AoD (7)

My barista job has put me into contact with many coffe-loving people. Not the Starbucks coffe drinkers, but people who are actually interested in the creation, maintainence, and consumption of coffee. Having this resource, I have started the planning for a coffe shop, which is only possible because I have built social capital.

As a barista trainee (still) at my church's coffe hut, I learn directly under Karen, a woman who knows a LOT about coffee. She's managed a starbucks or two, managed the coffee area of Marlene's, and now works as the head barista for the church. With this knowledge, she has shown me everything I know about coffee, and she still has more to tell me. At school, I've been having the idea of starting a coffe shop, although these thoughts seemed very impossible. Then I realized, Karen could greatly help with this, since she's mostly the guru of coffee. I then designed my business plan and talked to Karen about how she supplies the coffee hut with supplies. After gaining this information, I tallied up the prices, which was a lot, and decided to get the supplies right through Karen. I've set a time to talk with her about this, and I currently feel pretty good about being able to recieve the supplies from her. I also used information from the other baristas to learn about what type of machine I should buy. Everything seems ok for now, except I will have to find a proper location and a place for proper funding as well, but I believe I have a couple of other people I know that might help me with that. I never actually thought of relationshipd with poeple as anything other than annoying and seemingly non-important, although it seems that relationships are actually more important than just bonds with people needed for proper funcionality.