Today we’d like to introduce you to Lorena Jurado and Rex Roberts.
So, before we jump into specific questions about the business, why don’t you give us some details about you and your story.
We started dreaming about opening a cafe about six years ago. Rex was working in hospitality, and I was working in retail. Being around people has always been inspiring to us. When we first moved to LA from New York in 2013, we missed that sense of community and friends we had there.
We settled into our new neighborhood Glassell Park and soon came across this hole in the wall spot down the street from our house. Rex is Australian, and there’s nothing quite like Melbourne coffee culture. We wanted to create something like that here. We were ready to take the risk, and we started Little Ripper.
Soon after our doors open, we were suddenly a part of this incredible community of artists, creatives, musicians and young families that felt the same way we did. We have seen kids grow up and people come together at our shop and its kind of magical. We have never worked so hard in our whole lives, and we have never been happier doing so.
We’re always bombarded by how great it is to pursue your passion, etc. – but we’ve spoken with enough people to know that it’s not always easy. Overall, would you say things have been easy for you?
They say “nothing that is worth having will ever come easy” and we couldn’t agree more! We had it pretty rough; it took us almost two years to open our tiny shop. We made a lot of mistakes along the way but were so lucky to have met so many incredibly supportive people that helped us through it all. From structural issues to council problems there were so many hiccups—we almost didn’t open.
In one last push to open we ran a Kickstarter campaign. Our community, family, and friends came together, and it was amazing. Through our Kickstarter campaign, we met our neighbors (now friends and customers) from Keltner & Co., a husband and wife architect duo who helped us with the said construction issues.
We are super grateful to have met these incredible people and be able to open our cafe. We could not have done it without their help and the support of our community.
So let’s switch gears a bit and go into the Little Ripper Coffee story. Tell us more about the business.
We are a friendly neighborhood coffee shop that takes pride in making great coffee and delicious, simple eats with an Aussie flair. We make our own take on specialty coffee drinks, from housemade almond mylks to Tim Tams, Jaffles, a solid flat white, Lamingtons and a taste of Vegemite (if desired).
We love good coffee and good food, that’s it! We try to stay inspired and creative, and our menu items change seasonally. We make toasts, and small salads, yummy English muffins, and all our produce is sourced locally.
Has luck played a meaningful role in your life and business?
We feel very lucky to have amazing neighbors and an incredible community. We are so lucky to have found amazing staff that believes in our shop just as much as we do. The “bad luck” or hurdles that we faced were totally worth it!
Contact Info:
- Address: 4155 Verdugo Road
- Website: Littlerippercoffee.com
- Phone: (323) 739-0328
- Email: [email protected]
- Instagram: Littlerippercoffee
- Facebook: Little Ripper Coffee
- Twitter: lilrippercoffee
Image Credit:
Sean Lowes
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