Michael Keen’s rivers and roads have led to closing his Curtis Park coffee shop.
But his friend Mike Solis will bring Cuban bakery Café Tres to 2960 Champa St. in its place.
“It’s kind of a sweet blessing that we’re setting up our friends with their first brick and mortar,” said Keen. “But we’re pretty sad about it.”
Keen and wife Desiree opened the original Rivers and Roads Coffee eight years ago at 2539 Bruce Randolph Ave. in Denver’s Clayton neighborhood.
They added the 500-square-foot café in Curtis Park about three years ago, but Keen said he knew it needed a change a year in.
They experimented with the grab-and-go model — different hours, menus, staffing setups — but it never saw the success of the original location. Michael Keen said it was never profitable during its run and only broke even a handful of times during peak summer months.
“It’s a very difficult time to operate in the city of Denver right now, and we’ve been subsidizing this one through the other location,” Michael Keen said. “It never could do the amount of business that would justify the labor costs.”
In Clayton, Rivers and Roads offers breakfast and lunch cooked in its on-site kitchen, which Michael Keen runs. Having food and space for people to sit and work is a major reason it did $1.5 million in sales each of the past two years.
That gave way to daily returning customers, which he said wasn’t possible at the smaller Curtis Park location. And having to pay staff to run it rather than being on-site also didn’t help the shop’s balance sheet.
“We had the idea that it would act like a coffee cart with a permanent home, a pastry and coffee service,” Michael Keen said.
But both he and Solis are optimistic that Café Tres, which is slated to open late this summer or in the early fall, will fare better with that model.
Solis sells his pastelitos – a Cuban puff pastry that translates to “little pies” – at a few shops around Denver, like LoHi’s Little Owl Coffee and the City Park Farmers Market. In Curtis Park, the sweet and savory delicacies will be served alongside Cuban coffee drinks such as colada, a sweetened espresso shot.
Solis said the best-selling pastelitos are carne, his favorite, and guava and cheese. He anticipates having six or so flavors of pastries each day.
“When you do pop-ups, it very much still feels like it’s a side gig,” Solis, who built a career in advertising before going full time on Café Tres.
“With this being the next step, I’m a baker and that’s what I am,” he said through a laugh.
Related Articles
A favorite Golden burrito shop is growing with two new locations Historic Denver school reopens as a cafe and beer garden Venezuelan restaurant opens in Greenwood Village Denver restaurant on track to open despite death of much-loved chef/owner ‘My vision of retirement’: Sushi Den co-founder opens small chef’s counter restaurantThough this is the first physical location for Solis, baking has been a part of his family since his great uncle and grandfather emigrated from Cuba to Miami in the 1960s. They opened one of the first Cuban cafés in the Florida city, Solis said, but closed during the Great Recession in 2008.
After he moved to Denver in 2014, Solis said the need for a similar-styled shop was evident, but he didn’t jump in until 2023. He first started selling on the farmers market circuit, baking out of a commissary kitchen, before getting into other local eateries.
Now that he has the space, Solis said he hopes he, his girlfriend and future daughter, who is due in August, can re-create the family vibe he grew up on.
“Is this girl gonna grow up the same way I did, at the bakery?” he said. “How crazy, full circle that would be.”
Subscribe to our new food newsletter, Stuffed, to get Denver food and drink news sent straight to your inbox.
Read More Details
Finally We wish PressBee provided you with enough information of ( Cuban bakery filling space as Curtis Park coffee shop closes )
Also on site :