Tag Archives: Tampa Bay Times

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Teen apparel companies struggle to compete with low prices, fickle tastes

By Justine Griffin for the Tampa Bay Times

forever 21

Selling clothes and accessories to teenagers changes as quickly as a Snapchat message disappears.

Brand names come and go as the next hip chain emerges. Other retailers fall when they fail to keep up with the fast-paced nature of what’s trending with today’s selfie-taking youth.

H&M, a Swedish international apparel brand known for its discount prices on trendy clothing for young men and women, is one of the most popular brands to open in recent years, with stores in nearly every major mall in the Tampa Bay region.

A new wave of fresh teen-centric brands is lining up to take over the spaces of those that sputtered out before them.

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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.”

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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.

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