DECATUR, Ga. — A new coffee shop is bringing a new experience to Decatur, mixing coffee, hip-hop and culture. Their new spot plans to have everything from an event center, tasting room, basketball court and lounge.
Dope Coffee's co-founder and chief product officer, Michelle Loyd, gave 11Alive's Paola Suro a tour of the place before its grand opening on February 18.
"We want you to have the time to make sure that you can experience not only what you're about to drink but where you're going," she said.
It's a unique concept, bringing three important elements for Loyd to life. Behind the barista counter, they grind specialty East African and Central American coffee, while through the speakers, customers can sometimes hear music created by Dope Coffee's CEO and produced by Dope Coffee's CMO.
Loyd said they put it all together under one roof because she said they have a lot in common, too.
"Coffee is usually misunderstood," she said. "People who talk about coffee or coffee shops present coffee in a way where it's filled with sugar or creams and it's seen as a dessert. When it comes to hip hop, a lot of it's either lost where it's confused with rap music, or it's not taken as seriously."
She said her mission is also represented in their products: from their coffee, creamers and syrups.
"With the products, just like with hip hop, they're built to nourish the community," she said. "I can't talk about hip hop without talking about our culture or coffee, for that matter. They're kind of one in the same. And if we're if we're uplifting our culture, then we're doing it right."
The concept started out as "Solar Cafe" in North Carolina. Loyd and her partner had two coffee shops there, which got hit by Hurricane Florence.
"With the tides changing, we had to move down to Atlanta and really needed to get our feet under us," she explained. "We really wanted to represent culture. We wanted to represent coffee in our own way, and we were born out of hip hop."
They moved to Atlanta and decided to start Dope Coffee in 2019. Then, the pandemic hit.
"Nobody was going anywhere. Nobody was coming to us," she said. "We literally had to launch our e-commerce brand without anyone seeing it. That was the hardest part, but it made us pivot hard to market ourselves online so that people would know who we are and why we're important."
She said it worked. Now, she says they're ready to thank the people who helped them online during those years, in-person.
"We've had so much support from people nationwide," she added. "The community has been a really big part of dope coffee and growing dope coffee. Not just for the love of coffee, but also for hip hop."
Their grand opening will be at their new location: 5360 Snapfinger Woods Drive in Decatur. It'll take place Saturday, February 18, from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m.
They will be featuring free tastings of some coffees, creamers and syrups. The CEO and rapper, Michael Loyd, along with the CMO and producer, will have a live show.
For more details, click here.