Written by Jordan Michelman.
Big cities, small cities, every coffee scene is different. But for Caleb MacPherson at Take Two Coffee in Fort Myers, the changing nature of coffee culture in SW Florida has presented a unique set of challenges—and opportunities. Caleb’s story presents a couple of different overlapping arcs: from a failed early partnership to a new, thriving business; from an interest in coffee gear to a busy side-hustle as a service technician and sales guy for the wider coffee community; and Take Two’s own journey from a mobile cart (with a GS3) inside a building to a full-on brick and mortar experience (armed with a Linea PB).
This was a wide-ranging, unexpectedly candid interview, and I came away with a real appreciation for what Take Two is doing—their donuts look fabulous—and also a fairly serious interest in investigating the wider scene in Fort Myers, Naples, Bonita Springs, and so forth throughout SW Florida, an underappreciated region located directly across the I-75 from Miami.
Hey Caleb, thanks so much for chatting with me. Something nice the top of these interviews is to ask, how do you describe your business to someone who might be unfamiliar? What’s the thesis statement for Take Two Coffee?
That’s such a good question, man. Honestly, a lot of what we’re trying to do is to take the pretentiousness out of specialty coffee. We want to make it approachable and fun. I’ve been in the industry since 2012, and have owned a couple of different businesses, and it can sometimes feel like the specialty industry can trend a little pretentious, and lacking on the customer service front, like there’s an expectation that the product is so good you don’t need the service element. And so we try to really go beyond that in our roasting, our cafe service, our tech work, our sales work, and all the other points we touch. We want to make people not feel dumb when they’re entering our spaces and engaging with our industry.
I love it—a critique as a thesis statement. But can you please tell me more about the specific work you do?
We do a lot of different things in our own small way. That includes a decent bit of wholesale roasting, as well as some higher-end white labeling for clients, and then we also have a fun little retail donut shop in Fort Myers, Florida. We’ve also got a big growing department in equipment service and sales, and we’re doing tech work as part of that as well. It’s such a need, honestly, in our market here.
How did the donuts come about?
I owned another company located nearby, in Naples, which was started back in 2016, and then I exited in 2022 because of a bad partnership situation (it’s one of those classic situations). In 2023, I started developing the donut concept, actually in a travel trailer in my new business partner’s backyard. I knew I wanted to open a new cafe, and I knew that it would need a food element that was compelling. To be totally honest with you, part of me just assumed that like, donuts would be easy—or at least, easy compared to making croissants or something. I spent like six months just making donuts in that trailer, and to get the dough to proof, I would crank up the heat in the RV (and this is already during spring and summer in Florida). Honestly, it was kind of a nightmare, but once we were ready to share the donuts, it turned out people really liked them. Looking back, it was way harder than I thought it would be, and I don’t know if that was just me underestimating the amount of work it takes to make great donuts, or if I’m just too stubborn to stop. These days, I have a great team helping me, but when we opened our shop initially, with the donuts, I was getting up at 2 am six days a week. Donuts are not easy.
I will certainly remember this the next time I purchase a donut. Okay—I’m super curious to ask someone with your background as a tech this next question, because nobody is more particular about their gear than techs—what is your cafe set-up like at Take Two? What gear are you using?
My approach to cafe gear has really been an evolution. When that first shop opened, back in 2016—the one I ended up leaving—I had just fully bought into some big lie about what a cafe interior had to look like. I was so young, and so naive, and I didn’t realize how much VC money had already come streaming into coffee by that time. Some of these build-outs you’d see, they are 2 million dollars worth of work, but because it’s VC money behind it, no one expects a return on investment for a decade. That was not our reality, but our build-out was so extravagant, and looking back, it’s just ridiculous.
When it came time to open Take Two, I wanted to create a brand that felt clean and retro. Our building has an old concrete floor; that’s no reason to go and spend money on tile. Our earliest version of the cafe was actually a mobile cart inside a building, and it had a La Marzocco GS3 and a GBW Mahlkonig, plus an EK 43 grinder on the back bar and a Curtis single tap 1-gallon brewer. My goal was, without compromising coffee, how cheap can we do this?
After some time, we opened a second space, and then closed the previous indoor cart situation. We’ve been in our new space now for a couple of months, and we have a Linea PB on the bar, which I’m happy to say Jake Johnson from LM was able to be talked into giving us some free powder coating, which was very sweet of him. We have that paired as well with the Mahlkonig Grind-By-Sync. I actually sell those units, and we love using them in the bar.
Why the switch from a GS3 to a Linea PB?
Honestly, a big part of it was research. I knew I saw the potential of the Grind By Sync partnership with Mahlkonig, but I wasn’t going to be able to sell it or advocate for it until I actually knew I believed in it. I’m a bad salesman that way, you know? I need to actually believe in something, because otherwise it’s like—does it really work?? So part of me went over to the PB was because I wanted to try all of that out. But also, you know—the GS3 is a phenomenal machine, but it has some limitations, and I don’t think I’m saying anything unkind here. During our busiest winter rush mornings, the steam capacity of the GS3 could sometimes struggle to keep up. And so, there was a practical aspect to it as well, knowing that the PB could handle anything we threw at it.
Tell me more about the coffee scene around you in Naples / Fort Myers.
It’s growing a lot, honestly. I try to be honest to the point of being blunt, and so running a coffee business in SW Florida is not like a lot of other places. When I opened my first shop, it was really the first one on the scene here doing coffee that way. People thought we were so innovative, when really it was just like—no, sorry, this place is just 10-15 years behind trends in major cities. And it’s the same way with food. Look at anything that was cool in New York like 8-10 years ago, and that’s what is coming soon to this market.
I grew up in a place that’s sort of like this.
Well then, you know what I’m talking about. But I will say the growth here, especially in the last 2-3 years, has just felt massive. I also want to address the misconception, at least within our industry in this area, that assumes any new coffee shop is automatically a competitor. I want to say, I am not competing with other coffee bars, not really. I only need like 150 regulars to come to my coffee shop over the course of a year—4 days a week, 50 weeks a year—at 150 customers, that’s killing it. And there are a million people down here. So, as it pops off in our area more and more so, this idea that we’re all in competition with each other, I just really think that’s wrong, man. I think it’s more like—how can we as an industry get people to try local and independent chains? My theory is, honestly we’re trying to move people together away from the chains, and if someone has the audacity to one day say “Hey, you know what, I’m going to skip Starbucks or Dunkin’ today and try something local”—that experience creates such a huge opportunity for everyone, if what they find at that little cafe is good. So it’s really like a rising tide lifts all ships, you know? I genuinely mean that.
When I got started in the industry, I was really insecure. But now it’s like yes, please—more cafes, please. It’s good for everyone. I feel the same about RTD and good cold brew as well. The scene is growing, and it’s cool to see. My question for a long time was, “Am I too early here? Is it too soon to try and pull this off where I live?” If you’re too early, you’ll flop hard, but if you time it just right, you can crush it in a market like this.
This conversation honestly has me really interested in checking out your area in SW Florida, which is part of the state I’ve not been to. What’s some other cool stuff happening in your cities? What should be on my radar?
Out here it’s like a string of cities around the interstate, and the small business community here has never been stronger. I’ve lived here since 2013, and it’s genuinely really cool—this place has a combination of small town and medium city that I really enjoy.
Something great that’s just opened is called Sugar Shack Downtown, which is in Bonita Springs. It’s this really great live music venue and bar with music 7 days a week. It’s a blast—there’s local talent, but big acts come through, and the food is great. There’s a new Korean steakhouse in Fort Myers called Ember that’s awesome, too.
Visit Take Two Coffee at their website and on Instagram.
