Author Archives: Justine88

Posted on by

A good cup of joe wasn’t always easy to find in the Tampa Bay area.

By Justine Griffin for the Tampa Bay Times

buddy

A good cup of joe wasn’t always easy to find in the Tampa Bay area.

Take it from Billy Hutchings, a self-proclaimed coffee connoisseur. He has traveled all over the country for work and always stops to sample the local espresso.

“If you see a roaster in-house, that’s a telltale sign the coffee is going to be better than Starbucks,” Hutchings said Thursday from a couch inside Buddy Brew Coffee on Kennedy Boulevard in Tampa. “It’s all about the appreciation of the craft. The people here are taking the time to make this special cup for us.”

Similar to the craft beer movement that has exploded in Tampa Bay, locally roasted coffee is on the up-and-up. The people here demand a better cup of coffee, and they’re willing to go out of their way to find it.

“Coffee has its own culture now. Starbucks was so 2005. This next generation — the millennials — want their own identity when it comes to coffee,” said Brian Connors of Connors Davis Hospitality, a global food and beverage consulting firm in Fort Lauderdale. “Similar to wine, coffee nerds appreciate the taste. And they want their money to go back into a community they feel a part of.”

Read more here.

Posted on by

News Writer of the Year by Gatehouse Media

Justine Griffin was awarded the News Writer of the Year award for 2014 by Gatehouse Media, the parent company of the Herald-Tribune Media Group for the “Best of GateHouse 2014” awards, which included entries from newspapers across the media player’s hundreds of publications.

“Justine Griffin’s first-person report on egg harvesting is so different, so deep in detail, and such a good story that it alone pushes her to the top of a very competitive field. It’s a gutsy move to undergo a risky procedure and write about virtually every detail,” the judges said.

Third place in the projects category went to business writer Griffin for her first-person story about the pitfalls of egg donation, “The Cost of Life.”

Griffin also won second place for “Multimedia Journalist of the Year.”

Posted on by

The Cost of Life wins first place for general feature in 2014 Excellence-in-Features Awards

The Cost of Life won first place in a national 2014 Excellence-in-Features contest by the Society for Features Journalism today in the “general feature” division one category.

Judge’s comments: “This first-person, long-form narrative immediately s your attention. Plenty has been written about egg donation – the typical pieces about the cute college girls who are recruited to go through the process and the money they make. But this writer flipped it all on its ear and looked at the underbelly of a trend that sounds as though it can have only a happy ending but, in truth, can cause great physical harm. The author reminds us that this brave-new-world technology is not nearly as regulated as it should be – and that technology is not necessarily the answer to everyone’s prayers.”

Posted on by

Coffee company awarded spot at Tampa airport has history of financial troubles

coffee

By Justine Griffin for the Tampa Bay Times

Today, Herb Colvin runs a coffee stand inside a Hills­borough County Public Schools building, sells organic teas and coffees at farmers markets and other locales, and has a record of financial problems, including federal and state tax liens, evictions, a foreclosure and a bankruptcy.

By 2017, Colvin will have a $1.3 million stake in the restaurant operations of the $953 million renovation of Tampa International Airport. His Bay Coffee & Tea Company is the minority partner in one of the 11 concessionaire groups that won highly sought-after spots to sell food and goods at the airport.

A Dun & Bradstreet credit evaluation of Bay Coffee puts it in a ”higher risk” category for making late payments and suggests a credit limit of $20,000. The report was provided to the Tampa Bay Times by an airport consultant who works with another Tampa concessionaire, George Tinsley Sr. Tinsley lost a bid for a spot in TIA’s concessions lineup and has filed a protest regarding the win by Colvin and his partner.

Colvin and his partner scored a 91.3 out of 100 for their proposal, the highest bid in their group by 6.4 points based on the overall concept, layout, experience, business plan and the potential to generate revenue for the airport. But an airport spokeswoman acknowledged that officials there did not conduct any analysis of Colvin’s finances.

Read more here.

Posted on by

EXCLUSIVE: First Watch to buy The Egg & I restaurants

bilde

By Justine Griffin

MANATEE COUNTY – Like nearly all other industries, the restaurant business has metamorphosed through the years.

Some national and regional chains are feeling the push to compete with small businesses, as millennials and Generation X consumers flock to support hole-in-the-wall eateries within their communities that reach a younger customer through robust social media presence and online apps.

First Watch Restaurants, the Manatee County-based chain of breakfast, brunch and lunch cafes, also has evolved through the years to meet the demands of these new customers.

This year, First Watch introduced a new urban layout in restaurants across the country, including two sites in Florida: Largo and Estero.

The “urban farm” design is bright, colorful and modern. The build-out looks like something you’d see on a busy street in a bigger metro area than Sarasota.

“The new concept is more in line with the customer First Watch is targeting,” said Darren Tristano, executive vice president of Technomic, a food research firm based in Chicago. “It’s not fancier, but it plays on freshness and the importance of being local.”

Read more here. 

Sidebar:

First Watch evolves to attract younger customers: Like nearly all other industries, the restaurant business has metamorphosed through the years. Some national and regional chains are feeling the push to compete with small businesses, as millennials and Generation X consumers flock to support hole-in-the-wall eateries within their communities that reach a younger customer through robust social media presence and online apps. Read more here.