We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Miranda Quigley a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.
Alright, Miranda thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. Before we talk about all of your success, let’s start with a story of failure. Can you open up about a time when you’ve failed?
One of the big (or best) failures was financial and one we experienced in our early months of being open. We had originally used a specific payroll system that helped us get started when we began paying employees, and part of payroll includes paying taxes. Through the system we used, they would show that our payments were designated to either payroll and/or payroll taxes, and so I was relieved to know that the taxes were being taken care of each week.
Where I failed, was that I thought the payroll system was paying our taxes…when in reality they were telling me the amount to put in a “withholding account” for when it comes time to pay quarterly. Low and behold, our first tax season, we owed over $5,000 in payroll taxes and only had two days notice to pay it. We were able to pay it, and it wiped us out, but I remember being so grateful that we decided to pay quarterly, because had we waited until the end of the year, we would have owed over $20k in payroll taxes, and I’m not sure we would have been able to come back from it. Now, we have a specific tax withholding account designated just for these regular payments! Something every business should plan for.
It still took me three quarters to feel like I understand business taxes now, but that was a huge failure that I am grateful to have experienced so early on.
Miranda, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?
Opening a coffee shop was really my husband’s (Quigley) dream for a long time. He has loved and been in the coffee industry for over 15 years, and for a long time I did not ever see us being business owners. However, when COVID hit, and our world was shaken up as we had just had a 2 month old baby, we started to dream of what life could be if we did something crazy. We landed on wanting to do something in hospitality because we genuinely love connecting with people. And there is something really special about serving someone and making their experience extra special. In 2021, we opened up our mobile catering espresso cart and began serving weddings, corporate events, hotels, parties…you name it. We started connecting with other businesses and have fallen in love with what we do. AND we really do provide the highest quality coffee beverage you can get. We always say coffee is our thing, but people are our heart. And now, after two years of catering hundreds of events, our brick and mortar location in Sanford, FL, is set to open up in January 2024, and we can’t wait to keep expanding our relationships with people.
What’s been the best source of new clients for you?
Our best source of new clientele comes from the relationships we build with event coordinators. If we can let them know who we are and what we can do, they have all the clients already, and we get to help elevate their event to make it unforgettable.
Can you talk to us about how your funded your business?
Funding our business was tough, but also awesome. We bought our home when we first got married in 2016, and after living in it for 6 years, we had enough equity in it to be funded by the Small Business Administration (or SBA). We would not have been able to be funded if not for our home, and we are grateful we made the decisions we did in the past that helped us get to where we are.
Contact Info:
- Website: quigleycoffeeco.com
- Instagram: @quigleycoffeeco