Novel Café takes campus by storm

“A cup of coffee and a good read shared with a friend is happiness tasted and time well spent,” is the motto of A Novel Café, the new coffee shop which opened in the library this week.

The coffee shop has seen almost more business than librarian Heidi Spruill can handle.

“I want to encourage them to come to the library,” Spruill said. “But when there are so many classes at once, we can’t get them all served in one class period.”

Spruill had to send an email to teachers asking them to schedule visits for their classes instead of just sending students with no warning.

“I think it’s a wonderful addition,” senior Joey Todd said. “It keeps me awake in class.”

Librarian Heidi Spruill said the idea of a coffee shop in the library was given to her by a sales representative at a monthly meeting held by the library staff.

“The sales rep said a coffee shop was ‘the going thing right now’,” Spruill said. “I’m not doing this as a fundraiser. Last year, seniors who had their conference periods first came into the library to do homework or read, and this year no one comes in in the morning. I’m mainly doing this to draw kids in and make them feel comfortable.”

Spruill held a contest to name the coffee shop, accepting name ballots for several weeks. Family consumer sciences teacher Julie Jameson’s idea of A Novel Café won. She won 10 free cups.

“I can have hot tea!” Jameson said. “I love it when I win stuff. Mrs. Spruill and I looked on the Internet. It was a group effort, so I think I’ll share the prize.”

Spruill said much research went into the making of A Novel Café. Spruill has been in contact with the librarian at Dalhart, which also has a coffee shop. Other schools have taken this idea as well like Round Rock High School in state and  Centennial High School in Tennessee.

Spruill has been careful not to break any educational nutrition rules.

The Texas Public School Nutrition Policy stipulates that “Beverages (other than milk)…may contain no more than 30 grams total sugar per eight fluid ounce serving.”

Students will be unable to purchase anything during their lunch periods, since the coffee shop is not in competition with the cafeteria.

Spruill said she was given only two administrative “stipulations.” One was that the coffee cups had to be covered, and the other  was that students couldn’t take their drinks out of the library.

Spruill also said students are limited to two cups a day.

A Novel Café will be open by 8:15 in the morning and will close when Spruill leaves at night. It will serve more than coffee. Cappucinos, decaffeinated coffee, hot chocolate, flavored hot chocolate, tea and apple cider are a few of the other drinks that are on the menu. Everything on the menu is a dollar or less, and the cups are 12 ounces.

Spruill said she and her aides will man the coffee shop during the day since she doesn’t have the funds to hire workers.

Spruill said some of the money that goes back into the library will be used to buy games like chess. She also said that if a student’s parents don’t want them to have anything from A Novel Café, they could put it in writing.

On Monday morning A Novel Café had a line of first customers.

Senior Stephanie Fehr said she was surprised that the school was letting Mrs. Spruill open the shop, but “coffee and books were one of my favorite combinations.”