In a recent dried morning, Café paired The Owner Gefen Skolnick entered his arc -colored cafeteria on the edge of Echo Park and Westlake, stopping at tables to greet visitors who were drinking drinks like bananas and matcha. Some of them had discovered the store through publications on social networks, while others were passengers attracted by psychedelic colors. Most turned out to be the Z generation, the COLET target customer base.
Before Cound opened its flagship store in January, the Coffee Bean brand had already cultivated devout monitoring that leaned into aesthetics, the falls of limited editing products, the construction of the community, the narration of stories and social networks. Even the packaging, a striking holographic bag stamped with cheerful drawings and poems of Skolnick's pairing, stood out on the Erewhon shelves and the mother's market.
And then, last year, during a six -month contract, Cound's beans cafined thousands of SNAP employees at the headquarters of the Technology Company in Santa Monica. Skolnick had created a name like a whisper Z that other brands approached it, asking how to connect with the younger public.
Gefen Skolnick, founder of Coplet Coffee, said he wanted a “fun and funky” space where she and her friends felt they belonged.
Cound was just a seed of an idea that appeared in Skolnick's mind five years ago when Los Angeles's native was a UCLA student studying computer science. At that time, Skolnick, who describes herself on her website as a “proud woman and coffee lover”, felt that the coffee market was pretentious and rancid, and wanted a “fun and funky” space where she and her friends felt they belonged.
“The whole concept of pairing was that there must be a great coffee made more accessible to people,” said Skolnick, 28.
As giant corporations such as Starbucks are Designing employees To optimize operations, the newest and smaller companies such as COUNDS can be marking the beginning of the next wave of coffee drinkers who are looking for much more than only caffeine.
COUND COFFEE organizes local events such as community meetings, art workshops and rapid appointments in its Echo Park cafeteria.
Exaggerated culture
“The exaggeration and the brand were built before coffee,” Skolnick said, who adopted an unconventional approach to sell pairing goods long before he even had available beans.
Skolnick, a ongoing social media star who worked on product management in Hulu and Tesla at the age of 23, built a circle of support for her in X, previously Twitter, tweeting on investment in technology and risk capital. In 2020, when she began publishing about a new idea of coffee as a parallel project, Jen Rubio, co -founder and executive director of Far The luggage (which would later become the first COUND investor), quickly realized and encouraged Skolnick to do full time.
Rubio said Skolnick was quite well informed about newly created companies and fundraising.
“I assumed that she was already a full -time founder, and when she knew her more, I realized that she was not and that was crazy for me,” said Rubio. “There is someone with so much here, not only passion or interest, but also much knowledge about how this world works.”
He lit a low fire Skolnick.
To determine if the brand could become a viable business, Skolnick tried to exaggerate the masses. In 2021, he associated with the artist Ludi Leiva to create his first product launch: A Drinking glass adorned with the pairing logo and the creams and works of art of the mushrooms and the clouds. He went viral on Tiktok, selling hundreds in two days.
One of Couplet's first products was a drinking glass created with the artist Ludi Leiva, fungi and adorned clouds. He went viral on Tiktok.
Every two months, Coplet launched a new viral product. There was collaboration with the environmental conscious Kawa project sale Candle with vanilla milk made with recycled coffee. Skolnick then developed the extremely viral printed cows Mooka boat and French Red Heart Press.
“My sauce is that I like to do something creatively and get it very fast,” Skolnick said. “The Z generation likes limited edition drops and the things that are seen and know well.”
However, some projects took a little longer, such as the seven months that Skolnick spent obtaining all the details correctly with the iconic Opalescent Coffee Bag of Couplet that was designed by Javier García. Skolnick encouraged Garcia to continue experimenting with textured materials and find a way for the consumer to experience a trip through works of art and words in the packaging. This included adding Skolnick's pairs, as one who says: “Tangy, funky and brilliant, the Peruvian of Coplet feels like a ray of light.”
It was not until 2022 that Cound sold Café Real on its website.
Skolnick found his coffee grain supplier through his network X, a Nicaraguan farmer with “deep connections,” she says. He linked it with other cooperative and family farms, which resulted in Cound's offerings, which went from Peruvian beans of light unique origin to a rich and sweet mixture of coffee espresso of Brazilian, Nicaraguan and Peruvian coffee.
In January, Skolnick added a matcha of the coastal city of Ise in Japan to its parole of pairing, using it in its brick and mortar shop and also selling it to who whoever wholesale to other Los Angeles businesses such as Tropical Café and Lemon Poppy Kitchen.
In addition to the Couplet coffee offerings, including Peruvian beans with a single origin and a mixture of espresso coffee of Brazilian, Nicaraguan and Peruvian coffee, Skolnick added a Matcha de Ise, Japan, which also sells to other Los Angeles companies.
The charm of a vibrant coffee
While there are other coffees that also attract an audience of generation Z (like Century City's Chambelán coffee And Beverly Grove's Community goodsThey draw long lines), Skolnick sees Cound as a unique brand that has carved its own market niche.
In the pairing, the walls are lacquered in tones of pastel pink and sky blue, juxtapose the black and white pictures. Paints of swans, mushrooms and the sun cover the bar, emulating the appearance of Cound's merchandise. In a corner, a dozen New York magazines are fueled at a transparent acrylic table. The shelf connected to a mirror from the fun house shows a CD of the king's wool and a cassette tape, while other shelves are supplied with packaged products from popular brands such as Fly by Jing and Ghost city oatsGiving the small space superette vibes. A glass box contains grip articles from former baby pastry chef all day Sam Robinsonas a sunny egg bacon gallery worthy of Instagram and Poorpiusing center bakery Rolls of cinnamon vegans.
In the Menu in COUND: Caprichoso coffee and Matcha drinks.
Customers have realized. Emily Anne Fernández, 29, manager of the Arts District Coffee Concierge Who buys Couplet's wholesale matcha for his store, spent his free time in the Counding courtyard producing music on his laptop.
“Personally, I noticed that many stores are just white, so it is good to have a color change,” said Fernández. “I like the floor and the tiles.”
Beyond the design, Skolnick wanted to close the gap between specialized coffee heads and people who want fun drinks. In addition to the well -elaborate Lattes and espressos, exclusive drinks, created by Skolnick and their staff, are capricious, with options such as an espresso coffee tonic of romero and pass, and Matcha scored with rose, cardamom and saffron.
Skolnick says he wanted to close the gap between specialized coffee heads and people who want fun drinks. Skolnick and their staff create exclusive drinks.
When Skolnick was building coffee, she went to Tiktok and Instagram (which has around 28,000 combined followers) to document their process, asking followers to opinion about what they wanted in a cafeteria. He resonated with his fans base, with people who now traveled long distances from Westside and South Bay to coffee on weekends. Within the first month and a half of the business, Cound sold 10,000 cups.
Zoe Price, 20, who returned home in Los Angeles while he was on the University Spring Holidays, visited Cound with his mother for the first time. He had been a long time for Coplet in Tiktok and was excited to finally experience him in person.
“The online presence was very welcoming and inclusive, and seeing the passion of Coplet from the beans to open the store, and see that the vision will come to life was really special and rewarding,” said Price.
Construction community
Skolnick believes that generation Z is inverted in brand's property. “The main thing that people care is, can I connect to this brand?” Skolnick said. “And then they begin to dig, asking: 'Who is executing it? What is the environment that I get from them? Do I feel that I am connected to their vision and mission?' “
Before Cound was opened, Skolnick built knowledge of the brand through emerging coffee windows, from pride to execution club events. He has made a concerted effort to continue cultivating the community through meetings that are now held in their own store, including meetings for Women in imageshe Bring your own pen art group and Friend or call Quick dates.
A recent friend or quick appointment event at Coffee Couplet.
The collaborations have not stopped either. For Valentine's Day, Cound was associated with Kaja Beauty (A Korean makeup brand that resonates with the audience of generation Z) to give a free cherry -cherry -tailed lipstick with each purchase of a cherry vanilla cream lid and a cold drink. More than 800 people aligned in the block during the period of a weekend.
“I definitely think it's the experimental part [that’s important]”Brittany Wu, 23, said, associated with the Senior Social Networks of the Kaja Beauty, Memebox.” With the being a niche community, many people look for things to do on weekends with their friends. The cafeteria culture has also increased. ”
Skolnick knows that he has its pulse in the Z market and dreams large.
“I would like to open more coffee shops in Los Angeles and other parts of the country,” he said. “It would be great even internationally.”
