Coffee beans and bikes: A match made on the road
It does not take a super alert person to notice the amount of bike shops that have been popping up all over Melbourne and no doubt Australia.
It is now almost as common as a bank…or even a café.
Cafes and cyclists. Who would have thought they would be so well suited. Years ago, when biking was a sport that people pursued on the weekend, often in large groups, often on ocean roads, I guess the done thing might have been to stop off at a café along the way. Living in St Kilda I would often notice these hoards of bikers appearing on a Sunday, and then stopping in unison at the Café Racer on the Esplanade for a shot of espresso or a café latte. That was years go and Café Racer was a one-ff as far as I knew. In fact, most people who frequented the place weren’t even cyclists – the coffee was just great.
Today, coffee and bike riding go hand in hand like nothing else and it seems no one can stop this love affair. In Melbourne alone we could rattle off half a dozen cafes that have decided to introduce their lovely coffee beans to the bikes next door. And walla! A coffee shop with a workshop in tact is born, ready to see to all your caffeine and cycling needs in one! Could it be said, using that good old philosophy of logic, that if fido is a dog and fido likes bones and all dogs like bones then fido likes bones? Is that how this marriage came about? Do you even think there was that much thought involved? Perhaps it was an issue of economics. Perhaps two friends were talking and one wanted to open up a café while the other one dreamed of opening up a bike shop. So they got talking and realised they could rent a space and share the costs!
A coffee shop that fixes bike – why didn’t we think of it ourselves? And there you have it. Two people’s dreams coming true instantly. The waft of freshly roasted coffee beans merged with the grease of oil and rubber. Perfect!
Well, even if you don’t quite agree there are many people all over Melbourne in full support of the union between coffee beans and bike spokes. I guess if you think about it, cars have been hanging out at cafes for ages as well, it’s just that they haven’t taken that extra step and asked to stay the night…