Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Jodie Fairclough. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.
Jodie, appreciate you joining us today. Let’s start with the decision of whether to donate a percentage of sales to an organization or cause – we’d love to hear the backstory of how you thought through this.
When we were still in Australia, we were heavily involved with the charity Water For Africa. Friends of ours had started it and split their time between Tanzania and Perth in managing its operations. Water For Africa repairs and installs wells in remote villages in Africa. It’s incredible how many wells are sitting idle after being installed by charities over the years. Our friends have trained up locals to repair and install new wells where required in order that whole villages are able to access clean water. Women are not spending hours in retrieving water and girls are able to return to school. It just opens up so many more opportunities and prevents unnecessary illnesses from dirty water. When we started Elroy Coffee Co we really wanted to give back to humanity and decided to commit to installing a new well every year as a gift from Elroy. We have just handed over our first $5000 for this and couldn’t be more excited to see this become a reality.
As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?
Originally from Australia, we moved in the height of Covid. Having won a green card in the Green Card Lottery (Yes, its a real thing!) we had the opportunity to move here. We had visited the US on several occassions but moving here was a visa nightmare. Unless you have some extraordinary talent (baking and making coffee didn’t count!) it is very difficult to get a visa to live here permanantly. We had received our green cards during the whole Covid drama but were unable to use it as the US had an immigration ban in place. This was due to expire on the 31st December so we quit our jobs, sold everything we owned and booked our tickets to Portland as our son was getting married. Unfortunately at 8:30 pm on the 31st December 2020, President Trump extended the immigration ban by 3 months and we were left heartbroken. Our green cards were now useless, we had left our jobs and were unemployed, we had sold most of our belongings and the house we were renting was due to be demolished in 3 months. We were in quite the predicament!
6 weeks later, with only 4 weeks left on our visas to immigrate, we recieved word that President Biden had lifted the ban. We had a decision to make, do we jump on the last flight out in 4 hours to make our sons wedding or do we take our time to immigrate and miss our sons rescheduled wedding. Of course we got on that flight! We arranged to meet our family at the airport, rehomed a pet, arranged for the boarding of another until he could join us in the US, sold two cars, got a covid test and packed up our life into 5 suitcases- all within 4 hours. I have NEVER had that much adrenaline pulsing through my body. Our goodbyes were sorrowful. As leaving Australia, we were not allowed to repatriate for 12 months and didn’t know when we would see our family again. This was super tough to reconcile amidst Covid.
In Australia, I had owned a successful cafe and I felt like I had one more in me. During the first year of our time in the states, I visited a lot of coffee shops and cafes and tried to find the lay of the hospitality land. Australians have a particular love of coffee and I struggled to find something that felt like home. Hearts in East Nashville ( a fellow Aussie owned cafe) was a regular hang for us in climatising to the US.
In mid 2022, a friend asked me to meet her at a local place for coffee. The minute I walked in I could imagine it as a bustling cafe for the local community. The previous owner had set up a very small coffee and tea service in the middle of a natural and holistic supplement store. I felt instantly inspired by what the space could be. That meeting turned out to be quite serendipitous as the staff member told me that the owner was selling.
Within 6 weeks, we had the keys and begun a whirlwind transformation into what is now known as Elroy Coffee Co. We brought our Australian style food and coffee to the people of Franklin and have been welcomed by both the expat and local community. It’s a haven for creatives, with a huge musical clientele grabbing drinks and snacks on their way to recording and writing sessions, a meeting place where deals are signed and great local to hang out at. People have said it’s like a “Friends” crossed with “Cheers”. But that’s kind of how coffee shops are in Australia, they become a little community of their own
Can you share a story from your journey that illustrates your resilience?
Resilience is your middle name when you’re a small business owner.I remember 1 week into the cafe and my large fridge stopped working at 4:00pm in the afternoon. At first I sat and cried, I remember praying for what to do as I couldn’t open without a fridge and all this food and milk would spoil. I stashed the small display fridge and the one tiny milk fridge with everything I could. After a few phone calls, I managed to get a salesmen to bring out a brand new fridge for me by 8 am the next morning. This guy left his home at 5 am to drive the truck into the depo in order to bring me the fridge by 7:30. You better believe that I was beyond thankful and I have used him every time I have needed new equipment. Always develop relationships with people. Business will come and go, but bridges are very difficult to rebuild once burned down compared to keeping them in good working order to start with. We have since suffered power outages, point of sale failures, internet outages, equipment failure, you name it. This too will pass and in the scheme of life, it is only a small hiccup in the journey. People matter most. I’m still learning this lesson.
What’s a lesson you had to unlearn and what’s the backstory?
I definitely had to unlearn following the trends and feeling like an imposter. Imposter syndrome is real! You can be confidant in your product, your service, but you can still feel like you are faking it compared to the finely polished social media accounts of other similar businesses. I’ve had to let go of comparing oursleves to other coffee shops and embrace our own personality and identity. People want authenticity, they appreciate individuality and the uniqueness that we bring. Initially, I didn’t want to push the Australian factor, I wanted to be known for the great coffee and food we served. But people were curious. We have embraced our cultural heritage and now we get Aussies from all around Tennessee coming in to experience a sense of home and eat a meat pie. We celebrated Australia Day in January this year, serving Aussie styled tucker (food) and having a guest appearance by Bluey! It was standing room only and it we took in two days worth of trade in one day. Additionally, our local community has embraced our Aussie ways and we have managed to convince them to order long blacks ( instead of Americanos) and to try our flat whites. Don’t get caught up in following trends, embrace your authenticity and others will too.
Contact Info:
- Website: elroycoffeeco.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/elroycoffeeco/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Elroycoffeeco
Image Credits
Photos- Missi Calvert and Autumn Daniels