But it hasn't happened yet," Amanda said. "We thought we were really on the cusp of something huge.
"It worked out well for us."Īlmost five years later, the couple has proved their staying power, even as South Loop growth has been a process of fits and starts. Patrick's Day, the best day to open a coffee shop," Amanda said. That learning and growing came in ways not even they imagined at first, although consistent with their prevailing method of learning things for themselves and then passing it on to others.Īfter years of planning and then one last snag in the form of the " Snowpocalypse" blizzard, Overflow opened on March 18, 2011. It's about learning and growing together." "It's not just about making a quick buck or promoting our cause. "We need to grow the business side of ourselves," she said. "We just wanted to make a difference."Īmanda said she and her husband are "activists first and business people second. "We didn't focus on the profits or the money side," Brandon said.
The farmer gets a better deal, and the customer gets a better cup of coffee. Where they say the average Starbucks or even a so-called Fair Trade coffee shop uses a handful of middlemen in the process, for the Neelys the coffee goes directly from farmer to roaster to shop to customer. "We get it the next day after it's roasted and use it within two weeks," Amanda said. Overflow gets its coffee from a Bucktown roaster who deals directly with growers. The Neelys sought to pitch what they called "ethical economics" in each cup of coffee. "This location was kind of serendipitous," Brandon said, in that the disparate array of tenants actually wound up functioning like "roommates," lending support to one another. They eventually found space in the Daystar Center, a like-minded collective committed to "building community through culture and the arts in the South Loop," for which Amanda now serves as director. "We saw the potential that we could anchor ourselves here and further that development." "But there weren't a lot of businesses following suit, and there was no independent coffee shop in this area," she added. In 2007, the South Loop seemed on the verge of exploding with business opportunities.
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