CoCo Reflections from Michael Marchant:
This Week’s CoCo: Clean the Corners
My two younger brothers and I were raised by a single working Mom. She did her best to keep up with our laundry, dishes, and to pick up after the tornado that is having to share a living space with three mini dead-eyed maniacs. We treated the living room like a wrestling ring, the hallways were impromptu basketball courts, every bed a trampoline.
Being the oldest child in a single parent household, I naturally had taken on more chores than the typical kid. I remember being as young as 9 years old when I started asking “Santa” for a Dirt Devil handheld vacuum every Christmas. I’m still not sure why “Santa” didn’t take this request seriously, but I digress.
Each summer, aside from my usual list of chores, I would surprise my family by rearranging every piece of furniture in our living room. Mom would head off to work and I would send my brothers outside to play. I’d begin by dusting and vacuuming every surface of the current configuration. Then I would drag the couch, end tables, chairs, and entertainment system piece by piece out of the living room and into the hallway. There was usually a wealth of “missing items” that were underneath the furniture, toys my brothers thought they lost forever, enough pocket change to play the Final Fight arcade game on our next trip to Shopko. If I was lucky I’d occasionally find a Little Debbie still in its packaging and MIRACULOUSLY NOT MELTED!!! I’d collect all of these treasures, remove wall hangings, do another vacuum of the empty space and wipe the disturbing number of hand AND foot prints off of the walls. Mini. Dead-eyed. Maniacs.
I’d look at the empty living room and think about what I wanted to do differently. I began replacing the items back into the room in their new configuration. Later that day, my family would find themselves walking into a reimagined living space. My brothers would feign surprise for a moment before returning to that tornado brother lifestyle, but Mom— Mom would always be enthusiastic and encouraging of my bonus chore and welcomed the change of scenery. I’m grateful to her for allowing me to do it because it has followed me into adulthood.
You’d be surprised how effective changing your scenery can be to gaining a new perspective. Even just tidying up can be a good way to see things differently. Seek out the details in your spaces, welcome change, and rearrange.
Next Week’s CoCo: Create Remarkable Care
To “create remarkable care” might be an abstract notion to some, but it is essentially about making meaningful connections.
Now, I do not think I am qualified to specifically instruct you on how to make meaningful connections with the people in your lives, much less the strangers that you might interact with on a daily basis. There’s no road map to get you there; the journey is different for everyone. So allow me to paint in broad strokes here and hopefully it will lead you in the right direction.
You have everything to gain by being true to who you are. Allow the good in you to be seen and allow yourself to observe the good in others. Develop a genuine curiosity about the people you encounter. Make friends and be a friend.
CoCo Heroes:
- Clean the Corners: Our “Clean the Corners” Core Commitment Hero comes from the Cafe Coach group – A very special Hero Shoutout to Brian Koznarek and Lauren Huskins for their hard work and collaboration with our Shorewood and Tech teams to successfully reopen Shorewood Cafe! Brian and Lauren rallied everyone around them and worked together to prepare every corner of the remodeled Shorewood Cafe to ensure it was sparkling clean, organized and ready to welcome customers and coworkers. Thanks, Brian and Lauren!
- Create Remarkable Care: Our “Create Remarkable Care” Core Commitment Hero comes from the Cafe Coach group – Happy Musonda!! Happy has many talents, and the care and positivity he extends to his coworkers and customers is truly remarkable. Happy goes out of his way to create remarkable care to everyone around him, and encourages his coworkers to do the same. Thank you, Happy!!
Coffee Talk: Cream City
- What’s in this coffee? Where is it from?
- 50% light roast Colombia, 50% medium roast Colombia.
- How long have we been working with this partner?
- We source this lot of Colombian coffee from Cofinet. We’ve been partners with them for over 2 years.
- How does this roast affect the flavor experience?
- The light roast brings a nice citric acidity, whereas the medium roast brings a smooth mouthfeel. When blended, these coffees harmonize perfectly together.
- Why does it have this name?
- We love Milwaukee so much that we dedicated a coffee to it! It’s an homage to our hometown. It’s been our #1 selling coffee for as long as we’ve been around. We don’t have a “house blend,” but it’d be Cream City if we did.
Going-Ons:
- 7/8 Company Update: Did you miss the latest Company Update blog? Check it out here.
- Sunday Factory Tours: Have you been wanting to learn more about both Stone Creek Coffee’s Factory Cafe and our Farm to Cup mission? All SCC team members are welcome and encouraged to join one of our Sunday Factory Tours for free during their time with Stone Creek Coffee! Just email rperik@stonecreekcoffee.com or teams@stonecreekcoffee.com with your preferred tour date and time, first and last name, and email address to have a ticket sent directly to your email. Tour dates and times can be reviewed via Eventbrite.
- SCC Inclusion Survey: If you haven’t taken this survey yet, please do by tomorrow, July 19th! We are asking that each team member take a few minutes to complete our anonymous Inclusion Survey to help us celebrate what is going well and capture commitments for areas we can grow. Take the survey here.
- July 28 EDM Latte Art Throwdown: GET HYPED! The next Thursday Night Throwdown (TNT) will be an EDM theme. Invites and posters will be coming soon to cafes. Start talking this up and thinking about your schedules. Let’s Partay!!
Wins & Shout-outs:
Email the Employee Celebration Committee (celebrations@stonecreekcoffee.com) if you’d like to recognize or celebrate a teammate. Or if you want to make a public shout-out, email Val (vnewhouse@stonecreekcoffee.com) to include in the next Employee Newsletter!
Birthdays:
- 7/21 – Meghan Gross
- 7/22 – Justin Zambrano
- 7/24 – Arcadia Schmid
- 7/29 – Olivia Aponte
- 7/30 – Amy Balestrieri
Anniversaries:
- Kai Flores Komatsu – 1 year!
- Patricia Kovochich – 5 years!
- Brian Koznarek – 1 year!
- Bryan Kraft – 15 years!
- Andy Kubash – 1 year!
- Eli Miller – 1 year!
- Justin Miller – 3 years!
- Kara Moon – 5 years!
- Maya Oezer – 4 years!
- Molly Persin – 1 year!
- Marie Redding – 1 year!
- Domenic Serena – 1 year!
- Holly Sporek – 1 year!
- Mitch Stewart – 2 years!
- Margot Stonyte – 1 year!
- Karen Strange – 6 years!
- Margaret Tews – 3 years!
Welcomes:
- Destiny Williams (Bakery)
- Cole Kirkendall (Bakery)
- Zaida Ramirez (Downer Kitchen)
Employee Discount Codes:
Please don’t share these with non-employees
- 20% Employee-Only Website Coupon Code
- July: Jul22sccemp
- 40% Employee-Only Mobile App Coupon Code
- July: Jul22sccemp
Catch up on all of our newsletters, company updates, recipes, and more in our Employee Blog here.
Ways to Speak Up:
Do you want to speak up about ideas, thoughts, and more? Send an email to Teams & People (teams@stonecreekcoffee.com) or use the button below to send a note anonymously.