What started as a dream few years ago is a now a success story many wish to learn from. The blog post on CW site highlights the contributions of the team, suppliers, service providers, franchisees and other supporters.
What I wish to share here are the 20 unique things about Coffee Wagera. We may be the only (or the first) café in Pakistan to…
- Support women empowerment by buying most of our snacks from female entrepreneurs, and to further support the community through Brunch Wagera
- Hire transgender as a barista, and to offer a free training program for transgenders
- Have a menu in Braille for the visually impaired
- Learn sign language to communicate with customers with speech/hearing impairment
- Say ‘no’ to plastic bottles, and provide free drinking water to all customers
- Implement ten steps to reduce waste, support clean-city and be eco-friendly
- Support students and startups, by providing a fully functional workbench, with individual power/USB socket for a minimum spending of just Rs.248 per day
- Provide three WIFI connections (and free coffee if WIFI doesn’t work)
- Provide low-cost franchise opportunities to promote entrepreneurship
- Support local artists by displaying and selling their ‘coffee paintings’ at every outlet
- Run innovative events like Coffee Tour in collaboration with other cafes, Brunch Wagera to support female entrepreneurs, Coffee Workshops to share coffee skills/knowledge, free training programs for personal development, Open Mic to encourage new talent…
- Provide “happiness” training to all staff
- Greet every customer with the most enthusiastic “Salam Alaikum! Welcome to Coffee Wageraaaaaa!”
- Open 5 outlets in 2 years (the last four opened within a span of six months)
- Operate a cafe without any kitchen/cooking
- Implement ‘no free beverages/snacks’ policy that applies to all owners, family members, friends, bloggers, influencers, celebrities… and everyone else who wishes to support CW
- Offer a 10% discount to students and senior citizens
- Offer free coffee to non-Pakistani visitors, when they buy any snacks
- Offer free coffee on your birthday, when you buy any snacks
- Have a founder with an official designation of ‘Chief Happiness Officer’ – Mush Panjwani also teaches happiness at corporates and non-profits, and is also a published author.
And we are very proud to receive the ‘Best Coffee Place of the Year 2019‘ award by APRA (All Pakistan Restaurant Association).
The lockdown due to Corono did not allow us to celebrate the 2nd Anniversary with a party, but we had a virtual meeting with 30+ team members, complete with a flashback slideshow (inserted above), an address by Mush and many special Awards of Appreciation.
Extremely grateful to have achieved the first goal of opening five outlets in Karachi in two years, and moving forward with a lot of faith for the next goal: 20 across Pakistan in five years. Thank you everyone for your support.
Mush Panjwani 