feb06b.indd


Linda M. LaPointe 

Coff ee anyone? 
How marketing classes helped develop a business plan 
for a college library café 

Images of a coffeehouse: poetry readings, political discussions, intellectual exchang­
es, quiet conversations, peaceful refl ections, 
and good laughs. Where do these images of 
coffeehouses come from? Bookstore cafés, 
60s coffeehouses filled with Beatniks, the 
Central Perk coffeehouse on the television 
show Friends, our family’s kitchen table, or 
perhaps all of the above! 

But would these coffeehouse images ap­
ply to a café in a college library? Would a 
café change students’ traditional images of 
the library as a solitary place? Would it foster 
intellectual conversations? Would someone 
dare a belly laugh? Would the ambience of 
a comfortable environment encourage learn­
ing on the conversational level? At Moravian 
College, we answered with the question, 
“Why not?” 

Invading the halls of silence 
Library literature in the late 20th and early 
21st centuries refers to different models of 
functioning library cafés. These models vary 
from place to place but a central theme is one 
of recreating the image of the library from 
a solitary, quiet place to a more welcom­
ing and appealing center. The concept of a 
relaxing area that permits and even encour­
ages drinking, eating, and talking—activities 
traditionally taboo in libraries—is appealing 
to college and university administrators as 
well as librarians who aim to change the role 
of the library. After all, computers invaded 
the sacred halls of silence beginning in the 
late 1980s, why not coffee? 

Reeves Library, the library of Moravian 
College and Moravian Theological Semi­

nary, developed a unique way to establish 
a library café. In 1992, the college expanded 
the library, thereby adding opportunities for 
use of new space. One of these spaces was 
in the lower­level periodicals area, complete 
with floor­to­ceiling windows and views of 
a lush green lawn. Initially hidden behind 
makeshift offices and periodical stacks, 
this area, once uncovered, seemed to be 
the perfect place to try something new—a 
coffee shop. 

As fellow coffeehouse innovators at 
Moravian and I now well know, the process 
of opening a library café is daunting because 
most academic librarians are not trained 
in business models. Although academic 
librarians manage budgets, how would a 
staff of librarians translate their budgeting 
experience into a marketing plan, even if 
they had the time to develop one? If your 
library is lucky, like ours was, destiny steps 
in and a marketing professor walks through 
your door and proposes a wonderful solu­
tion: have his marketing classes develop a 
marketing/business plan as a service learn­
ing project. 

A class project 
During his orientation tour of the library, I 
met a new marketing professor, Gary Kas­
kowitz, and learned that he incorporates au­
thentic assessment assignments and service 

Linda M. LaPointe is technical services, serials and 
systems librarian at Moravian College and Moravian 
Theological Seminary, e-mail: lapointe@moravian. 
edu. 
© 2006 Linda M. LaPointe 

February 2006  97 C&RL News 



The concept of a relaxing area 
that permits and even encourages 
drinking, eating, and talking— 
activities traditionally taboo in 
libraries—is appealing to college 
and university administrators as 
well as librarians who aim to change 
the role of the library. After all, 
computers invaded the sacred halls 
of silence beginning in the late 
1980s, why not coff ee? 

learning projects into his classrooms. 
These  types of assignments r equir e 
students to develop marketing plans 
for real situations that exist within their 
communities. 

As I described the vision of a library 
café, bells within both of our heads started 
ringing and collectively we decided that 
Kaskowitz would design a class project 
in which students would develop a mar­
keting plan for the library café complete 
with targeted customers, cost projections, 
demographic statistics, and marketing 
strategies. After several brainstorming and 
organizational sessions with Kaskowitz, we 
decided to try to bring a real­life learning 
opportunity to his marketing students and 
provide the librarians with a plan to start 
a café. 

Although our work did not follow the 
normal form of faculty–librarian collabora­
tion (the norm being the librarian teach­
ing reference skills to a faculty member’s 
research class), we embarked on a joint 
adventure. 

Prior to collaborating with Kaskowitz, 
the librarians and I had developed several 
goals and taken some actions. Because 
the library wanted to reap the profi ts from 
coffee sales and use the monies on other 
projects, the library staff agreed to manage 
the café. This was a key decision because 
although the college administration sup­
ported the café in theory, they could not 
fund our café. 

Besides obtaining administrative ap­
proval, we also arranged an agreement 
with the college’s food service vendor 
(with exclusive rights to provide food on 
campus) over the opening of a café beyond 
their scope. Further, we developed designs 
for the café that would distinguish it from 
the rest of the library, which included 
comfortable furniture, tables, and Internet 
access for cyber­café seating. 

And finally, the library staff decided 
to uphold the ethics of fair trade by con­
tracting only with coffee vendors who 
purchased directly from farmers and who 
paid the farmers a fair price for their 
product. 

As a fall 2003 term project, the stu­
dents enrolled in Kaskowitz’s classes 
were assigned to create a marketing 
plan for the library coffee shop. As the 
library’s liaison, I attended the classes 
and represented the library’s goals, previ­
ous café work, and interests. Following 
my presentations, the students asked 
clarifying questions. At the end of the 
class sessions, I provided the students 
with my contact information, and over 
time, my office was frequently visited by 
students with questions and plans. 

Upon completion of the projects, the 
seven groups of student teams presented 
their café marketing plans to me, their 
client, over four class sessions. After the 
formal presentations, I had the opportunity 
to question each group, thereby affording 
me an inside view to their business­ori­
ented approach. 

The enthusiasm surrounding the stu­
dents and their presentations sticks out in 
my memory. For example, one group de­
veloped a promotional video and another 
group printed t­shirts with a café name and 
logo for its presentation. 

At the end of the semester, I received 
a printed copy of each plan. Through my 
exploration of the plans, I was able to 
incorporate many of their ideas into the 
library café. The groups’ ideas ranged from 
the practical, such as purchasing and dis­

C&RL News February 2006  98 



playing student artwork in the café, to the 
less practical for our specific context, such 
as selling enough coffee to go national. 
In the end, one unexpected, but extremely 
important benefit occurred: we were selected 
as the recipients of the “Senior Class Gift” 
donation. Several of the marketing students 
were also members of student government 
and thanks to their efforts, the café received 
its first solid seed money from the seniors’ 
gift. With this pleasant surprise, we paid 
for plumbing for the coffee urns, electrical 
outlets, and café furniture. The Senior Class 
donation, coupled with the enthusiasm of the 
marketing students, fed into the library staff’s 
belief that a café’s time had come and that 
it would be well received by the students. 
In fact, student members of the Senior Class 
Gift Committee are using our café as a model 
for their next project—creating a comfortable 
meeting place in the student union. 

Has the café made a diff erence? 
One year later, our café is a reality, serving 
as a café open weekday mornings and eve­
nings and also as an intellectually stimulating 
place to gather. We have a faithful and grow­
ing clientele of students, faculty, and staff. 
Friends of Reeves Library, a group comprised 
of interested alumni, faculty and staff, has 
taken interest in the project and generously 
supported the café with several signifi cant 
gifts. At the café we buy coffee from a fair 
trade company, Green Mountain Coffee, 
which allows us to make an ethical state­
ment simply through the coffee we serve. 

We have also hosted several events, includ­
ing faculty workshops on library resources, 
community­building gatherings for faculty 
and staff, art displays of student work that the 
café purchased from the Senior Student Art 
Exhibit, reduced coffee prices, and extended 
hours during exam week, as well as theme 
parties, such as the “Blue Book Blues Bash,” 
which aimed to relieve finals week stress via 
a live jazz/blues band, a masseuse, and free 
food and coffee. And through it all we have 
maintained a healthy bank account. A con­
test held during the fall semester provided 
us with the finishing touch, a much needed 
name for the café, AfterWords Café. 

But, has a library café made a difference 
in the traditional image of the library as a 
solitary place? Was all the work, on the part 
of the librarians and Kaskowitz’s students, 
worthwhile? In response to these questions, 
I think about a typical day in our café—in 
which a student and a faculty member 
converse over a cup of coffee or a student 
fits the final piece into an impromptu, com­
munal jigsaw puzzle or a group of students 
laugh over a political joke or a student sits 
crosslegged on an oversized couch and pours 
over the daily newspaper. In our opinion, all 
of our work was worth it because the milieu 
created by the café has refuted the stereotype 
of the library as an unwelcoming place. In 
this broken stereotype’s wake, we at Reeves 
Library instead witness a new image form­
ing—one of a library as a convivial place. 
Now that is an image that would make any 
librarian smile. 

February 2006  99 C&RL News