Good Grief Coffee opens second location in Creemore
When asked about the origin of the name Good Grief Coffee, proprietor Alix Haddy just laughs and says, “There’s really no big story. My former business partner had a grandma who used to say that all the time, and we thought it was cute.”
Since opening the first Good Grief in Thornbury, she has discovered that lots of grannies use that expression.
Haddy was born and raised near Sudbury and studied sign language with the intention of becoming an interpreter. That plan changed when she met her now husband and moved to Collingwood eight years ago. Her husband is a partner in Gibson and Company, the wine bar and café. It was while working there as a barista that she joined forces with coworker Jesse Keast to launch Good Grief.
The pair decided to launch a café with a difference in Thornbury. As one of four coffee houses on the same stretch of Bruce Street, they knew they needed to do something special to survive.
“Jesse has a real passion for coffee. He used to roast beans in his apartment,” said Haddy. “We decided that we would roast our own coffee with great care and pride. We invested heavily in equipment and training and tested every variety of bean before adding it to our menu.”
The Thornbury location opened in 2019, just eight months before COVID changed the world.
“We were forced to close down the café and focus on the roastery business to keep us going,” said Haddy. “I was driving all over Southern Georgian Bay delivering coffee.”
Good Grief survived – as did the three other coffee shops on Bruce Street – and the café reopened in June 2020.
Good Grief was an instant hit, said Haddy, “It was a bit unexpected so we had no staff. The two of us were working non-stop and we had friends and relatives helping out on the weekends.”
Haddy is friends with Cassie and Jeremy Austin, owners of the Michelin Star-rated restaurant The Pine. When Cassie invited her to tour their newly renovated space on County Road 9 in Creemore, Haddy took one look at the retail space adjacent to the restaurant and was hooked. “It has these big windows full of light, sort of like the garage door at our Thornbury location.”
Keast decided to leave the business last summer meaning Haddy was on her own to staff the café, but she had fallen in love with the Creemore location and decided to open Good Grief Coffee, Creemore at the end of September.
“For now, we’re open Thursday to Sunday, and it’s just me,” she said. “It’s too soon to bring on more staff. I’d rather be perpetually tired than expand too soon. We’ll hire staff next summer.”
The Creemore location is take-out only.
“I’d love to have some seating but I’m going to wait and see how it goes before I commit to investing in washrooms,” said Haddy.
For now, Haddy works six days a week behind the counter, splitting her time between Thornbury and Creemore. Both locations are closed on Monday when she and a roasting expert spend a full 12-hour day roasting beans. Their best seller is a Brazilian espresso bean, Fazenda Jatoba. “It’s a very traditional bean, chocolatey and smooth and works equally well for espresso or drip coffee.”
Good Grief features at least five different beans at any given time, with the selection rotating based on the growing cycle of the beans. Haddy says the local coffee drinking population is becoming quite sophisticated. “Lots of people moved up here to their second homes during Covid and some never left. We’ve got a lot of millennials who are doing their own research and asking lots of questions.”
Good Grief Coffee is located at 7535 County Road 9 in Creemore.
