Working from a home office, I conduct most of my business meetings elsewhere. Meetings that involve people from the Heights community tend to get scheduled at a coffee shop.
And how lucky I feel to have so many choices. My personal preference is to conduct meetings over a table – in plentiful supply at Stone Oven on Lee – rather than slouching in the big, comfortable chairs at other places, like the Phoenix locations on Lee or Coventry.
Brew N’ Bistro at Fairmount Circle also gives good meeting, though it’s just far enough away from home that I don’t usually think about it unless I’m seeing someone who is coming from Beachwood or some other location to the East. Meetings with Shaker people often take place at Dewey’s on Shaker Square – though an increasing number 0f “outsiders” seem to enjoy coming to Lee Road these days.
I tend to avoid Starbucks at Cedar-Fairmount, even though it’s easy walking distance from the home office (a.k.a. World Headquarters). It’s noisy and crowded and you have to be willing to speak a silly language to place an order. And I simply favor the shops that are wholly owned by locals who are betting their entire livelihood on the community. But both of the nearby Starbucks locations (the other is a tiny shop in the Rockefeller Building at Mayfield and Lee) seem to do brisk business; I’m glad our community is such a hospitable place for merchants like these.
This morning I met with someone who arranged for us to talk at Luna Bakery, also at Cedar-Fairmount. I’ve been there several times since it opened last summer, but despite the amazing cookies and other baked goods it hasn’t yet worked its way into my morning-meeting routine. I’ll have to rectify that; the cooked breakfasts are delicious and affordable and, though seating is limited the atmosphere is comfortable.
But what a wealth of choices, all within a few minutes’ drive – or an easy bike ride when the weather is mild. Each has its own personality and its share of serious, repeat clients. For instance, a meeting at Stone Oven almost always means bumping into the entire membership of some working committee for some local non-profit.
Likewise, I always seem to bump into an old school friend at Phoenix.
There’s also the matter of pastry preferences, with the freshest coming out of the adjacent bakery at Luna; the most plentiful on display at Stone Oven (I’m a sucker for the Russian Tea Biscuits), and the worst being at, well … let’s just say that some big corporate bakery on a distant coast seems to favor items that have to be dunked in coffee to be eaten.
On The Rise Bakery at Fairmount and Taylor isn’t really a coffee shop. It’s a bakery with coffee. My schedule tends to place me there late in the day – when the best of the bakery has already been sold and the coffee is past its prime. But there is no better place to wait out my son’s music lessons, which are held on the second floor of the same building.
Back in my corporate days, I used to drink 5 or 6 cups of coffee before lunch. It’s what I did when I needed to take a break or didn’t feel like confronting the next task on the to-do list.
Now I’m not much of a coffee drinker at all. Just a few cups a week, strictly decaf and so much more enjoyable.
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