Coffee expert brews up fresh opportunities

In January, the novel coronavirus outbreak forced Yang Beibei to temporarily close two of the three coffee shops she runs in Beijing.

At the time, she had already decorated the shops, all called Visitant Bay Coffee, with red paper-cuttings and was ready to celebrate the Spring Festival holiday with customers.

Yang, who was born in the 1980s, said she had grown accustomed to shuttling between her three outlets to see how things were going and make coffee for customers every day, but the epidemic has brought this routine to a temporary halt.

After closing the two coffee shops-one in Guloudajie, a popular tourist spot, and the other close to the Forbidden City-to reduce outgoings, she focused all her energies on her remaining outlet in Qianmen, south of Tian'anmen Square.

She found the lack of customers depressing and felt a little lost, especially when looking at her empty shop. "After all, the hustle and bustle of people flowing around and being busy making coffee for them were the norms of my work," she said.

However, a special experience changed her situation and encouraged her to discover a new way of maintaining her business during this troubled time.

A few days after the epidemic was announced, a medical worker who regularly visited the coffee shops, told Yang she was eager to have a cup of coffee. She suggested that Yang should leave the drink in a designated spot and then head for a safe place to reduce the risk of becoming infected.

"My shops rarely prepared takeout coffee for customers, because the whole point of opening them was to help me meet interesting people and become friends with them," Yang said, describing the difference between her operation and large coffee chains.

"The medical worker is one of my closest customers. When I discovered that we could only 'talk' with each other in such a special way, I was upset and wanted to do something more to thank her for her efforts in fighting the virus," she said.

Yang made a liter of espresso and put it in three bottles. She added four bottles of milk to the bag in the hope the customer would be able to share her favorite coffee with colleagues.

After she realized that demand for takeout coffee was high, Yang began developing livestreams so she could teach people how to make coffee at home. It also allows them to buy her products as a way of maintaining sales during the lockdown.

In addition, she is working with the owners of bars and flower shops, bundling their products together as takeout packages.

"I'm happy to see that private coffee shops such as mine can offer takeout products and have good online sales," she said, adding that when the virus has been defeated she will promote the takeout coffee service and optimize sales of products online.