pablo: 1:26:25

Yeah, i've never read them like I used to now, like I used to like, screenshot them. And Tony who said Look who, what like? oh we're sunk. 

Michael: 1:26:33

Look at this No, that's not how that works. 

Pablo: 1:26:35

It's like well, you know. Sorry, we didn't have the right lid for your cup. That's right, yes, So, yeah, I think people need to be more considerate of that. You know, especially local businesses Just the damage that one bad review can do like I know they're not thinking about that when they typed it. Yeah, but yeah, I can. 

Tony: 1:26:54

Simples. Just come back, let us know and let's try to fix it and if they don't want to. I. Okay, i understand, you know, but that's I feel like that's not what we are at the shop. We, we give freedom and capability to all our staff members to fix it. So we're all human. Yeah, not all perfect. Yeah, we'll make sure that we try to fix it for you. 

Michael: 1:27:13

And you have such a good like customer service ethos in there. You know the the times that that I visited It I'm always well taken care of. 

Tony: 1:27:23

That's what very attentive honestly that that's a life professional. It comes to our staff. Yeah, that comes to our general manager, Beth. Again, we want to build that. You know place or you come in, people know your name. What is that show? Cheers Yeah Oh my god I'm blowing up those minds right now. Cheers, oh, what's it? Gen X show, the Gen Z is like cheers, cheers, a beer now. 

Michael: 1:27:52

It's. 

Tony: 1:27:52

it holds up, it's still a good show, yeah so you know, just bring that vibe and saying hello and whatnot. So but we do give them that ability to fix it. I have an issue if we didn't fix it, you know that's like what? Why, why didn't? 

Michael: 1:28:08

we do it. You want the feedback so you can learn Correct What can we do better? and and you're already doing so much. That is that is so right on and then like but there's always, there's always room, there's always somebody that sees something, and they're like I don't know, yeah, but your shop is always super clean, as you said. It's just like It's. It's awesome. Yeah, it's really awesome what you guys do. 

Tony: 1:28:32

I do want to give a shout out to the guys at tactical. They also helped us out a lot, you know, just starting up, probably a good year or two, when we sat down with them and they kind of walked us through. Obviously we're in the same market But different market. 

Michael: 1:28:46

Yeah, this is tactical brewing. Tactical, yeah, yeah, yeah, cool. 

Tony: 1:28:52

You know, it's just the support that we've got from them and from other people as well, and if we forget anyone we apologize. But You know it. Like I say, it takes a village to raise a child. It also takes friends and family and a village to be able to open up a business. It's not easy, especially in the service industry. Yeah. So it's been. it's been incredible, it's been a dream come true, it's been a whirlwind good and bad Yeah. 

Pablo: 1:29:20

I honestly laugh sometimes, mike you got to. I think about my first time meeting this guy's tall, lanky, you know guy and Running miles for PT or whatever. Cap was making a stew back then they like to torture us back there. Oh yeah the military thing We had to run together and just to you know that, going to him bringing me the idea of Lobos to actually see in the doors Open, like we're not supposed to be like this is wild right from uh-huh. So you know, I just sometimes like sit back and laugh and I'm like man, This is pretty cool. That we to have somebody tell me this is the best cold brew I've ever had is like wow. 

Michael: 1:30:00

That's what it's about right. 

Pablo: 1:30:03

When we first launched our facile Tigre, which is our we call it our draft latte. It's pretty much oatmeal, a cold brew, and you know some other recipe secrets that we put together that is on tap. Nobody'd ever seen that. I, you know, i love it, i drink that stuff by the gallon. And for people to tell me, like my god, what is this like? and I can I take it home And I'm like, wow, like you, actually like something that we sat down and came up with and and Tested and like it paid off You know what I mean like hours that we were sitting there, just like, well, this one needs more vanilla or this one needs more this come on, i don't have to be not. 

Tony: 1:30:39

What about the secrets? 

Pablo: 1:30:40

Oh yes, i'm surprised. Anyway but just the fact that we, we put in that effort and then it's actually seeing it is beyond like Wow to me, like sometimes I'm just like I can't believe we did it. 

Tony: 1:30:53

So the quick story the first year, in October, we changed it out. 

Michael: 1:30:58

This is October 2021. 

Tony: 1:31:01

October 2021. Yes, for For that month, let's try something different. Let's put on what we call the Kalawasa spice. Let's try it. I May have had a mini revolt from the community, like do you have Fasid? Can you still make it? I'm like This is never gonna happen again. I'm gonna keep this on and I've never changed it. People have like do you bottle it? like No, but we're gonna try, you know it's like it's that it's that popular week We go through a keg Roughly three to four days And we have to reproduce it, saying about actually the nitro goes out before the facet. A day That goes. That stays on for maybe two days, max three days, wow. 

Pablo: 1:31:46

So it's like he said like it's hot here, so people like cold. 

Tony: 1:31:48

Yeah yeah. 

Michael: 1:31:51

Absolutely I drink it year-round. Just just about so yeah you're a cold brew guy. 

Pablo: 1:31:57

I am, i mean. 

Michael: 1:31:57

I can go either way, but if if it's hot out It's. It's a hard sell to drink a hot coffee when it's hot out. For me, I shouldn't. I maybe should be, you know, expanding from there, but I don't. I don't know a great cold brew That is. That is that's where the magic is right make sure the staff knows that. 

Tony: 1:32:25

Yeah, yeah yeah, yeah, i mean, especially in Florida, eight, nine, ten months out of the year it's Muggy and we get two months of just pleasant weather, you know. So it's yeah, and we see it like the first year. Obviously, we're open in December and all of a sudden summer came around and just flipped, like we we had. We had boxes of hot coffee and lids and we started running out of the cold, the cold cups just that learning curve, just like oh, this is like a seasonal thing. 

Michael: 1:32:56

I'm from Maine originally and like things start to shut down kind of in September. You know certain seasonal things, but you don't really have that here, like places just stay open because they can, but then you don't realize it like oh yeah, it's. Summers are sometimes pretty tough for us business. 

Tony: 1:33:15

So yeah, um, you know. But you know, just work through it, figure it out, right. Like I said, we don't someone else go that's true, Yeah but yeah, that also boggles my mind that you know just close down for a whole season, close down for three months, go home, or We, when we were in Costa Rica, we met a guy he's he owned the coffee shop in Spain. 

Pablo: 1:33:37

Yeah he's like, yeah, i shut it down for the summer and I'm like so you can survive being open four months a year. 

Michael: 1:33:45

Wow, yeah. 

Tony: 1:33:49

That's. 

Pablo: 1:33:52

Completely cultural, i don't. I don't. I mean good, more power to him, but yeah and it's. 

Michael: 1:33:58

That's a different, different way of life altogether. 

Tony: 1:34:00

Yeah, absolutely. 

Michael: 1:34:02

Yeah, yeah. Well, it's so cool to see childhood friends doing something like this too. You know, really really invested in doing it right and you seem to be having a pretty great time for the most part, I know for the most part, we fight like cats and dogs. 

Tony: 1:34:17

And you're gonna marry for God? no, like 20 years. 

Michael: 1:34:19

But that's part of a healthy relationship. 

Pablo: 1:34:21

Right is like working through this stuff, so you know, and I'm glad to have that because it's like, it's a balance like that. I'd be lying if I say there weren't times I just threw my hands up in the air and say you know what, tony, your name's on the building, do what you want, right. And I'm like walk away. And luckily he's been right on most of those, you know, i'm not afraid to admit it. 

Tony: 1:34:40

And there's times where I would get his information and his ideas and like let me think about this again, let me see it from a different perspective, because I don't have all the answers. And that's why I said, like from when we opened or from when we started just having one or two people in the mix to now having a team, that you could really bounce off ideas and say, hey, does this really work? Or what do you guys think If it's our feedback? we love our team. you know, bree, jovan, beth, adam, you know those guys are just amazing. 

Pablo: 1:35:11

And who looks at you now? 

Michael: 1:35:12

There's so many names And all the others, yes, the whole team. 

Tony: 1:35:17

And the ship leads and the supervisors. You know we actually get their ideas, like I know for a fact I can't come up with all the ideas, though. The Fasi Rodrigo wasn't our idea, it wasn't my idea, It was, it came from the team. And so same thing with the special drinks and seasonal drinks. 

Pablo: 1:35:32

We love giving them that freedom to like that. Yeah. Hey, if something makes sense in your head, shout it out. Like we've had several drinks on our menu that were made by our team that I would have never thought of. I mean Dylan recently made one called. Brittany. Beach It was like great. It was summer, it was fruity. I don't even know if it had coffee in it? 

Tony: 1:35:52

No, it didn't, but it was great And people loved it. 

Pablo: 1:35:55

It came with a little umbrella garnish and it was nice And it's just having that input, having that teamwork that's saying, hey, what else can we think of? You know what colors can we come up with? And just getting creative and giving them that freedom, I think really bonds us a lot too. 

Michael: 1:36:11

That's the special thing about a small business is that you can do that. You know like you can empower your employees, your team, to have those ideas and bring them forth, and know that you can just implement them if they're working. They're working And that's. 

Tony: 1:36:29

And they're on the front line, so they know what customers are wanting, looking for, so on and so forth. 

Pablo: 1:36:36

Sometimes customers like a surprise, Like hey, surprise. You know I've been here three times this week. I don't want a latte today, i want something different. Yeah yeah, yeah. It's nice to have that freedom to be able to say, oh, how's this taste, mike, and if you don't like it we'll make you something else, like, hey, here's something new. 

Michael: 1:36:50

Yeah, and that creativity right. 

Tony: 1:36:52

We had a customer, one of our little customers, his son, wanted something a little different And he was like, ah, you know, can you do something? And ended up, we ended up making a hibiscus lemonade. Oh nice, we have it on the menu now. Oh wow. So it's like it's just, we've taken it to events, it's just the pairing of the two, the marriage is like why not? Uh-huh, it's not just why not? Oh, it's actually delicious, it's just. Again, you don't know where ideas are, where they're going to strike. It doesn't matter how old you are, how young you are, where your background is. If it makes sense, it makes sense. Yeah, and that's what people want to order. That's what people want to order. So, yeah, we have a great team, from the beginnings to now and in the future. We give a lot of testimony and a lot of credit to them because they're the ones on the front lines, they're the ones that are keeping the shop clean, organizing, making sure their guests are happy. You know, i can't cook, i can't take orders, i can't roast, i can't make a drink, i can't make a dog, all at the same time. Right, i can't, i have to rely on a tea. And then, yeah, they're fantastic. 

Michael: 1:38:00

And everybody has some level of ownership too, like they really care about the outcomes, they care about the reputation of the place, the experience of the customer, and all of that really does show, it does make it so unique And it does You do differentiate from other places that you can get coffee And you are offering something that is unique and special. And I just thank you guys. 

Tony: 1:38:31

No, thank you for all the warmth and the compliments And hopefully two years is going to be for us, our anniversary December 2nd, and hopefully there'll be more to come after that. Yeah, happy, almost anniversary. 

Michael: 1:38:45

Yeah, it'll be almost anniversary, perfect time too, that time of year, you know, yeah. 

Tony: 1:38:51

Last year we actually were literally working and went out on a coffee trip. 

Michael: 1:38:55

I don't know if we'll fall again around that time. 

Tony: 1:38:58

It's just the nature of the beast, of what other seasons are. 

Pablo: 1:39:01

Yeah, source and season is a mean beast in Central America. Like we said, we got to Costa Rica too late. Panama worked out for us, and Nicaragua is one of our stronger relationships too. But at the end of the day, if you're late, all the good stuff's gone. You got to settle for what's left, and it can be challenging to find quality. Yeah. And we're not just going to bring anything in. So we want to make sure that what we do bring has a certain level of grade, absolutely. 

Tony: 1:39:27

I just put on film saying that we were thinking we were in Panama, We were trying to just pack a mara And literally we're sitting down. He's like try this, Like this is really good, This is like Santos Cafe. 

Pablo: 1:39:37

We love them Santos. 

Tony: 1:39:38

Cafe. 

Pablo: 1:39:38

Great, great. We love the guy from Panama. And he's having a sample. He's great. He's like this one won Best of Panama last year And I'm like, yes. And he's like, yes, i'm like all right, well, we'll take 100 pounds of it. And he's like, oh, i don't actually have that. I don't have this one, I'm like that's not the one. 

Tony: 1:39:55

I want it I want it. 

Pablo: 1:39:58

I can't set me up like this. Come on, so that's heartbreaking Yeah. Yeah, but luckily, like he said, his father and his family have the relationship. They went to high school together. So, this year, hopefully we'll be bringing back some Santos Cafe from Panama, which is great, great coffee. I mean, janssen will always be our key relationship in Panama and Argyra. I feel like we'll always come from Janssen. But there's just so much good coffee You can't stick to just one farm And we want to be able to bring that here. We want to be able to bring the best coffees of the world here and really put out that special club that you can't get anywhere else. I'm pretty sure we're one of the very few that have actual Panamanian geisha coffee, not just Florida but the US. Yeah, it's hard. It's nice to get your hands on, it's hard. 

Tony: 1:40:47

It's a very unique flavor And, again, these things could be expensive. But it's also economy of scale and who usually buys it? It's very similar. The Asian market loves it And that market has been booming. You know, the Chinese and the Japanese gobble a lot of the geisha up. The rest goes to Europe, holland and those places that really have a big coffee culture. I think per capita, i think Denmark, finland drink more coffee than anywhere in the United States, and then if anything's left, mostly it gets sent to the port of LA to those buyers. So to have a relationship with a farm that does over winning geisha, that's huge. You know, it's a little feather in our cap. You know, again, there's a lot of other places that produce a lot of great stuff and a lot of roasted nuts. But I have it, we'll be roasting some geisha here pretty soon for the holiday season, so everyone can, like you know, purchase it for the holidays. It's really a special cup, you know, for me, for instance, half a pound either Nicaragua or Papua New Guinea, as every day, but like a geisha, if I have someone coming over I want to have a dinner and then I want to do something like. That's kind of when. 

Michael: 1:41:56

I make Yeah. So it's kind of something And what a story behind it too. Right Like that, almost was it almost an endangered species kind of thing, because it wasn't so popular. 

Pablo: 1:42:09

Correct, i know that plants can be that way, Right. Well, yeah, the yield per plant is a lot less. And if you don't roast it properly like the roasting of geisha is so sensitive If you don't have the right profile on it, you'll burn all the florals right off of it. So you really want to, you know to shine, you really want to understand it and have it downpack, Like our first roast of geisha was not perfect, You know, we studied it. We took it back. 

Michael: 1:42:35

Some trial and error yeah. 

Pablo: 1:42:37

It's offensive driving, yeah, wow. 

Tony: 1:42:41

That really encourages you to figure it out quickly, right, right. So listen, we sell a bag of geisha from Jensen family farms of a half pound for $55. Most bags you could probably get, even at our shop, it's. You know, a half pound is $16, $17, $18. 

Michael: 1:43:00

So it's quite a leap to buy this coffee, and there's a reason behind it, a very specific reason. 

Tony: 1:43:07

We try to put it at a price point per cup which is not that's attainable. I think we charge like $9 when we have it available. So people come in and really try it and some people are just fanatics for it and they want to buy it because they want to have it. But, like in everything you know, you could go to a steakhouse and have a dry aged ribeye. For me, personally, that's not my favorite cut. I like a New York shipper for Le Mignon or a boning for that. So to each his own right, but still there's a reasoning why that ribeye is so expensive and the dry aging and whatnot. And so there are people that will love this coffee. and then some people will be like, oh, it's okay, i'd rather have X coffee. 

Pablo: 1:43:52

Sure, sure, and that's something that we had to fight too, because you know, in Miami coffee culture is way different. Right, It's your Cuban coffee, It's your three teaspoons of sugar, You whip it up and you know, some milk and really, really burnt dark espresso. 

Michael: 1:44:07

Yeah, and just getting, which is nice too, and it's on way. It has its time and place. Black bean deli does a really good Cuban coffee. Oh God, it's so good. Yeah, it's great. 

Pablo: 1:44:15

And yeah, i like to think we have a good one too, but it's just not that specialty we're all of. There's no reason to have to go to Panama to find it, like we can reproduce that here, whether it's our Columbia or something else. So I think for us, stepping into that specialty coffee world where coffee stops tasting like your traditional cup of coffee is just training our audience for that to expect, like, yeah, we can whip up dark, you know, tar for you if that's what you like but we have the specialty you know 86 and up want to enjoy on its own. So it's a broad spectrum of where we can go. 

Tony: 1:44:53

And then you know we're getting into a little bit of coffee. We're in tune as humans to look for certain tastes and profiles, because our ancestors we had strawberries, we have blueberries. You know, and back in the day, back in the day when people were eating and they didn't know what they were eating, if you had a blueberry and you didn't die, well, that's going to be cemented in your brain. So Ethiopia tastes like blueberries, for instance, right. So when you have that sense and that smell and it's just roasted right and you have those tastes, that's what really gravitates towards it. You know again, not knocking Maxwell House or any other you know big roasters but they roast it to a certain point that's consistent that you could get your caffeine. That's not our job. Our job is specialty, to make sure that we get those essence of those coffees. You're not going to get those blueberries. You know Nicaragua is going to be completely different. No matter how you roast it, you're never going to get those notes from that region of the world. 

Pablo: 1:46:04

You don't have the right elevation, the right climate, so much has to happen to get that. 

Michael: 1:46:08

Yeah. 

Pablo: 1:46:09

And it's rare for a reason. 

Michael: 1:46:11

It's like with produce and with berries and things like certain things out of season that you're still getting, or if they travel further and their origin, it's like it can make a big difference, and that's what forest is for. 

Tony: 1:46:24

Yes, and again, we have food, and one of our, i want to say claim to fame, but one of our popular items, i want to say avocado toast and people. 

Michael: 1:46:37

I love avocado toast. 

Tony: 1:46:38

Yes, but like you just said it's not always in season. 

Michael: 1:46:42

No, that's true. 

Tony: 1:46:43

So we have it on the menu and sometimes we don't have them or they're not ripe, or how can you not have avocado toast Like? I don't mean to put this avocado toast on the wall. 

Michael: 1:46:52

We want it to be good, and it's not good, right now, yeah, and it's not our fault, those coals are really tricky Yeah. 

Pablo: 1:46:59

And that's you mentioned. You know where you grow and stuff like that's what makes the Panamanian Gaceous so special too, because the soil is so rich because of volcanic ash that millions and millions of years to have fertilized this ground, that you can take the same plant and grow it in Colombia, grow it in Guatemala, wherever, same altitude, and still not going to give you that same quality, because the nutrients are underground. The weather, and with Volcán or Volquete, or some of these towns that are around this volcano, which it's just, it's perfect Like it's raining, but you can't feel the rain, because it's just like a do-miss. Yeah. 

Tony: 1:47:37

And it's very similar to how I like to describe it, to why right Napa Valley has an elevation, has a climate, just that you know it's correct. 

Michael: 1:47:47

Right, And it's exactly. 

Tony: 1:47:50

France and other like South Africa. They have certain regions that are just primed to grow these items right. That's where, kind of like, the specialty coffee comes from. And you asked us you know, do we produce coffee or what? We're not at that elevation. We're not there to produce the quality that we want. 

Michael: 1:48:10

We would love to Yeah At today's standards, right, yeah, but you know after a couple of years you know, and some places are able to do it at the quality and the level that you want, and that's where that comes from Gotcha. 

Tony: 1:48:23

Right, so it's again. It's a world on its own. Yeah, this idea of you know Lobos started years for me, and it's one of those things when you start getting into it, you know you start to get into it. Oh, i can actually see. Oh, chemex. 

Pablo: 1:48:41

French press Blah, blah, blah, blah blah. And I'm just like, am I putting 50 grams of water or 80 grams? 

Tony: 1:48:48

of water, Just like the 30 second mark. 

Pablo: 1:48:53

I need some lean. It is It is. It's crazy how it grows on you. 

Michael: 1:48:56

Well, and you've been to the places where it comes from too, And like that level of connection is that tells such a cool story. And that's the kind of stuff that, like I'm so excited to do this podcast and share this with the world and the neighborhood. And just like I did not know those things, you know, I knew there was a Panamanian connection, but the fact that you are actually going and brokering these deals and you're visiting the farms and being at the origin of these beans, that you have that level of understanding and you're tasting their roast, you know and getting their ideas and nobody knows better than they do, So you're learning from the best spots, and you know it's responsibly grown too, because you see the community that just thrives off of just coffee. 

Pablo: 1:49:45

you know, like that's their whole economy. Fair trade people are being treated equitably. Our partner in Nicaragua, jaime great man. He was the mayor of one town that he was in La Dalia, in Matagalpa, for those of you familiar, and was elected mayor of three more towns. because it's just so much good, like his wife, build schools. we'll show up with a you know luggage full of just like toys for the school teacher, like we brought them a speaker phone, like you know just little things that, not to say, we take for granted here in the United States but are so easily accessible when you go somewhere like Nicaragua and you literally see what poor can be. 

Michael: 1:50:26

Yeah. 

Pablo: 1:50:27

The smallest things that we can do to help and give back to them. It makes us feel so good to go back there and see our partner. You know we're driving around in the truck with him through town and people are literally screaming at him like hi, theo, theo means uncle because, the whole town. They call him Uncle Jaime And it's just like amazing to see the love that this town has for him And it's because of all he gives back. Like he has a coffee farm, but there's several other coffee farms there right And he works to help sell all of their coffees together And you know it comes back in the form of, you know, better roads, houses for teachers. Education, education Just little things like that that we have here so accessible, and people kind of turn away from and over there they do anything to get their hands on some of it, you know. so it's nice, it's really nice, to go back there and see the impact that the coffee industry has in a place like Nicaragua. 

Michael: 1:51:24

What a beautiful thing Yeah. 

Pablo: 1:51:25

Yeah, it's awesome. It's a cool town too. I mean I love it's a cool country. We ate great food, oh. God, my wife's grandfather lives there, so that's how we got that connection. Oh, lucky enough, we spent a couple of good days there. Last time we were there I got to show Tony because I had been going by myself for years, even before Lobos opened. I just had been going to visit my wife's grandfather and met Jaime on one of those trips, and kind of the same time that he was bringing Lobos to fruition. 

Michael: 1:51:55

Just so meant to be like all of these things, right. 

Pablo: 1:51:58

Yeah. 

Tony: 1:51:58

I remember like wait, wait, wait what You went home for a coffee shop. I was like wait, i just met a coffee farmer. I wonder why that happened. 

Pablo: 1:52:06

And then our first shipment was it wasn't small for the average person, it was small for a coffee shop because it was already December and we didn't want to buy too much coffee. We want to make sure we got the fresh harvest that year, and so forth So you know it's 2760 pound bags of coffee, and Tony just conveniently had to be out of town that way. So it was me. 

Tony: 1:52:32

I knew this one was going to buy me another buddy. 

Michael: 1:52:35

It does sound like a lot to move and store and separate and process right. 

Pablo: 1:52:40

Yeah, So it was a good workout. But now we kind of got it down to a more simple process. So you know, we were able to double our initial shipment the second time, or more than double it actually. So you know it shows our growth and that's awesome. Gives us that more solid relationship Now. 

Tony: 1:52:59

if only the commodity prices would come down a little bit, the coffee price doubled Wow. 

Pablo: 1:53:05

And the actual bean prices doubled too. 

Michael: 1:53:07

So it's all things you got to work around And the average consumer doesn't understand those inputs, and we absorbed a lot of it too. 

Pablo: 1:53:15

We absorbed as much of it as we could, because you know we don't want to scare people away by. 

Tony: 1:53:20

Yeah. So coffee really like analysts in the business say, it should actually be worth and be more expensive. Yeah, there's a lot of hands in the cookie jar from exporters over there, importers over here, roasters, growers you know there's hundreds of thousands of hands that actually touch that coffee before the end user has it in their hands. But that's what we made that decision from right from the beginning and say, okay, let's try to. you know we can't do them all ourselves, but let's start building as a day one, start building relationships. So you know, once we hopefully get to where we want to be, that will be going directly to the market or directly to the farmers ourselves and shaking hands and kissing those babies and saying hello to everyone to be able to import. Again, we work with a great importer as well now that brings stuff from literally across the world, from a proper beginning to our Ethiopia, to say the least. And again, we have one shop. we're not there yet, but hopefully in the future. that's what is on our core DNA that we want to bring here to other stores that we possibly hope in the future. 

Michael: 1:54:34

Are you roasting at capacity right now? Are you basically like, or is there room to grow with the roasting operation that you have? 

Tony: 1:54:43

There's room to grow, unlike some other coffee shops that open one every week. You know, that's going to be impossible to do at our shop. But for what we have in our wholesale accounts, we've already sat down at the numbers and know what our capacity is And in the future, what kind of warehouse we want, to how many stores we could support, to how many wholesale accounts we could do. and we want to be able to cap that and then say, okay, well, do we get to a certain level where we now do another roaster or whatnot? So that's the goal to make sure that we keep that quality. That's the idea. 

Pablo: 1:55:21

We're only roasting one or two days a week. Right now, though, summertime, but for whole days Yeah. 

Tony: 1:55:28

Usually during the winter. 

Pablo: 1:55:29

we roast more During the summer, obviously, we roast less And you smell it this far down the block. We walk towards the school and we only have the first opening. I had. 

Michael: 1:55:39

We roast and see how far you get. Yeah, I didn't notice it from here, but as you get closer for sure I actually had a guest come in. 

Tony: 1:55:49

It was mad. I smelled you guys roasting. I had to pull over and have a coffee and I was like, oh, okay. 

Michael: 1:55:56

Poor guy. I mean, if that's his worst problem that day? 

Tony: 1:56:01

Yeah, it was really funny because he came in really upset but he was joking. But yeah, just to give you a little tidbit, the amylized smell, out of your five senses, is the only one that passes or bypasses your logic system. So, for example, if you go in for me, i remember walking into a store that we were looking at to buy some seeding and whatnot, and they smelled a certain wood and it transcended me and put me back into my grandmother's place, panama. Now it reminded me of it, but I knew logically I wasn't there. So smell is very, very powerful. Hence why we roast And remember as kids their parents making coffee and having that smell, and it's a wonderful smell. Now, it's very potent when you're roasting it, but when it's degassing you open it up and I've had whole cell accounts come in. All right, let me show you something. I just opened it up and that whiff of coffee. The Nicaragua has the best smell out of all the coffees we have. For whatever reason, That's that chocolatey? 

Pablo: 1:57:14

Yeah, it's just literally. 

Tony: 1:57:17

People are just like they're moving their mouth, like they're eating it. 

Pablo: 1:57:22

It's like a coffee guys, coffee Like it's a coffee cup Yeah. 

Tony: 1:57:26

It's not like the berries or like the flowers or something, but it's just like a solid like. 

Pablo: 1:57:29

You can make it on espresso, you can make it drip, you can blend it. It's just a solid workhorse coffee. 

Michael: 1:57:36

I have to experience that. What days do you roast the lately? 

Tony: 1:57:40

So usually we vary depending on the volume of business and what we do, but usually to their Monday, tuesday or Wednesday, those are the days that we kind of roast and it could vary. 

Michael: 1:57:52

Do you roast during business hours, or is it We do? You do? That's awesome. 

Pablo: 1:57:56

That's really cool, it's hard to during the summer because it gets really hot in there. Yeah. So usually we added tents and we try to do it early in the day. 

Tony: 1:58:05

so it's not so because it can get pretty, pretty heated in there yeah um, but yeah, usually Monday, tuesday mornings people come in and they say and it's, and it's one of those things that if you smell it, it's a sub like oh, i can probably pick up a coffee, you know, yeah. 

Michael: 1:58:24

I am powerless to this coffee and I will admit it yeah, it's. 

Tony: 1:58:29

It's it's too full, but it's. It's a beautiful smell it's, and when you taste it, i I actually don't have a lot of breakfast or don't eat breakfast until I get to the shop and I just have a coffee and professionals say you actually shouldn't drink coffee. Right, when you wake up it has more effects an hour or two into your day. So that's usually what I do and I can actually feel it just moving in my brain, the caffeine hitting all of a sudden. I could take on the world. Everything's bright, i have no bills, nothing, and when it goes away I'm like oh man it is the best drug, isn't it? 

Michael: 1:59:10

and it's not bad for you. I mean, yeah, my doctor's, like you, can still drink coffee, and very grateful for that yeah, yeah, yeah. 

Tony: 1:59:21

There's a couple of things that I'm not sure if it's not worth living. You know, nice piece of steak, mm-hmm, my part. Great cup of Joe, good cup of coffee, yeah, you know friendship, friendship community. There you go absolutely to share with yeah, yeah and there's no point of doing all this if I can't share, especially on the best friend, for instance, the highs, the lows, the good, the bad, that's you know. I feel like I have a really tight knit friendships and family that I could really confide and trust him, mm-hmm. So to do it with, obviously, my best friend that's pretty much my brother this point of time. He knows he knows me more than anybody else. Mm-hmm, it's great because I want to be able to. If this is able to take off and we're able to grow the company, i could do it with the people that really trust in me. Yeah, i take that to heart yeah, it makes it sustainable. 

Michael: 2:00:23

I mean it. That's what you need. As you said, ticks a village and this, this is like your baby right. I mean it really kind of is it has all all of these things and it grows and it becomes a fully formed thing and it and it, it is doing that, it has done that and hopefully we'll keep it going, you know, with the sport community and and our partners, and they're in our team. 

Pablo: 2:00:47

Hopefully, you know we'll be stable here for years to come. That's the book but, Mike, we can talk your ear off all night. 

Michael: 2:00:53

This is amazing. I know it's not over two hours, i love this again. 

Tony: 2:00:58

You're gonna have to like stop it out of bottle whiskey soon it's not a bad idea right. 

Michael: 2:01:05

Is that the next step? are you going to carry alcohol at some point? I? 

Pablo: 2:01:09

don't think so yeah it, with the school and the church being so close. Getting beer and wine, sure a mission on its own, and again something we didn't. 

Michael: 2:01:17

Us, two rookies at this didn't consider yeah, so we're lucky enough to have the blue laws. They have to basically get permission and the church is really cool about that. I know like red light had to go through the same thing yeah, and, and the school was too. 

Pablo: 2:01:32

So we were lucky enough. You know, jen, down at Audubon Park put us in touch with them when we were building out and you know we couldn't ask for a better partnership. They they literally vouch for us to the city, said we don't have a problem with this, or so. So I mean, we imagine, with other establishments around the area yeah, do worse than you know. I don't think that a four COP is in our future, at least not in this location. It kind of just you got to know where to draw your line. Yeah, bottle sparklers is where we draw well, i can't wait for those. 

Michael: 2:02:05

But no, yeah, we can talk to you off all night down so yeah well, i think we've done it and again I just I can't thank you enough and keep keep doing the great work that you're doing, and I know that the customers will. They will be there to support, as they do in the community. 

Tony: 2:02:28

Thank, you, thank you, and I'm belated. Happy birthday, thank you, pass by any time. 

Michael: 2:02:33

Yes, you've, you've made a regular customer out of me. I mean after that cup yesterday and talking to you both, i have a another spot that I'm going to go to all the time for coffee yeah, start us this great it is great right. 

Pablo: 2:02:48

They were really, really one of our first coffee shops in this area that we would go there and just work out of, and it's great vibe. They do whiskey there, so that's that's right. 

Michael: 2:02:59

It's a whole different. 

Pablo: 2:03:00

They've got that covered, yeah everybody brings their own specialty to it. So you know, we we found our niche, i think, and we just want to make our what we do better. 

Michael: 2:03:09

Get better at what we do first yeah, and I love that you do have like nighttime hours as well. What? what are your, your daily operating hours? 

Tony: 2:03:18

Monday through Thursday from 6 30 to 9. Friday it's from 6 30 to 10. On Saturday 7 to 10 and on Sunday from 7 to 8. Holidays and one night, you know there will be modified hours. Yeah, we want to take care of our staff and go home early and whatnot to celebrate the holidays, but primarily those are the hours that we have turned during the week and usually we have. Yeah, we will be closed Christmas day and then some other days will do like half days. 

Michael: 2:03:50

I think my first day going in was maybe July 4th, because Stardust was closed and I'm like there are some businesses that they close us certain days. 

Tony: 2:04:03

Look, why are we so busy on this random day? and then we realize, oh yeah, that's okay, i'll take, we know. 

Pablo: 2:04:13

I mean, i heard your show and you know Stardust, i know, was one of the first coffee shops you went to. We can never be your first, but right right right. But you know, just to be mentioned in the same sentence is an honor to us because, like you said, these are staples. Yeah, we recently won Best of Orlando for Best Local Coffee Roaster. We've got voted third place and my initial reaction to Tony was like should we be celebrating third place? but then you look at the list of who's in first and who's in second, like wow, like all right, like yeah doing something you know so top top three, that is that is something cuz. 

Michael: 2:04:47

Orlando is a big place and it's growing and hopefully we can, you know, stay on the list. 

Pablo: 2:04:51

You know there's more competition this year, so we got to do a better job of getting quality out there. 

Michael: 2:04:57

Yeah, we're doing that. 

Pablo: 2:04:58

So yeah, i think we're testing more we're learning, more we're getting better. A lot of people think Lobos is like this huge conglomerate coffee. Yeah, you guys just know how to get coffee out the trunk of the car. 

Michael: 2:05:14

It's like the Wizard of Oz thing, right, i mean you do have this really. I mean it is so well put together. It does look like something that has been reproduced or you know has some huge backing to it. It's just you guys are doing it right. And what is the website that people go to to visit you? I know you do a lot of online sales stuff now too. 

Pablo: 2:05:36

Yes, Lobos coffee roasterscom or Lobos coffeecom on Instagram, facebook. 

Tony: 2:05:41

Lobos coffee roasters and our website, you can find all the what more locations that you can find us at as well. Very cool we also ship nationwide yeah, we also do shipping, and then your polly is here's doing a couple more events down the down the pipeline, either offside or onside. That's that's our goal to expand a little bit more, and that's a great way to get out there, right? 

Michael: 2:06:04

I mean especially this time of year when it's nicer to be outside. 

Pablo: 2:06:07

We recently at Lou Gardens for their jazz festival and the weather was just perfect and saw so many people there that gave us compliments about the shop and it's nice to have that extended arm, that we can, you know, have an event down the street and people see us there if they haven't been, you know, had a chance to come by and stuff. 

Michael: 2:06:25

Yeah, and it's, it's right in the neighborhood Lou Gardens Botanical. I mean it, just it's incredible what they have there, isn't it? yeah, it's gorgeous yeah, what a partner to have for an event like yeah, that's very cool you know we've been invited back. 

Tony: 2:06:42

Thank you, tracy, the director, for I believe their plant sale hopefully so that'll be huge that'll be fun, yeah, you know. So hopefully we'll be able to do some other events and I know they're going through a transition and trying to figure some stuff out, but we'll be here and you know, whatever they need or whatever support they need and whatever support the community needs, they supported us, so we're so grateful for you guys. 

Michael: 2:07:09

Thank you so much, you for taking the time. 

Tony: 2:07:12

No, thank you for inviting us and totally and talking to us and sharing our story, so we really appreciate it. 

Michael: 2:07:19

We'll talk to you guys soon. Hello, apgd. A neighborhood podcast is brought to you in part by Stardust video and coffee, audubon Park's beloved neighborhood cafe, bakery bar and meeting place located at 1842 East Winter Park Road. We're also sponsored by red light. Red light brew pub. Founded in 2005, red light is widely known as the source for world-class imports and micro brews, a wide selection of natural wines plus award-winning beers brewed in-house. A full kitchen is in the works with an amazing menu by chef Jess Tantolo, located at 2810 Corrine Drive. Please check out red light for all things beer and wine, and soon food. Our theme song is by Christopher Pierce, and special thanks to Trey Hester for all of his help in making this podcast a reality. We do hope you enjoyed this episode. If so, please click subscribe and leave a review if you'd like. We'll see you next time.