Roseville Coffee Shop Celebrates Grand Opening of Drive-Through

J. Arthur's Coffee shop in Roseville kicks off a five-day run of freebies and celebration today (Wednesday) to mark the grand opening of its new drive-through coffee service.

J. Arthur's, 2441 Rice St., will offer free coffee and beverages at its new drive-through window from 5:30 to 8:30 a.m. today (Wednesday) through Saturday, June 2 and from 7 to 9 a.m. Sunday, June 3. The coffee shop will also sell pulled pork sandwiches from 11:30 a.m. to 2 p.m. Saturday and hold a pig roast from 4 to 7:30 p.m. the same day.

Also, J. Arthur's will feature freebies for kids from 11:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday, including free ice cream sandwiches, balloons and mini-cupcakes.

Meanwhile, a trio of music groups are lined up on Saturday afternoon and into the evening to entertain customers and visitors. The schedule includes Dixie Land music from 2 to 4 p.m., the High Strung Trio from 6 to 8 p.m. and the August Blues Band from 8:30 to 9:30 p.m.

Four years ago, Roseville-based ACR Homes opened J. Arthur's Coffee shop as a training and meeting place for its employees. The provider of housing for people with disabilities also desired to have the coffee shop serve as a place where  ACR residents can gather in a friendly, welcoming environment.

Then last year, ACR (which stands for Acceptance, Communication and Respect)  expanded J. Arthur's Coffee, opening its doors to the public. Now, in it a bid to build up its public business, J. Arthur's has added its drive-through coffee service within the last two weeks, officials said.

Gene Leistico, ACR chief operating officer, and Jordan Hubred, J. Arthur's manager, said the coffee shop has been retooled to emphasize an artisan approach to coffee service. The shop does a lot of single-cup brewing and relies  on local coffee vendors and a Wisconsin dairy for its supplies.

J. Arthur's coffee roasters are Dogwood Cofee Co. from Minneapolis and  Roastery 7 in Brooklyn Center while its dairy supplier is Castle Rock Organic Farms of Osseo, Wis. 

Leistico said J. Arthur's decided to add drive-through coffee service given the high volume of early morning commuters that travel on Rice Street and the dearth of coffee competitors along the road, north of Highway 36.

So far, J. Arthur's has averaged more than 100 cars per day in the initial days of its drive-through service and Hubred expects the coffee shop to more than double that number of customers with its expanded hours.

Wednesday will mark the first day that J. Arthur's opens at 5:30 a.m., one hour earlier than previously during weekdays.

Leistico said J. Arthur's is committed to turning its handcrafted, artisan-style coffee orders around for drive-through customers in no more than 90 seconds per car.

"We think we can be very competitive" in the coffee turnaround time compared with big-chain operators, he said.