Two years in the past, espresso entrepreneur Kavia Simmons thought she had fallen into the right alternative to take her on-line retailer, I Love My Espresso Black, to the subsequent degree as a espresso bar contained in the Save A Lot at 832 W. 63rd St.
Amid guarantees of hiring community-based and Black distributors, retailer proprietor Yellow Banana mentioned she may use existing cafe area in its former Entire Meals constructing.
The Ohio-based firm supplied the Auburn-Gresham native a low-risk, low-cost alternative: She’d pay them 5% of her store’s month-to-month gross sales in trade for utilizing the area, in addition to gear Whole Foods left behind in 2022.
However Simmons has since walked away from the deal, disgusted, after spending hundreds on stock. Her espresso bar by no means opened for enterprise.
The 38-year-old blames Yellow Banana, saying the corporate didn’t preserve its finish of the deal to offer working web and gear after which stopped responding when she spoke up. She describes a chaotic state of affairs through the 16 months she confirmed as much as prep for opening and run her on-line enterprise.
“I don’t even know why I stayed so long as I did,” mentioned Simmons, who lastly gave up on the deal final summer season. “I assume it’s as a result of I really did put my model on the road, and I sort of began to really feel like they used me to make themselves look higher at a time when nobody actually needed them there.
“After which as soon as issues didn’t go proper, I simply acquired ghosted like everyone else.”
Yellow Banana was chosen by town of Chicago in a 2023 redevelopment settlement to renovate and reopen six different grocery shops in areas with few contemporary meals choices on the South and West sides. The Englewood retailer — for which Yellow Banana obtained $250,000 and discounted lease — is separate from the deal that promised $20 million in public cash to the corporate if it renovates six shops and meets sure metropolis requirementsby March 31.
The corporate has faced significant problems, because the Solar-Occasions has documented, together with racking up $2 million in unpaid payments because it misplaced management of dozens of shops elsewhere. Six-figure lawsuits have been filed starting in fall 2023 in Ohio.
Residents protested Yellow Banana’s arrival in Englewood as a low-quality buying expertise.
Neither a Yellow Banana spokeswoman nor CEO Joe Canfield — who signed Simmons’ lease — returned requests for remark.
Simmons launched her area of interest espresso firm in 2019, promoting flavor-infused beans, roasted domestically, as a heart-healthy option to take pleasure in espresso with out including sugar and cream.
The partnership with Save A Lot got here to Simmons by means of Stivers Espresso, the place Simmons nonetheless works.
“I believed it was nice. … I used to be actually excited as a result of it gave me a possibility to go from on-line to brick and mortar with low overhead,” mentioned Simmons, who additionally thought of a meals truck as a smart subsequent step.
The 150-square-foot walk-up bar would serve espresso, tea, smoothies and pastries in what Simmons describes as a “prime location within the entrance of the shop.”
Yellow Banana’s year-long lease, signed in March 2023, gave Simmonssix months lease free to get began in its “first-class grocery retailer.” She spent the primary 5 months attempting to get licenses, which acquired delayed, she mentioned, as a result of the ice maker and different supplied gear hadn’t been maintained and failed inspections.
The lease assured utilities and web, however Simmons mentioned the corporate didn’t pay the web invoice, so her cost system couldn’t function. At occasions, the warmth didn’t work both. A metropolis inspector flagged low water temperature in sinks twice in 2023, inspection studies present. Simmons emailed Canfield in September 2023 to inform him the shop’s plumber broke her espresso machine.
In the meantime, Simmons watched the shop get stocked with groceries and emptied forward of failed openings. She counts about six retailer managers after the doorways opened to the general public in Might 2023. In March 2024, Chicago officers cited the shop for working and not using a legitimate enterprise license.
Different potential native distributors toured the area however by no means finalized contracts.
“All I do know in my conversations with them was, they have been very respectable individuals,” mentioned Chicago chef Cliff Rome, proprietor of Peach’s Restaurant. “It was going to be a consulting partnership. It by no means took off. They have been coping with a lot with the neighborhood. We thought, allow them to get their issues collectively and get their sea legs out. Nevertheless it by no means occurred.”
The exception was Dion’s Chicago Dream, which provides fresh produce for shoppers in lockers inside the shop.
By February 2024, Simmons mentioned Canfield had stopped responding to her messages about renewing the expiring lease, returning keys and reimbursing license charges Canfield fronted.
However earlier than she moved her stuff out final summer season from an workplace upstairs and the cafe, she mentioned she wanted to determine the right way to get the shop’s elevator to work.
“I learn the elevator guide,” Simmons mentioned. “It took me seven days, and I figured it out.”
