Brooklyn · United States
Cafe Grumpy
Cafe Grumpy is one of 7 Brooklyn roasters tracked on day9, in New York.
Since 2005 · Caroline Bell, Chris Timbrell
Overview
Cafe Grumpy was founded in 2005 in Greenpoint, Brooklyn by married couple Caroline Bell and Chris Timbrell, who opened with a hospitality background and an Australian finance day-job respectively before going full-time after the second Chelsea cafe (2007). The company began roasting in-house in 2009, expanded to a Greenpoint roastery with a 15kg Probat L12 and 45kg G45, and is certified as a Women-Owned Business Enterprise by NYC.
Known for
- Greenpoint flagship cafe used as Ray's coffee shop on HBO's Girls
- WBE-certified — independently owned and woman-led
- Roasts in-house since 2009 on Probat L12 (15kg) and G45 (45kg)
- First specialty cafe to take over a Grand Central Terminal Starbucks location (2014)
- Limited Wi-Fi and laptop policy at certain locations to encourage conversation
Why it matters
Cafe Grumpy is the most public-facing chapter of the early NYC third-wave story — predating Joe Coffee and Stumptown's NYC arrival, and providing an unusually grounded counterweight to the male-dominated founder narrative of US specialty. The Grand Central takeover symbolically marked the moment when independent specialty became viable real-estate competition for Starbucks in marquee NYC locations.
Production
- roaster machine
- Probat L12 (15kg) and Probat G45 (45kg)
- roastery location
- Greenpoint, Brooklyn (former flower warehouse adjacent to original cafe)
Café
This roaster operates a café.
Recognitions
- NYC-certified Women-Owned Business Enterprise