1951 Coffee Company
Berkeley, CA
About 1951
1951 Coffee Company, founded in 2015, is a non-profit specialty coffee organization that promotes the well-being of the refugee community in the United States by providing job training and employment to refugees, asylees, and special immigrant visa holders while educating the surrounding community about refugee life and issues.
Status
Due to the current crisis, we have had to close two of our three cafes. Two of the cafes rely heavily on the students and staff at UC Berkeley. Our busiest cafe was located in the UC Student Union and has been closed for six months with no sign of reopening until campus life can return to normal. And our Rockridge, Oakland café simply wasn’t seeing enough business to stay open. Pre-COVID, we had 25 baristas working at our three cafes. Now we are down to three full-time at our Flagship cafe, which is located just South of campus.This café has seen a 60% decrease in sales due to classes being online at UC Berkeley and a dramatic reduction in the occupancy of nearby dorms by more than 75%.
How You Can Help
Please buy some coffee, or if you're in the Berkeley area, order ahead for pickup at our Channing Cafe. Additionally, please consider supporting our campaign to more widely distribute our film, No Single Origin.
