A coffee shop is a great business for almost any size community. A great little shop can be opened in a walk-through business district, on a busy street or in a cozy small town beach community.

Coffee is popular on college campuses for students cramming for tests, for young adults staying up all night gaming or corporate America pulling all nighters. Policemen, soldiers sailors and security guards all use coffee to get through the late shift without falling asleep.

Coffee is ideal for some very sound business principles:
- Coffee is inexpensive on a per unit sold basis;
- The market supports high profit margins;
- There is high demand for the product across age, economic and social demographics;
- The product is consumable with a high rate of repeat business.

Most people are aware of the high cost of coffee. Even generic or common brands of coffee cost about five dollars per pound to purchase at this time and will likely be more expensive in the future.

Premium blends are far more expensive. Hawaiian Kona coffees are only grown in volcanic soil in the islands and exported to the mainland.

The current most expensive coffee is called Kopi Luwat. It is a special coffee been that has been recovered after id has passed through the digestive track of an Indonesian tree dwelling primate called a Civet.

Only a few hundred pounds are harvested per year and most of those are consumed in Japan. Rarely a hundred pound bag makes it to the US, even less often in Europe.

None of that impacts a startup coffee shop. The entrepreneur needs to secure a few hundred pounds of more reasonably priced coffee. A steady source of water and a good brewing machine and you're almost ready for business.

Coffee has a universal appeal. Originally discovered in Africa in the highlands of Ethiopia, coffee spread to Europe from the Muslim world. The effects of caffeine were noticed from the beginning.

Flavoring the coffee with honey, milk or spices removed some of the bitterness without affecting the stimulating effects. Coffee was the second most popular drink in the world after tea until the 19th century. Americans switched to coffee early in its history when the British cut off access to tea imports.

Coffee fueled the westward migration and kept the men alert on long cattle drives. City workers needed the boost to keep operating under difficult conditions as the Industrial Revolution drove increasing demand.

The pace of work hardly slacked through the following decades. With the exception of the Great Depression the nation grew at a rapid pace. The demands of WWII required work around the clock. Coffee kept workers on double shift functioning.

The relentless demand for coffee has not faded; if anything it has grown. For a time there was fear that the incredible spread of a chain Coffee Corporation from Seattle might put small businesses out of business. That fear has yet to be substantiated as small local coffee houses have survived well just a few doors down.

A large chain cannot provide local flavor or a hometown feel. The big chain also discourages lingering patrons while a start up business can provide comfortable reading space and meeting areas.

For the entrepreneur the simple inventory, the ease of operation and long-term outlook for demand makes a coffee shop a good place to start.

Learn more about this author, Morgan Johnson.
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