Maggie and Rich re-trace some of life’s steps that got each to where they are today in their education and careers. Visit housecoffeepodcast.com to submit a question or leave feedback.
Special thanks to TJ McMaster for mixing and editing our episode!
Transcript
Intro:
Hey, you’re drinking house coffee – unfiltered conversations brewed at the intersection of real estate life and coffee shop service. We’re Maggie and Rich – local business owners and friends sharing stories and welcoming you to pull up a chair with us. The door’s always open. Let us pour you a cup.
Maggie:
Welcome back to House Coffee episode 2 where Maggie and Rich
Rich:
Very happy to be back with you
Maggie:
Maggie. Yeah, same
Rich:
Today. We’re talking about our resumes a little bit of work history how we got to where
Maggie:
We
Rich:
Are now
Maggie:
Past lives current live.
Rich:
That’s right your lives future lives. Yeah. Hope
Maggie:
Yeah, so last week we had our first episode and we had a great kickoff and I think it went really well. And so we decided to come back for a second time.
Rich:
We thought we could do that at least one more time.
Maggie:
Yeah, so
Rich:
If you heard that thanks for checking it out. If not, you can go back and find that we’d be happy to hear any feedback you have and I think we drop some like contact information there and and we want to hear from you just as we keep rolling with these we want to. Hear your stories. Yep, get your thoughts. And just know how we can encourage you on whatever Journey you’re on.
Maggie:
Yep. Cool. So today’s episode about our work history. Do you want me to go first or do you want to go first? We thought we would interview each other? Yeah. We don’t know. Yeah.
Rich:
Yeah well Are you if you feel if you’re if you’re cool,
Maggie:
Okay.
Rich:
All right. Well, I mean there’s different ways to do this. Let’s just put that way so so my my question was what did you want to be when you grew up?
Maggie:
What did I want to view when I grew up? When I was little my earliest memory is I wanted to be a lawyer.
Rich:
Nice and
Maggie:
Because my mom told me that I could sell an icebox to an Eskimo. And so I mean, I guess I was just a really good negotiator, which is kind of funny because that’s what I do for a living today.
Rich:
Yeah,
Maggie:
But I’m not an attorney spoiler alert. I may real estate agent.
Rich:
I work with a lot of attorney,
Maggie:
But I work with a lot of attorneys, correct, and then when I got a little bit older and I realized all the schooling and work associated with becoming an attorney. I decided I really liked people and getting to know their stories and meeting them and I Pursued a career and an education in broadcast journalism. So I wanted to be a reporter for the local news and when I went into college, that’s sort of Developed into a major in like documentary film and cinema screen studies. So I double majored in broadcasting and film and When I graduated I was hired for a local PBS station doing as a production assistant like the bottom of the totem pole bottom of the barrel like helping with the local production team.
Rich:
You got to start somewhere.
Maggie:
You got to start somewhere.
Rich:
That’s really cool. I didn’t know that about you. I had also I didn’t study broadcasting or anything like that or journalism, but I was interested in documentary studies and I looked at a couple local.
Maggie:
Yep,
Rich:
A couple documentary studies programs quote unquote at different colleges. So
Maggie:
It’s interesting. It’s over that like even though I’m not in that career field today. I still have like some of my college professors in the back of my head with like the one-liners they would say when they were teaching when I’m making Instagram real.
Rich:
Yeah, that’s funny. So it’s
Maggie:
Really interesting how they still use some of my education. Yeah, but not fully
Rich:
Wisdom of the ages. Yeah.
Maggie:
So should I keep going? Yeah, okay, so shortly after. I got hired at PBS. for the local station I was also accepted into this leadership program. I was just out of college and this leadership program. allowed me to travel for a year to different countries and the point of the program was to have leaders in other countries like Mentor me and they had one student accepted per year and a lot of kids joined when they just graduated high school, but I applied after college and Knowing that I was studying broadcasting the project or the thesis for this. End of this program was to produce a film about like my study. So I went to Bulgaria India and South Africa and I produced a documentary film. About the concept of Hope and I just spent a whole year like interviewing people editing it and then I was able to present that feature film quote unquote at the end and that was a really cool experience. Yeah, like have people see that work that go into it and The after that feature film was premiered I should say. I was hired by a local church to do their media department. So I worked there for a couple of years and I realized after one after a year so that like I just really didn’t two things. I did not like working for a church. That was not a good experience for me personally and number two. I just didn’t enjoy the like doing video and editing as a job. It was more of a creative outlet for me and I actually think that’s a really good point to make for a lot of people is If there’s something creative that you have in your life that brings you Joy and you get a great amount of pleasure doing it don’t think that you have to turn it into a job because once it’s turned into a job, you might not find the same joy and you might not get the same pleasure out of doing it that you do when it’s a creative Pursuit. Yeah,
Rich:
That’s
Maggie:
Just my little tidbit of advice not saying you can’t make money but just know that like there are some there are struggles when you turn your creative Pursuits into a full-time job and I’ll leave it at that.
Rich:
That’s a good point. I mean, it’s that’s a good question. I’m sure a lot of people ask themselves like how I’m really passionate about something. How do I know when I want to turn this hobby into a job or a career? And there’s a lot of different ways to do that. I have a friend right now who’s asking me, you know, he’s he’s a home coffee. Brewer and and just he gets really fun coffees from all different places. He’s got all every little pore every I think literally every pore over device or just method of Brewing you can you can have at home. He’s tried them all and he’s always talking to me about him and recently he was like, you know, I think I want to get more serious about coffee and he’s like trying to find a place where he can get a few hours a week, you know, and it’s And that’s that’s cool, but it’s hard sometimes to know when to do that or or to take so much ownership of it that you like try to start a whole business of your own around it. That’s a big question for I’m sure a lot of people in a lot of different things. Yeah,
Maggie:
And I know this because people were asking me to film their weddings and film like other like parties and situations and I just was like there was just so like I just remember doing a wedding one time and the pressure
Rich:
I
Maggie:
Felt to have this be their wedding video and like needing to hire somebody to help as a backup camera and then like the pressure to have the video edited the right way and all the footage and stuff and I just I did not like the amount of pressure and anxiety that I put on myself and Whereas like when this was a creative project where I was just meeting people and interviewing them and hearing their stories to me. That was a totally different scenario than like, this is your wedding video. And this is like,
Rich:
Yeah,
Maggie:
But like local local gym hired me to do a promo video for them and like I just couldn’t like the pressure was just too much.
Rich:
Wow. Yeah. I mean that’s fair. There’s a lot of pressure on that but especially at a wedding situation like I mean shout out to our friend Becca, she’s away for I don’t think she does the videos so much but like just the cameras. I mean God have a special Personality. Yeah really know what like how to how to navigate The Wedding Day scenario, you know, I’m sure with experience it gets
Maggie:
Yeah
Rich:
Easier for sure still
Maggie:
For sure.
Rich:
When was the last time you saw that film that you created?
Maggie:
When it premiered
Rich:
Really yeah,
Maggie:
Which it premiered in. 2011 no, yeah to 2010 Premiere in 2010
Rich:
How do you feel about it now?
Maggie:
I haven’t I don’t really know how I feel about it. Now, I think
Rich:
Public is it accessible?
Maggie:
It’s it’s not public. It’s on it’s in a file somewhere like on a hard drive.
Rich:
That’s you
Maggie:
I could get it to you. If you want to see it.
Rich:
I’d be interested to see it. Yeah, I’m not really
Maggie:
In it. I’m just right right. I’m just your work and yeah.
Rich:
Obviously, you know anything you do 12 years ago as a snapshot of literally that time in your life or or and your experiences at that time is There’s a lot of ways to think about something
Maggie:
The movie is called aperture. Hope
Rich:
After
Maggie:
No aperture like a camera aperture aperture. Hope
Rich:
Aperture. Hope
Maggie:
Like a camera.
Rich:
Yeah, sure.
Maggie:
Yeah.
Rich:
Super cool. Well, I’ve been down to see that and maybe we’ll
Maggie:
We’ll have
Rich:
A we’ll see oh party. Subscriber only.
Maggie:
Yes. So yeah, and then I guess after I left the like church world. Courier I got and I started a Blog that’s really kind of the really the base of my where my career path LED because I I was born and unhappy at my job at the church. So I started a Blog as a creative Outlet again. There’s that key like a creative outlet and I started blogging about like repurposing furniture and like a little bit of fashion a little bit of like DIY and I wanted to explore Like Home Design and interior design world. So I got a job at a local retailer Pottery Barn and I was one of their design Specialists and I got to go into people’s homes and help them buy furniture basically like measure their space and recommend like material and product for them to purchase and so
Rich:
Fun.
Maggie:
That was really fun and that think that’s what really got me comfortable and gave me the confidence to do staging because I was in so many people’s homes. And these are people who are spending thousands of dollars on furniture. So this isn’t just like a quick like, you know, Wayfair purchase like this was people like some of the orders I would Place were up to $10,000 just for the just for sofas and accessories and things so it got me exposed until like that world and I there was an opening for a local Builder. for one of their interior selections person and that person the selections Coordinator would be the person who helped the person buying the house. Pick their kitchen cabinets their counters their floors their doors. They’re siding like anything that goes inside of a home. When you build a house, you have to select those items
Rich:
And
Maggie:
They would meet with me for their appointment. And sometimes it would be like two to three hours picking all those selections. and then the Builder would make orders and build the home based upon those selections and that I’ll quickly try to wrap up that was opening my world to the world of real estate because when I was at that job I was working with the Realtors like the builders agents who represented the Builder. and facilitated the sale and I’ll never forget one day I was in the office and I was somewhere like in the back and I got a chance to see one of the commission checks that the agents were making and I was like oh my gosh, like there’s so much opportunity out there for me. Because I was only making I was only on an hourly salary. So what I was paid was by the hour to help them build these beautiful homes, and then I saw that in comparison to what the agents were making when they closed on the sale. And let me tell you it was there’s a significant Gap in what I was being paid and what the agents were being paid and I’m like, I’m in the wrong career field here. I need to get my real estate license.
Rich:
Wow,
Maggie:
And that also happened around the same time that Brandon and I bought our house. So we had just had an experience buying a house and I was in the world of real estate with with the new construction. And I said, you know what I’m going to get my real estate license and I’m gonna I’m gonna go after that because there’s a lot of opportunity there.
Rich:
Yeah. Wow, that’s cool and that That speaks to some of the same. experience I’ve had which you know get into but with how just being kind of in an environment and in a culture. seeing the Dynamics of things how things work together just helps like make something feel a little more accessible or I think the familiarity that that comes with being in in that environment
Maggie:
Totally
Rich:
Couldn’t can make something seem appealing or or worth going after yeah, otherwise, it would have been well it made it accessible. Yeah. Yeah exactly.
Maggie:
I was like, oh, okay. I can do this. I’m working just as hard as the people who are doing that, I mean different skills completely, you know, like they were doing sales and they were going to all the walkthroughs and all the appointments but like the amount of time I feel like could ended up being the same between all the paperwork and the background and emails and follow-up like not just the actual two to three hour appointment like all the time in between that scheduling and ordering and doing things for for them. And just just seeing the comparison. I’m like, oh there’s an opportunity here for me.
Rich:
Cool.
Maggie:
Yeah so
Rich:
Many years. Have you been in real estate? Like if
Maggie:
You don’t last with my life
Rich:
Going started going after that?
Maggie:
So I would say 10 years.
Rich:
Wow, okay.
Maggie:
I’ve been licensed for eight years, but I worked for the Builder two years before I got licensed.
Rich:
Yeah,
Maggie:
So
Rich:
Great.
Maggie:
Yeah. Yeah, that’s my that’s my. Shortened version of the story
Rich:
And that helps us see like how you know, you’re you’re big on staging and with your company with your company. Welcome home code that’s like it’s clear to see how For you, it’s a unique way of kind of marrying not just real estate Selling Houses, but also like making them beautiful in the process and making them homey. And then just bring all that together. I think that’s a unique.
Maggie:
Yeah
Rich:
Aspect to what you do
Maggie:
Totally and I am I’m passionate about this too. Like I really get so excited.
Rich:
Yeah
Maggie:
To be able to
Rich:
Know you I know that’s
Maggie:
Yeah I sometimes I have to like stop and say to myself like okay, like yesterday I was taking on I was unstaging at home. The home is gonna close soon. The new buyers are going to own it very soon. And so I had to unstage the home
Rich:
And
Maggie:
Take apart all the beds and all the furniture. I had to stop in the middle of what I was doing and like I was like, oh, this is a moment where I could take a video and and do a quick educational moment. So I had to stop and like kind of like put together a little area where I could I had to like set the phone on the floor because I didn’t have a tripod and I’m like filming the video and like doing doing the actions and So sometimes it’s hard to like stop in the moment and do that when you’re like in the flow of it, but I’m very bad at that. It’s it I think it’s important for growing a brand.
Rich:
Yeah, and you’re totally right and you’re good at it and that helps, you know, I enjoy watching your videos. Where do you post most of that content?
Maggie:
I posted on Instagram and that’s my personal Instagram at Maggie from
Rich:
Maggie from right? But you know, it’s your personal Instagram. It’s got a lovely you’re just you just kind of chronically your life. Yeah way that a good social media user does but a lot of you’re like staging videos if anyone wants to see kind of behind the scenes of or even what we mean by staging it’s fun to watch Maggie does a lot of she does a good job documenting a lot of the different processes and shows you just a little bit how it’s simpler than you maybe you would think in a lot of cases. That’s just the Practical
Maggie:
Totally
Rich:
Ways that you do it and maybe that’s unique to you. I’m not sure.
Maggie:
Yeah, I think because I’m a documentarian. Yeah, I think that’s why going back to my like Original education that’s what’s comfortable for me. Like I’m not the kind of social media person who’s going to be like singing and dancing because that’s not true to me. But I am the kind of person who will like document something and like give you tips on something that I think is practical
Rich:
Yeah
Maggie:
Or entertaining because sometimes I’ll sprinkle in a little bit of like scary houses or like weird things. I see along the way.
Rich:
That one you show the other day whether you were walking someone through and it was just like on my comment was like it’s half gutted already half demo. Yeah, there’s like no walls or floors. He did fall through at any point.
Maggie:
Yeah
Rich:
For one level to another
Maggie:
It was awful.
Rich:
But I don’t know what you’re gonna see out there.
Maggie:
It’s because of my career in real estate that our paths have crossed.
Rich:
Yeah,
Maggie:
Because it if it weren’t for storied coffee, we wouldn’t have ever met because a lot of my administrative work and a lot of my shall we say like I don’t know like Comfort would just come from just like stopping by storied and talking to you and Christine when she was there about like The Perils of clients and business and stuff. So
Rich:
Yeah,
Maggie:
I guess that’s a good segue into like talking about your history. And I guess before we get into that I’m I want to know I’m what kind of kid were you?
Rich:
Uh, you know, it’s interesting because now that I have my own kid. All of a sudden I’m thinking a lot about the kind of kid. I was more than ever. I’m like trying to be reflective of man. What did I think when I was seven weeks old. No, I was that young. But but I do think back often to being Maybe six seven eight, you know, I grew up as an only child. So I think for me that might tell you a lot already. I do have a half-sister. She’s 13 years older than I am. We didn’t like live together ever grow up together. So I really was I grew up with the only
Maggie:
Child intense and purpose. Yeah
Rich:
Only child experience. I lived in a duplex at that for the first 11 years of my life 10 years, whatever and and there was a family upstairs that had two kids who were just the kid was maybe one year younger than me the boy and I had a younger sister even and so that was like kind of built in Friends and then there was kids there were kids on our street because we lived in Scotia below the Ave which is kind of a neighborhood. He type of place. Oh, yeah easier to ride bikes and go to people’s houses and Yeah, so I I don’t know. I remember definitely like I liked being around people as much as I had my solitude. You know, I was I think I was a pretty imaginative person and someone inventive. Those are words that my characterize me. Yeah, very imaginative. I think. In when I was in elementary school, I was definitely called weird a lot. Not that I was like, you know quote unquote loser or Outcast or whatever words, but but I was a little strange now. I don’t know that any third grader is not weird and whatever ways but But that was a word commonly used to describe me by my peers
Maggie:
Interesting and you embraced it.
Rich:
Yeah, I guess so. I guess I think my mom would say stuff like oh they just say that’s they like you, you know, especially it was girls. I was also very this doesn’t really factor into my work necessarily. It is interesting in like the way my life has gone, but I was very interested in like love and like the concept of I don’t know a girlfriend or like a relationship, you know from like a young age like in kindergarten. I had a crush on a girl and me and this other dude who we were like neighbors. We fought over this one girl and we were friends but you know, we always argued about who she liked more and just that kind of thing. It’s interesting kindergarten and then from second grade to fifth grade. I had a crush on the same person. We were inside great together and then I just like maintain that Crush. I don’t know what fifth grade I got like I don’t know. I went on a date with another girl take one, right, you know the date was we went to we went to Raymour and Flanigan. with her parents I skated desk keyboarded down our house
Maggie:
Raymour and Flanigan is a furniture store local to our area itself like yeah.
Rich:
It was the biggest heartbreak of my life up to that point that I couldn’t go to her her roller skating birthday party because I had strep throat.
Maggie:
Oh
Rich:
And I don’t think I’ve quite a really ever recovered from I recovered from the strep throat, but not the Heartbreak.
Maggie:
I don’t think I’m gonna recover from that heartbreak.
Rich:
Um, but just to give you sense of like when I was a kid, I don’t know why I was so invested in that idea of like there’s one person in the world who? you know, you’re supposed to be with and and like Build a life together and then you’ll be complete, you know some Disney. Yeah. I don’t know that honestly, though culture,
Maggie:
You know,
Rich:
I didn’t. That literally was sort of my defining belief. through the rest of Up until I was 19 basically
Maggie:
Wow
Rich:
Up until I was 19 when a very like pivotal thing happened in my life and I came to a realization about you know, what I take to be the meaning of life. It really came home for me in a way that I was I won’t go into it. Yeah, but the point the point is like I realized. Relationships were really meaningful but relationships between human beings are never ultimate and they can’t totally satisfy you and that’s sort of by Design. So I think I was kind of freed from that that thing and then I end up getting married at 22 to my Still life. Yeah, and and we just obviously
Maggie:
Your baby mama
Rich:
Talked about. Yes, so Yeah, I know that was that was kind of what I did. I skateboarded a lot as a kid. I got a skateboarding at the age of nine maybe eight actually. And so skateboarding was kind of my identity. That was another thing for me. Maybe is like I always was seeking identity in something and that might have been where that relationship thing came from then it was skateboarding from the age of 9 third grade learn how to ollie the foundational skateboard trick like mastering that as a third grader and then just
Maggie:
I just realized yes, skateboard connection
Rich:
And your son It’s not why I named Tom Oliver, but it is a bonus.
Maggie:
That’s amazing
Rich:
On the record. Yeah, so that became I sort of hit a peak of my ability to skateboard and around maybe 8th grade. But in seventh grade just before that. I had picked up the bass guitar and I had not really grown up as a musical kid. Although I liked listening to music and singing. I’ll listen to like America’s Top 40 on fly 92 on Saturday mornings or whatever. Casey cases lasted shout out. So That was that was pretty definitive in my life. But then but there was there wasn’t really musicality around me in my life. And then in seventh grade, I got an invitation to come like join my friends basement band, you know, and the rest is history of I’ve been playing music ever since then and that really did Eclipse skateboarding in my life for like my identity and sense of purpose and even like Skill set and what was your band name? Oh man. We had a few different iterations. At first. Our first band was called identity crisis. And
Maggie:
So fitting
Rich:
Shout out IDC. True fans will remember the little emo guy that I that we had as our as our mascot identity crisis and then that same band change names just as we were growing up. We went to kill Hollywood and then with a member of that band. I started a different band with some other people and that was called radio
Maggie:
Okay
Rich:
The exclamation point And those are my three main like bands with other people. I played I played bass but eventually but I was I was the one doing a lot of the song writing lyrics and stuff. And and so I eventually just sort of transitioned to acoustic guitar so I could kind of not rely on other people and just have more videos. Again, I’ve had different ones there but mostly just went by my own name Richard sarnacki on or Richard sarnaki making noise. It was what it was online for a little while.
Maggie:
Do you have a MySpace?
Rich:
I sure did did mine. Yeah. Shout out to Myspace. Yeah. Yeah, I had music one and a personal one. Obviously every band you create even a band concept that you create you created Myspace for
Maggie:
Oh, it’s like me and websites.
Rich:
Yeah you and getting domain names. Yeah. so let me just think here.
Maggie:
So how did that lead you into starting a coffee shop? Well,
Rich:
Like
Maggie:
Where was the
Rich:
That’s actually life.
Maggie:
A great ocean the fork in the road where you’re like, I’m gonna become.
Rich:
An owner so with the bands we were always looking for places to play we were, you know covering songs and we were also writing our own songs and just as kids you’re always looking for different places and it’s hard to get, you know, big venues and whatever when you’re when you’re young, although if you could it was cool, but coffee shops would be a good a good place to to try to get in and so Both with the bands and even on the solo side with open mics and stuff. I would often pursue that kind of thing. So when I was in high school, there was a local coffee shop in a little tiny Hamlet. Of Glenville called Outlaws, and the coffee shop is called Samuels Cafe. And it was run by a Christian organization. So it was a not for profit coffee house is an interesting concept and like all the kids that would work. There were volunteers. They had a couple paid staff but point is like it was just a really welcoming environment for for kids to hang out and We you know, even though it was like Christian run. It wasn’t anyone could play anything there. You know, I think there was maybe like keep the language like don’t swear keep the language family-friendly you could play whatever music you wanted music had to be done by 9 pm because of the noise curfew in the in the you know, the neighborhood, but other than that, yeah. Anyone was welcome and basically like there was all kinds of Hardcore shows and just like our little rock bands and and whatever. And it was a really meaningful place. I would just hang out there on the weekdays and weekends, even if or just going to other people’s shows even if I wasn’t, you know playing but it was a place where where we would play and I guess the point is like it was having that sense of belonging and a place to hang out at a pretty formative time in my life that made a deep impact on me and they would do these open mics there. And so I found myself bouncing between Open Mic at Samuels and then there’s other local little cafe in Schenectady and just getting a real taste for that open mic kind of thing. And that just dropped brought me to all kinds of different coffee houses and capital region. and having that kind of environment I got a sense of like what kind of defines a coffee house and
Maggie:
Yeah and
Rich:
Draws people to that kind of environment and then I just as I was growing up so that was like high school college, you know.
Maggie:
Wasn’t there a local coffee shop? We won’t say the name that you went to and you were you were like, this is what I don’t want to be. Or was that like later on?
Rich:
Yeah that factors into like my philosophy of of when I was going to start my own business. Got it how I would want to do that. It was not necessarily one coffee shop as much as like a pattern of behavior. I would say among Baristas or like people taking your order.
Maggie:
So did you one day were you the kind of guy who was like, I want to own my own business one day or I want to own a coffee shop one day or did you just wake up one day and say I think I’m gonna start a coffee shop.
Rich:
I literally never thought I would own a business.
Maggie:
Okay,
Rich:
It was not on my radar which is what makes me owning a business. So
Maggie:
Ironic.
Rich:
And crazy I think it was just a natural progression. It’s like looking back. It’s like okay
Maggie:
Said to before you were working for a tea shop.
Rich:
Yes, and
Maggie:
That sort of Kind of like
Rich:
Yeah, but that’s later on. That’s like the last step before going to do my own thing. So what I was gonna say is like looking back now, it’s like okay obviously and with the stories, I was just telling it’s like, all right, the natural directory of my life was maybe that I was gonna open my own coffee shop just because I grew up in a coffee shop, you know. and and that was so meaningful to me as a younger person so that when I when the opportunity presented itself in a sense, it was like, okay I could do that because I was familiar enough with it. But it was not something that I was on a totally different career path. I was in college Ministry for four years. which I loved and and but the time came just a part ways with that. Over in 2017 and that just left me in a place where I was like I could do I could kind of do anything. I mean I got to pay some bills, but I don’t have career prospects because I didn’t graduate college. I don’t have business acumen. I don’t. Have this this job or career that I was just doing so. What do I want to do? What could I do and up till that point? You know, I think the 2017 we got married in 2013 my wife and I so it was like You know some things were already settled and stable in my life. She had a good job, so we one something I have something I noticed was we would always kind of throw around that idea of like we would see a place for instance like walking around be like, that’d be a cool coffee shop. And and so I had this idea in the back of my mind of like what a coffee shop. space could be like and you know, I could kind of picture myself. Doing that but there was no plan or even real intent to do it. It just kind of was something that we had found ourselves throwing out there enough that when We came to a certain point it was like well, you know Schenectady doesn’t really have any super cool coffee shops going on like the ones that we are really enjoying in Albany and Troy we were living in Albany at the time. So it was like well, maybe maybe we could do this and then some money materialized
Maggie:
At a thin air.
Rich:
Yeah, I mean Christine got a Bonus at work and it was is decent enough to like ask ourselves. Like well is this worth? You know
Maggie:
Pursuing
Rich:
Pursuing and we were living in Albany. So many little details here. This episode’s gonna be a part two for sure. We were living in Albany and
Maggie:
But you’re from Scotia.
Rich:
Yes. So that’s what I was gonna say is my parents were still living in Scotia that whole time, you know, so we’re driving back to Scotia all the time to go see my parents and just hang out whatever and there was a a building a very specific building in town that had been vacant for a number of years that I thought was in a good location and like had maybe some old charm and I was like that could be an interesting place to do if a coffee shop could work in Scotia. It could be right there and And there’s more to say about why I would be why I would be very specific about choosing a location in Scotia for a coffee shop. Something that this will come out in the bad but later on as I talk more about story. I can’t get into these details, but the point is like there had been a succession of coffee shops in town. Since the time I was in high school, so yeah from we’re talking 2007 to 2014. There were three different coffee shops. But the thing was they all occupied the same space in town. So when we start thinking about a coffee shop the natural question be like why is your situation gonna be better than these other people who didn’t work out and I was like because there’s a few things again details. But yeah, there’s a few things in place for me in 2017 that weren’t in place even as far back as when the last one closed in 2014 let alone when he started in 2000. ten, so Just I just was very thoughtful about the process and so I was looking out. And I and I thought that one spot could could work out. So that’s what drew me to Scotia and particular I think before that I had been thinking about okay, where could we do something like this and I was thinking about places where there wasn’t already like. a presence of good coffee because like I said, there were some cool places in Albany already cool places in Troy and they were really leading the way. for What I call a more modern coffee approach the more modern approach to coffee that is sort of characterizing what we call Specialty coffee or third wave coffee not to use buzzwords. Yeah, just to say like
Maggie:
That
Rich:
Is a pretty modern. Within the last 10 to 15 years kind of movement and coffee. versus the old school like coffee house kind of kind of vibe and I found myself drawn to these newer. Modern kinds of places but there was nothing like it in Schenectady. No one was like making good quality coffee with espresso preparation dialed the way that that it should be and so I knew that and I was like well, maybe we could do this over and it’s connected where it’s our home base. I’m familiar, etc, etc. And But I was looking around like Guilderland Rotterdam like where could this work? And then it just it just kind of LED back to Scotia.
Maggie:
There’s a cool video about that that you had in your campaign of you like driving around the Kickstart. Yeah. Yeah, we should put that up there somewhere on our website for people to see yeah actually tells the story of storied. and you get to see our little village and you get to like point out. It’s kind of cool.
Rich:
Yeah. Yeah, you’re an Insider. There’s cool little moments in there. Yeah. We did it. That’s something I think we should definitely talk about in the future
Maggie:
For sure
Rich:
For a lot of reasons. I mean, it’s part of the story of storied and we had a good experience doing a Kickstarter. Inviting our community to join with us to get storied open, but also, you know kickstarters are cool Avenue for starting stuff. So I’d love to to put that out there in the future and let people know about it. And yeah, we can definitely the other videos just included
Maggie:
With
Rich:
With that process. So yeah, I don’t know there’s so much I could say the point that I like making is you know storied kind of came out of nowhere for me. It wasn’t my long-term Vision. I didn’t want to I didn’t go to school. They’re gonna be a business owner I studied. I studied liberal arts and philosophy in a very non-traditional. On a very non-traditional timeline and I didn’t graduate with a bachelor’s degree. I sit before you. a proud holder of Simply an associate’s degree which you know, nothing against that I’m I’m six credit short of of that bachelor’s degree for a very specific reason but but the point is like I’m five years into owning my own business and I didn’t.
Maggie:
That’s a college experience in another
Rich:
School of Hard Knocks, you know. I got so much to say about that the business School of Hard Knocks. So yeah, I don’t know there’s there’s a lot of different ways to focus on that question, but Like you were saying before I think what made me think I could open a coffee shop was you mentioned the tea shop that I worked for. So when I when I finished that Ministry career at that time 2017, I I worked for six months for a local tea and bubble tea shop that was definitely out of my element because I’m more of a coffee person but it was a cool experience, but it was a small family-owned business. I think at that time it was maybe four years old and they were crushing it. They’re still rocking now. Of
Maggie:
My shout out.
Rich:
Shout out to short and stout tea. We actually shortened out Tea Company. We actually use their tea in our at storied all of our loose leaf teas come from them as well as when we make our bubble tees our milk teas in the shop. We’re always using short and style Loosely if teas as our as our tea base that we we Brew so nice stories on short and style dude. You heard it here first. So I worked there and I went into that kind of knowing like I’m kind of interested in maybe doing my own thing eventually, but again, no timeline could have been any amount of time in the future and it turned out to be less than a year later that we would decided.
Maggie:
Wow
Rich:
That it would it would really snap into place. But while I was working there I had this really pivotal experience where I got to see kind of behind the scenes of how just some of the Dynamics of how business. operates a small restaurant how it works and I would I had the I had the like just the opportunity to go to there’s a local like restaurant supply store. And working for this company. I was one of the employees that got to go to the store which I love little stuff like that but I got to go there and and do shopping for the shop. But while I was there, I would see people that I knew from all these other coffee shops and restaurants. and I was like, oh man, all these fancy food places are just getting their stuff at the local like The local restaurant store. It’s all the same. It’s all the same stuff. It’s just it’s just what you do with it, you know
Maggie:
Package differently.
Rich:
Yeah
Maggie:
At their store. Yeah branded differently.
Rich:
Totally totally.
Maggie:
So like peeled back the current I
Rich:
Could yes. It was like man. This isn’t actually that crazy of an idea. Everyone’s kind of Getting their stuff from the same places and once I realized stuff like that where it was. It was like this. There’s kind of like these these proven methods these patterns to these kinds of things and it doesn’t take I mean, there’s numbers involved and all that stuff and I’ve I’m you know, I’ve learned that along the way. but it really yeah, it made it all seem more accessible to me than I ever would have thought the the intimidating idea of you know owning a business. running a coffee shop It it’s sort of became as as I got more familiar with that environment and again the familiarity with the processes and the behind the scenes that made it all start to feel more accessible to me despite whatever limitations I might have had educationally or or whatever else. And I think I’ve continued to to have similar experiences like that. As I’ve gone. So yeah, I don’t know they’re
Maggie:
Interesting. Yeah, we’ll have to have a part too
Rich:
A little bit of the story there.
Maggie:
To the leading up to the opening.
Rich:
Sure sure, you know, I have more questions for you. So I was like write them down. I was kind of thinking like man. I can have a whole episode just on on Maggie’s. career progression so
Maggie:
Yeah,
Rich:
Cool. Well, yeah, we do got to wrap up for time. But
Maggie:
You say
Rich:
Would say that again
Maggie:
I said, well you heard it here first.
Rich:
Yes. I’m fine with saying that sweet. Well, thanks for tuning in to this episode of House Coffee. We will return with part two part two of our past and present.
Maggie:
Are you part two in the next episode and a future episode?
Rich:
No next episode.
Maggie:
Okay next episode. Okay. Yeah for sure mentally prepare.
Rich:
Yeah, exactly. I don’t want to Wild fresh. We got to keep the questions
Maggie:
Right
Rich:
Word.
Maggie:
So next time. here