Throughout its 10 years, R&R Coffee CafÈ in Black Forest has changed locations, evolved its menu, added staff and survived the devastating fire of 2013.One thing that hasn’t changed: a quest for excellence.”Sort of the mental space I’ve always had with this place is the next cup we serve is better than the cup we did before,” said owner Ryan Wanner. “It’s just that constant mental state of what can we tweak to make it just that much better. We do that on the food and the drink side of things.”Wanner opened R&R in March 2008, across the street from its current location. In the beginning, the business included just Wanner, his mother-in-law, who prepared from-scratch pastries, and a friend of hers.R&R crossed the road to 11424 Black Forest Road in early 2013, more than tripling its space. Today, Wanner has a dozen employees. (His mother-in-law still works there a couple of days a week, and he handles the rest of the baking.) And R&R has an alluring breakfast and lunch menu, from omelets and cinnamon roll French toast to burgers, soups and salads. Wanner looks to local sources for everything he can.Although menu offerings were limited by the tight quarters in the initial space, “We realized very quickly that coffee alone wasn’t going to fly,” Wanner said.On the coffee side, Wanner has worked steadily to improve the roast quality.Initially, he said, “We had a lot of air style roasting. (While that produces) perfectly fine coffee, it’s just that you hit upper limits on what you’re able to do with quality after a while.” Since switching to a vintage Diedrich roaster about a year ago, he said the coffee quality has just ìskyrocketed.îWanner, age 41, developed his interest in roasting when he was a student at the University of Northern Colorado in Greeley, where he received barista training while helping a friend open a coffee shop. “It just hooked me,” he said.Before opening R&R, he worked at another Black Forest coffee shop that went out of business. “When they closed up there, I bought all the roasting equipment from them.”Operating a business in the heart of Black Forest has its challenges, Wanner said. Starting a business is tough enough, ìBut adding in a limited market location like this makes it that much more difficult.” Despite that, he said R&R has seen year-over-year growth most years.About half of R&R’s customers are regulars, he said. “Word of mouth has always been our No. 1 source of advertising here.”One tool that helps draw business: social media. “I can tell on the weeks we don’t post on Facebook, our numbers slow in here,î Wanner said.One challenge he and fellow business owners have discussed is how to reap benefits from the new homes and continuing development at the north end of Black Forest.”We get our fair share of people coming up from there, but I think we could be pulling in more,î Wanner said.What has he learned from a decade in business?”Sleep is highly rated,” he said, with a laugh, referring to the many hours required of a small-business owner.More seriously, he added, “It’s just that I never have all the answers. There’s always something new to learn, there’s always something new I can be doing, there’s always something we can refine.”
