Where: 680 Mt Rose St. Reno,NV (775-329-2114)
Downtown Location: 50 W Liberty St. Reno,NV (775-329-3322)
"Bibo's? Is that the one near Mogul Mouse (A funny sounding ski shop
in Moana Lane)? I curiously asked Gayla who I was about to have
coffee with. "Umm, how about Starbucks at Kietzke?" I retorted, "
No, no you don't understand I want to show you this coffee
place. You'll like it. Trust me."
And with that assurance I half-heartedly complied to meet her at Bibo coffee house.
That happened a year ago. I've never been to any other coffee house ever since.
The
first thing I noticed with Bibo's is the variety of people that comes
there. This was no accident I later learned from the owner
"My wife and I wanted to create a place where people of shared or
varied interests could come together outside a bar or a club.
We've got Doctors, blue collar guys, artists, students, real estate
people, we have office meetings, we have
families. And that's really what we strive to create--a
gathering place." Paul Martin said.
Paul Martin was a golf
professional who lived at Tahoe with his wife Debbie for fifteen years. Then
moved to Reno and just "fell in love with the town."
I asked him how he got started with Bibo's:
"We were just trying to figure out how we can just make Reno even
better, even more of a place we wanted to be. So we started kind of
looking around figuring out things that matched my skills and something
that we could feel like was a contribution to Reno. And so we looked
around and came up with a coffee house. It was just a really good
match of a place where people of shared and varied interests could come together outside of a bar or a
club."
The place is also widely praised for it's urban-contemporary design yet not lacking in warmth. Paul sought out architect Jack Hawkins to accomplish this.
"It
was really important for us to keep a sense of Reno. We wanted to keep
the theme going with some original photos of Reno that
my wife's grandfather took back in the 30's and 40's and all those
things give us a sense of place, rather
than you know just anywhere U.S.A."
On one of my lazy
afternoons at Bibo's I met a lady who gladly explained to me why bibo's
coffee tastes much better. "Other franchised coffee houses over-roast
their beans to get the maximum aroma. Bibo's don't have to do
that simply because the beans are already top quality."
Paul
later explained to me the process "We source
out to really unique roasters with premium beans. What they do
is one of them travels to India every year to buy our espresso and
also our monsoon medley (*personal favorite). He goes directly to the
growers buying their best beans but he's also giving them the best
price. Then we deal with quality roasters who are going to roast those
beans."
"And
it's also about the small steps we do within the store. We get
coffee delivered once a week so it's always really fresh. We
don't grind before it's time. The grinding only takes place when
it's brewed, so it's always fresh and tasty.
So it's kind of all those things- it's the small steps.
And when the
guys are making their lattes, we don't hold milk. It's like if you
were going to make a latte or a cappuccino the milk is steamed for that
precise drink at that moment. And the espresso is pulled and ground at
that exact moment, it's not held over. It might take us a bit longer
but it's all those qualities assurance that kind of adds into it."
Now can anybody blame the author for making Bibo's my half-way home?
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