Terms and Conditions
About the fund
Listening to cafes around the country, it’s clear the financial deficit due to the COVID-19 pandemic is greater than originally anticipated. Glitter Cat, GoFundBean, Fellow, and Mage are collectively reestablishing ComeTogether.Coffee not only as a place to purchase goods from cafes in need but as a place to donate money specifically to those who need it most.
ComeTogether.Coffee focuses on supporting small specialty coffee cafes and businesses, with 100% of the fund reserved for businesses owned by minorities and marginalized individuals.
These funds are specific to businesses and not available to individual coffee professionals. However, Go Fund Bean supports, uplifts, and defends the hourly coffee professional - all individuals looking for support are encouraged to head to GoFundBean.com.
More details about the fund
ComeTogether.Coffee grants are subject to Glitter Cat Barista’s mission statement, and are specific to businesses owned by those who self identify as being a member of an underrepresented or marginalized group in the coffee industry including but not limited to: BI-POC, disabled, LGBTQIA+, womxn, and racial and ethnic minorities. 50% of the fund is reserved for Black owned/co-owned businesses. Additionally, ComeTogether.Coffee seeks cafes/roasters not only owned by these groups but who also hire diversely.
ComeTogether.Coffee’s application is created to get a sense of your business, the people employed, the community you support, and past and present look at the state of the business. The Selection Committee is looking for candidates who showcase a strong statement of need and ability to invest the funds into their staff and communities. Strong applications show intentionality and completed answers.
ComeTogether.Coffee is aware that there may be language, writing challenges, or other barriers to filling out an online application. IRS regulations require public charities giving relief funds to collect information to verify financial distress and plan for spending received funds. If completing the application is a barrier, please reach out to the community around you for assistance or to us for assistance on applying. ComeTogether.Coffee will not assist in filling out the application but may be able to provide resources for you to reach out to in your community.
Who can apply?
- Cafe/Roaster/Business owned or co-owned by a person representing a marginalized or underrepresented group in the industry - not limited to: BIPOC, disabled, LGBTQIA+, womxn, racial and ethnic minorities. 50% of the fund is reserved for Black owned/co-owned businesses.
- Business’s staff are from a diverse background. The Selection committee is looking for businesses that work to increase representation of people from various backgrounds.
- Fund is available to businesses with five or fewer locations.
- Prioritization of businesses not backed by venture capital.
Grant Application requirements
- Business applicant falls under guidelines of “who can apply”.
- Note that exemptions from certain requirements may be requested.
- Fully completed application.
- Applications that are not fully complete will be disqualified
- Statement of Need
- Describe the need for applying for a grant from ComeTogether.Coffee. Things to consider
- How has COVID-19 affected your business financially
- How has it affected the staff working for your business
- Unforeseen expenses/issues
- Most recent tax returns (2019 or 2018) - if you are uncomfortable with a tax return (from prior year), financial statements from prior and current year are sufficient. (Please send from your accounting software/accountant. )
- Examples of loss incurred (Loans? Debts? Layoffs?) - Projected losses for newer businesses
- What is your rent per square foot, average pre tip wages, and monthly payroll?
- Based on your examples of loss incurred, how much money would be significant to help?
- Describe the need for applying for a grant from ComeTogether.Coffee. Things to consider
- Plan for use of grant funds
- Do you plan to use the funds to cover re-opening costs, rehire staff, necessary repairs, cover payment of contracted green coffee...
- Two letters of recommendation
- Cannot come from current staff or ownership family members
- Ex-staffers, community members, other cafe owners, greater coffee industry folx are encouraged
- Special Showcase - 60 seconds max
- This is a place for you to showcase what your business stands for. This can be a video, voice recording, photo montage…
- Use this as a way for the selection committee to get to you know and your business
How are we giving?
Cohorts
The ComeTogether.Coffee fund will be giving out funds in month long “cohorts”. In order to avoid any timing advantages that may come with “first come first serve” grants, we will provide an application window, followed by a donation dispersal window. Application and fundraising windows will be a month long, followed by a month long dispersal window. For example:
Cohort #1
- June - July application and fundraising window
- July - August grant selection
Cohort #2
- July - August application and fundraising window
- September - October grant selection
And so on and so forth....
Given these unprecedented times, our hope is to connect grant receivers/cohorts to encourage community and share information on what’s working and what’s not for their businesses.
Evaluating Needs
A ComeTogether.Coffee committee will be reviewing all applications and choosing grant receivers in order to cover any biases the creators of this relief fund may have. This committee will be five individuals within the specialty coffee community. Our committee members will be representatives from the different corners of the coffee community, such as, individual baristas/coffee folks, cafe owners, and roasters. If needed, committee members will recuse themselves if conflicts of interest arise.
Committee Responsibilities
- Given need is different depending on the cafe, the committee is responsible for allocating funds proportional to the applicants statement of need.
- Cohort applications will be open for a month, then a selection committee will review cohort applications within a 4 week period.
- The committee will meet weekly for 45 minutes.
- Each committee member will also be responsible for 3 hours of individual review time per week.
- The overall minimum time commitment will be 6 hours/month.
- Meetings will take place weekly on whichever day works best for the committee. Meetings will be scheduled by ComeTogether.Coffee’s Andy Eblin. Each meeting a designated note taker will be assigned by Andy, and notes will be recorded here in order to have a record of how each application was evaluated.
- After the first cohort is decided, committee members have the opportunity to opt out for the next round, or continue. We ask the committee members to give us a 2 week heads up before the start of the next cohort.
Terms and Conditions
- ComeTogether.Coffee is a project by Fellow, Mage, Glitter Cat Barista, and GoFundBean forming and managing the fund under Glitter Cat Barista 501(c)(3). Glitter Cat Barista is located at 870 E. 28th st, 1B, Brooklyn, NY 11210 and is a registered federal non-profit 501(c)(3) as of July 14, 2019.
- This fund is available to businesses and individuals whose purpose is linked to the coffee industry. Examples include, but are not limited to: cafes, roasteries, individual roasters, coffee retailers etc. Any donation granted to a business from ComeTogether.Coffee must be used to invest in the business and support its employees. Any usage not in compliance with the reason for the applied funds is prohibited and, to the extent legally possible, ComeTogether.Coffee can retract donation and expect repayment.
- This fund is not available to businesses with more than 5 sites and/or is not registered in the United States of America. Exceptions for more than 5 sites can be requested. At this time we can only support businesses registered in the USA.
- This fund is only available to underrepresented and marginalized groups in the coffee industry. ComeTogether.Coffee, being a project of Glitter Cat Barista, falls under the mission statement of Glitter Cat Barista which states: “Glitter Cat Barista highlights the specific experiences of those who identify as BI-POC, LGBTQIA+, womxn, gender non-conforming, racial/ethnic minorities, and persons with disabilities among others in order to establish the next generation of coffee professionals and champions and to inspire those like them to achieve the same goals.”
- The fund is intended to be a long-term project, which will have multiple application periods. This is not a first-come-first-serve foundation. Dates will be announced shortly. Applications will be open for 30 days, once closed a selection committee will analyze applications and select the group to be announced within 30 days of the application deadline.
- ComeTogether.Coffee has the right to terminate the project at any time.