Verve Coffee Opens Cafe In Palo Alto

PALO ALTO, CA — "Coffee is a fruit," said Colby Barr, the co-founder of Verve Coffee Roasters — a Santa Cruz-based company that makes a mission out of sourcing and roasting the world’s highest-quality craft coffee.

The declaration rolled off Barr's tongue with such poetry and passion it's no wonder the roasting company is so successful it's opening a cafe in the heart of Palo Alto Friday — complete with tastings, music and festivities sure to light up University Avenue than its usual Fridays.

Barr's knowledge of coffee is quite the display, as if he were a master roaster. He just knows his stuff, or beans rather.

"If there are two things I'd like a person to take away from us, it's that coffee is a fruit, and they're not all the same," Barr told Patch.

The insight and evidence of a unique creation didn't end there — especially for a coffee addict who can't function without it.

It soon becomes apparent this is no ordinary coffee company nor new cafe in the land where coffee fuels the bright minds of Silicon Valley, including top tech companies such as Facebook, Google and Microsoft. The major firms have served up Verve brews long before the company expanded. Now it will become one of the first roasters in the Peninsula city where academic genius is a part of the vernacular.

Even the design of the 1,400-square-foot building with a patio twice the size represents an extraordinary departure from most commonly-known coffee houses.

"One of the aspects here is the site is kinda unique," Barr said, downplaying the discovery he's made and wants to share.

He knows that in some cities unmentionable names can be found on what appears to be every city block. Things are different at Verve.

The cafe will serve up signature coffee beverages from the Santa Cruz roasting company as well as a rotating menu of directly-sourced, single-origin brews with a wide selection of roasted coffee for sale.

"The product — the food and the coffee is on another level. We travel the world to source the best coffees," he said with poetic justice.

So mirror, mirror on the wall, what country has the best coffee of all?

After a reflective pause, Barr returned to the roots of the ever-so-popular, cult-like drink: "Ethiopia." After all, it is considered the birthplace of the brew's production.

So what's the difference between Verve and others? Think the making of craft beer. Think distilling whiskey. Think varying fermentation processes behind fine wines. It's more than a slight of hand, among the 25 dedicated Verve staffers.

"Our roasting style is much lighter," he said. Barr proceeded to hint at the German roasting caramelizing process without giving away the house secrets.

Still, it all comes down to how a consumer perceives it rolling from a mug rim to the tongue.

"Coffee is so personal. People like what they like, the way they like it," Barr said in a familiar tone millennials could have coined as a mantra.

For foodies wanting to broaden their horizons, Barr and his business partner, Ryan O'Donavan, have teamed up with a South Bay institution for the finest grains of bread and pastries for its sixth cafe in the San Francisco Bay Area and 12th overall as far away as Tokyo.

Manresa Bread, itself a restaurant so successful it shows in its expansion, has created a number of special items served exclusively in Verve’s Palo Alto cafe, including a brioche bun for breakfast sandwiches, gluten free banana sesame muffins and kale parmesan scones. Vegetarians and others are bound to salivate over the restaurant's iconic avocado toast and house-made chia pudding.

For the truly like-no-other offering, Verve’s nitro FlashBrew is on draft in a rotating menu of its coffee brews. Launched in November, "FlashBrew" gets its name from the process in which the coffee concoction is brewed hot then suddenly chilled to enhance the flavor as an out-of-the-ordinary cold coffee.

Information on FlashBrew may be found here.

It's like when a Santa Cruz surfer becomes invigorated by diving out of the California sun's heat into the cold Pacific.

“We made the decision to open in Palo Alto after receiving feedback from the passionate community members that a cafe with local roots was needed in Silicon Valley. Since we’ll be one of the only cafes with local Bay Area ties, we want this space to serve as a place reminiscent of our home in Santa Cruz, with opportunities for the community to connect and enjoy one of the best cups of coffee in the west,” Barr explained.

Then, there's the atmosphere in a space that once housed a skate shop. Now the cafe opens up to a large, redesigned patio that has its own unique quality that matches the product.

Verve, often recognized for its unique design aesthetic, created a space that is both modern and warm for the community on the Peninsula. The collective of visionaries at Verve partnered with Bay Area-based designers and artists to bring their vision to life. Verve worked with multidisciplinary design studio Young America Creative YAC to design the bright, welcoming pad. The cafe will also showcase a custom art piece by Windy Chien, known for her style of knots, storied life and tenure with Aquarius Records.

Of course, art begets art in a symmetry that makes the Silicon Valley and Bay Area stand out for its immersion into the contemporary.

The Verve Palo Alto Cafe located at 162 University Avenue is open from 6 a.m. to 8 p.m.

Founded in 2007 in Santa Cruz, Verve fuses craft, culture and communities behind the world’s finest coffee as a vintage roaster. The independent company is known to operate in the specialty market by still roasting coffee by hand in small batches. It got its name based on the "spirit and enthusiasm surrounding the creation of art.”

More information about Verve can be pulled up by visiting www.vervecoffee.com.