Business notebook: Wine-shop owner readies opening of coffee shop

As managing partner of Primo Brands, Keller Ford has dealt in high-end wines and spirits for years now.

So his new venture -- a coffee shop on the ground level of the Marquette Tower -- is a sort of natural progression, he said.

"I've been surprised at how similar coffee is to wine as far as flavor profiles," he said. "I think a lot of my experience in wines over the years translates to coffee."

The shop, called Baristas, is scheduled to open within the next month, he said.

Ford said at this point, renovations are down to the trim, painting and final tile work and setting up all the coffee equipment.

He and Rafe Camp, Primo Brands director of operations, are testing recipes for menu items.

"It will be typical cafe food," Ford said.

That means five or six breakfast items, muffins, pastries, as well as soups, sandwiches, and salads for lunch. And the menu will be all-day.

Baristas will open at 6 a.m. and close at 9 p.m., which Ford said is intended to accommodate the earliest-working customers, from business professionals to busy moms.

"If someone wants to have a breakfast sandwich at 8 o'clock at night, now they can have it," Ford said.

And, of course, "the whole bevy of coffee and drinks," he added.

Camp said every beverage will be handcrafted, from espresso to iced coffee to hot teas.

Camp trained restaurant employees for Ruby Tuesday for 15 years before teaming with Ford, or as he put it, coming "to the dark side."

"I'm happy to do it," he said. "Being able to start from scratch is always a good thing from the get-go."

He said that makes it easier to build a team that functions well together.

"It's not just the two of us here trying to get this up off the ground," Ford said.

And being part of the Marquette Tower's restoration is exciting, Ford said.

"It's wonderful to see this building be brought back to life," he said.

Plus, Camp said, there will be about 100 people working in the tower above them on any given day.

"That's just gonna be the icing on the cake," he said. "This tower and the tech district, it feels like the heartbeat of Cape. ... It's magical."

But renovating a space inside a historic building had its hurdles, Ford said. Several decisions, especially about signage and awnings, had to be "run up the ladder," he said.

But the resulting theme, with black-and-white diamond-accent tile and stone bar, is what Ford calls "the classic coffee shop of yesteryear. It's a little more old-school, Old World."

EBO opens clinic in Doctors Park

Essential Benefit Offerings has opened a clinic at 37 Doctors Park in Cape Girardeau.

The direct-access clinic allows patients to visit a physician, obtain lab results and fill generic prescriptions in one place.

EBO also offers TeleHealth services, connecting customers 24/7 by phone or video to primary care, pediatric, internal medicine, dermatology and mental-health physicians.

"The mission of EBO is to help health-care consumers to become better educated about resources available to them, the actual costs involved and how to keep more money in their pockets," EBO co-founder Tony Thompson said in a news release.

The company also plans to offer specialized diabetic services in the near future.

"EBO is putting common sense back into health care," co-founder Josh Stephens said.

tgraef@semissourian.com

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