Café Coast, on the City’s Beach Boulevard, is soon to be operated by the same company that operates the two Cove-based Haar Rock Coffee shops.
The café was established in 2007 by local learning disability charity, Inspire PTL, and has been successfully run by the organisation for the past 11 years.
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From April 1st, the establishment will operate under the new name of Café Rock and join GCK2L Ltd’s existing portfolio.
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All the existing 18 staff and nine volunteers at Café Coast will continue to work under the new banner as part of the long-term lease agreement and the venue will continue to play host to a number of regular events attended by the people with learning disabilities that Inspire supports.
Linda Gray, Chief Executive of Inspire PTL, says the move will allow the charity to focus on its core business of providing person centred support and delivering added value for local people with learning disabilities, while ensuring the venue remains a focal point for those in the local community.
Linda said: “Haar Rock Coffee have a significant community presence in Aberdeen and have worked with various charities over the past two years including The AFC Community Trust and Friends of Anchor. As such we feel this is a great opportunity for both parties.
“We were clear that anyone taking over the running of the café needed to be committed to continuing to support our volunteers and maintain the values and ethos of Café Coast. Over the years the venue has been vital in enabling us to offer added value to the people we support – a key feature of our strategic plan – by providing a safe space for social activities and we want this to continue. We are confident this agreement with GCK2L Ltd will achieve this and build on the good work we have done over the past decade.
“I would also like to offer a sincere vote of thanks to local businessman, Martin McAuley, for all of his help in securing this new agreement and ensuring it will work well for both Inspire and GCK2L.”
The team at Haar Rock have set-up and organised a number of successful initiatives to benefit charities at its existing two premises and they are looking forward to replicating this success at Café Rock.
Co-owner Grant Davidson said: “We have a number of ideas and initiatives that we want to implement at Café Rock – strengthening links with local community groups, increasing evening usage, welcoming more private parties, organising larger corporate events, bus tours, promoting local companies through digital advertising and maximising usage of the excellent on-site meeting room facilities. All of these will benefit Inspire PTL through our agreement.
“Our message to Cafe Coast customers would be that it will be business as usual at the venue. We have been working really hard with the existing team to embed our ideas and hope that people will like the new initiatives we plan to implement over time. We would encourage everyone to please come and see us and work with us to further develop what has always been a great venue for the community.”
