There is an area of town next to our house that is characterized by nothing but empty lot after empty lot. So when a new condo conversion with shops on the bottom started up in one of the few remaining buildings left on the street, we were naturally excited. Even more excitement when a sign went up in the window saying there was a coffee shop coming soon.

The excitement began to wane as the year crawled by and there seemed to be no progress on the shop. The windows were papered over, so you couldn’t see in the inside. Finally we were forced to conclude that the economy had claimed another victim and the coffee shop was a dud.

No so! Last week the Robust Coffee Lounge opened for business. So obviously we had to go over and take a peek.

The place is huge! There is lots and lots of seating. I had a chance to talk with the owners while we were there, so I got some inside information. Their idea was to create a space where people would hang out (hence the “lounge” in their name), so they wanted to make sure they had plenty of space.

We popped in extremely early on Sunday morning, around 7 or so, and ran into 2 other families with little kids. I don’t know if this means the place is especially kid friendly, or if it means that only people with little kids are out of the house before 7. Either way, kids were not a problem.

They have a full menu of sandwiches etc., which I am excited to try. However, if I had any quibble with the place, it was that the bakery section was a little underwhelming. We were in the market for a flavored coffee and a quick breakfast, and we didn’t find much. They had a few muffins and other standard fare, but they were pretty expensive for what they had. One notable exception were the cupcakes from Brown Sugar Bakery, which we are familiar with from the farmer’s market. The cupcakes are good and I’m really glad to see they went with a local company over a national chain of some sort. However, we weren’t looking for cupcakes.

Anyway, if you’re in the neighborhood, please support this business! The owners seemed to be counting on a lot of business from students once school started back up. Perhaps I’ve lived in the neighborhood a little longer, or perhaps I am just cynical, but I don’t think they are counting on the bias against us from our neighbors to the North. It will take a lot of convincing on their part to convince students to walk down there.

We’ll see. But either way, it would be great to have a successful business there. The other shops are empty, but the owners of Robust told me that since they’ve opened a lot of interest has been generated about the other shops. Seeing a thriving coffee shop makes the rest of the property more valuable (seriously, every time I’ve been by Robust, it has been hopping).

This is the kind of place that can really turn a block around.