The Do Good Team Podcast
A podcast where we highlight nonprofits and charitable causes with the goal of improving your life and those around you through inspiration and creating meaningful connections. Together, we'll do some good and spread some love.
The Do Good Team Podcast
Episode 5 - Community Building, Youth Programs, and Black-Owned Businesses with Black Coffee Northwest
In today's episode Nora and David sit down with Darnesha Weary, co-founder of Black Coffee Northwest. Black Coffee Northwest, a 501(c)3 nonprofit business, is a gathering space with more than just coffee; it is a Black-owned, family-owned, community-driven organization providing local youth with job training, mental health services, and much more! It's a place where people meet, cultivate relationships, develop new ideas, and also a place to grab a delicious cup of coffee. Please join us and listen to the wonderful work Darnesha and Erwin Weary are engaged in to make their community better and, additionally, flip the script on how to run a successful business with empathy and justice as core foundational principles.
You can visit their website and donate directly by following this link: http://www.blackcoffeenw.com/
Darnesha and Erwin are amazing examples of doing some good and spreading love in our communities and we're excited to share their success.
As always, we hope that Darnesha and Erwin's story inspires you to do some good and spread some love by engaging directly with Black Coffee Northwest, donating, or sharing this episode with others.
Juntos, somos un buen equipo (together, we're a good team)!
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David:
Thanks so much for listening to The Do Good Team Podcast. We've been working with several nonprofits over the past few months and a common theme keeps occurring. Please share these episodes. Awareness about the issues these nonprofits tackle is incredibly important to their mission, and you can immediately make an impact by subscribing to our podcast on the platform you're listening to and follow us on social media and leave us a 5 star review so others may find our episode. And now we present our episode.
Nora:
You’re listening to Episode 5 of The Do Good Team Podcast, an interview with Black Coffee Northwest.
[Introduction Music]
David:
Hello do gooders out there and thank you so much for listening to another episode of the Do Good Team, a podcast where we highlight nonprofits and charitable causes with the goal of improving your life and those around you through inspiration and creating meaningful connections. I am one of your hosts, David.
Nora:
Hello everybody I am your other host Nora.
David:
And it's great to be back with another episode, episode five. Well, technically episode 6, but this is our fifth interview episode, and we're excited about today's episode because, well, we're talking about coffee today. Well, two things. We're talking about coffee, which is really important to Nora and I because we are avid coffee. But the second reason why we're really excited about today's episode is because it's the first episode where we're conducting an interview through a recommendation of one of our listeners. So this recommendation is coming from the President of Shoreline Community College, Jack Kahn, who is also a friend of mine. So huge shout out to you, Jack, for making this recommendation, Black Coffee Northwest up in Shoreline, WA. We're just really excited that you made this recommendation because we had great conversations with the CEO and co-founder. It's a great organization and, like I said before, we get to talk about coffee! So while we're still talking about coffee, Nora, what are some of your favorite coffee flavors or coffee places that you've visited?
Nora:
Well, coffee flavors, that's kind of a little hard to think about just on the spot just because there's so many wonderful coffees, different origins, different flavors different combinations. But there's three coffee places in particular that are very close, personal and dear to you and I. And we definitely would like to share some of those recommendations to anybody that's ever in any of these areas. So usually when we go up to Humboldt and we drive up to Humboldt, we do a few coffee shops along the way. And one of our first stop is actually at Steep Coffee and Hopland. There's a honey lavender latte that is delicious. We get that and sometimes we just get the drip coffee, which is amazing. We also make a pit stop at Black Oak Coffee in Ukiah. They have a wonderful little place full of a variety of different coffees, so that's also one of the places that we really. And that we visit on our way up and down from driving to Humboldt. And then finally, we haven't gotten attempts to go to this place for a little bit ,but we love Seattle and we love Seattle Coffee Works. We always take time to go have a cup of coffee at the location in Seattle. Those are three of my favorite places to go visit. For coffee.
David:
Nora, I think I know what your favorite flavor of coffee is.
Nora:
What is it?
David:
Folgers instant.
Nora:
I do love my Folgers instant. I mean, I love authentic coffee and not that I'm saying that instant coffee isn’t. But instant coffee reminds me a lot of my childhood growing up. My mom loves plain, simple, Folgers instant coffee. I really love it. There was a family friend of ours who I used to hang out with. He was his name was Don Marcelino. You know, and he was a nearby neighbor, kind of like an adoptive grandfather for me and my siblings. And he would always make the Folgers instant coffee with evaporated milk and, oh, my gosh, it is delicious. Very simple. It's a very simple thing to do, but instant Folgers coffee with evaporated milk and a little bit of sugar is. Wonderful and so homey.
David:
Oh, now I'm getting really excited because some memories are coming to head. There was one time that we were traveling. I think we were traveling up to Humboldt. I think we might have stopped in some restaurant in San Jose where they were, where we bought a cup of Cafe de olla. And they had steeped their coffee with orange peel.
Nora:
Oh yeah.
David:
If you're not familiar with it is it's black coffee with piloncillo, which is a kind of a brown sugar. But what they did in this coffee as well was they steeped it with orange rind. So the coffee had just this real nice hint of orange .That was one of my favorite cups of coffee I've ever had.
Nora:
It was wonderful. Yeah, it's a very traditional Mexican type of coffee. And then as David said, you add piloncillo, you add some cinnamon sticks and orange rind.
David:
I usually drink my coffee black on account that I can't drink a lot of dairy stuff cause I'm lactose intolerant. I really like beans from Ethiopia. That seems to be my favorite because they usually have some type of like fruity flavor profile, usually kind of like berries in the background, so I really do like that a lot, but I used to think that it was a coffee snob. But I discovered that I'm just a coffee floozy. I just like coffee, so I have to say that Folgers instant coffee is also something that I really like, so I cannot attest to being a snob anymore. I'm sure my coffee snob card is rejected after confessing my love for Folgers Instant; it's good. Right now we are drinking a cup of Black Coffee Northwest right now, and we're drinking their Snoho Mojo Blend. You could get this online and we'll share the website a little bit later with you. It's described to have notes of hazelnut, macadamia and BlackBerry. Now, we're gonna keep you in suspense and give you a review after the actual interview. So stay tuned, we're going to give you a review of the coffee. I'll give a little spoiler -- it's pretty good, but I'll tell you what I taste coming up soon.
Nora:
So please stay.
David:
Yes, stay tuned, and in today's interview we sat down with co-founder Darnisha Weary of Black Coffee Northwest, who operates Black Coffee Northwest with her husband, Irwin weary. So, Nora, why don't you tell everybody listening in a little bit about the organization?
Nora:
We are very honored and grateful to have had an opportunity to sit with back Coffee Northwest and interview them. So just a little bit of background on black coffee northwest, aside from being a coffee shop, as the name entails. The organization is a black-owned family owned community driven 501C3 nonprofit organization that is focused on providing support to local youth and some of the support that is provided includes job training, mental health services, amongst many other things that you'll have an opportunity to hear Darnisha share directly with you . Black Coffee Northwest isa place where people have an opportunity to meet and make connection, to cultivate relationships, and also share and develop new ideas. It's a place where people have an opportunity to step back from the daily hustle and enjoy the community and enjoy the exceptional beverage that is offered and, aside from that, be able to build and center a place where people feel at safe at home and enjoy a wonderful cup of coffee. So their mission statement reads that they are a proactive and innovative community building through youth leadership development. They do this through integrating creativity. Exemplifying excellence and meeting the needs of the community so the organization, though it is a business, it takes a different approach that when one has a business that you still have the ability to be accountable and connect with your Community, support your community and bring change to your company.
David:
I don't think I've actually met so many people in my life that are so community focused like Darnisha and by extension Irwin, who we didn't get to have a conversation with. We talked with Darnisha, but almost everything she talked about, and people will hear this, it was there. This business model it's a 501C3, but a business model that is purely community driven and. It was so refreshing to hear Darnisha talk about that vision, where she came from and kind of how this idea came about and we’re just so excited to see this company be around in Washington where her and Irwin can spread their love, their hope and their message. And I feel very honored and I know I'm probably speaking for both of us, Nora, I feel very honored to be able to share Darnisha and Irwin's vision with many more people and make them aware of Black Coffee Northwest. Also, go visit their website and get a good cup of coffee.
Nora:
Right, exactly. And we want to share a quote from our interview that really captures the meaning of everything that David just shared. So during our interview, Darnisha stated the following, “We're creating a new normal and a new standard for running a nonprofit organization. And a new standard for running a business.” So we now want to go ahead and introduce you to our episode and interview with Darnisha. We hope you enjoy it.
David:
See you on the other side of the interview, everybody.
David:
See you on the other side.
[TRANSITION MUSIC]
David:
Hello everyone, thanks so much for joining us on another episode of the Do Good Team. We are here today with Darnesha Wearry, the co-founder of Black Coffee Northwest, along with her husband, Irwin Weary, it is a coffee shop and community hub in Shoreline Washington. Darnesha, thanks so much for joining us today.
Darnesha:
Happy to be here. Thank you for having me. I'm super excited.
Nora:
Yes, thank you. We really appreciate your time and are super excited to share with the audience all the great work that Black Coffee Northwest is doing Amazing. Yes, can't wait to share.
David:
Yes, and anybody who is a lover of coffee is a friend to us.
Darnesha:
Hey man, I agree with that, I love coffee.
Nora:
And we definitely have to throw in there that, as we were speaking with Darnesha, if you want to share a little bit with us about the ranking of your coffee specifically.
Darnesha:
So we ranked top 10 actually coffee shops in the Seattle area and the greatest Seattle area and that was voted on actually by consumers and so we're really excited because Seattle is definitely a coffee place. So to be a new coffee shop popping up our coffee is delicious and so it was really exciting to be a new company and to be ranked that high.
David:
So for our listeners who have not been to Seattle and I really love coffee, I know Nora really loves coffee too it has, at least in my mind. I haven't been to a lot of places but the best coffee in any city that I've ever been to. It's amazing. So to reach that level of top 10 so early on in the foundation of the company is an amazing accomplishment. And so the listeners know we do the interview and then Nora and I we do the introduction in the outro recording. Later we will be having a cup of black coffee, northwest coffee, when we do that other additional recording. So we'll let you know everybody how good it is and we're looking forward to it.
Darnesha:
Amazing. I want honest reviews too, so I love to hear feedback.
David:
Alrighty Danisha, why don't you just tell us a little bit about yourself?
Darnesha:
Yes, so I am Seattle born and raised and so I am local to this area and we've been. You know I have been here my whole entire life. I love the coffee scene here. I love community outreach work. I am married to my husband. We've been married for 23 years now. We have two children. Ine of them is in college at Dillard University, which is a HBCU in New Orleans. She's back home for the summer. She is the president of our company and we did that on purpose and we can talk about that a little bit later as well. We have a son who's back home now and really just trying to figure out what he wants to do next in his career, which we're excited that we have this opportunity for him to grow with us and our company.
I'm definitely in a different stage of life now. Being an empty nester. Having raised my children, I feel like I've done. I did my job of getting them through school and kind of getting them out in the world to be good people, and that was really my husband and I's goals is just to raise good humans, and I feel like we did that, and so now we're really able to concentrate and focus on building a business for ourselves and building it for our kids and our community and anyone else that attaches to it, and it's really kind of this, this collective win and this collective good, and so we really, really love that part of our work. So I spent my time in nonprofits and so I spent over 20 years in the nonprofit sector, starting as a volunteer.
Like literally walking into a place and saying I want to work with kids and they were like, okay, but what happened is a lot of people started to notice and see traits in me that were that needed to be developed as a young person entering into the workforce, and I was so blessed and thankful to have so many great mentors around me and I was so intergenerational from both young and old, people who had been in the sector for a long time, black women who had been in nonprofits for a long time that could really help me navigate through the system, help me and correct me and hold my hand and stand in front of me when needed and echo and develop me to become a senior executive, and that's where I left in 2020. I'd worked my way up really to that level, but it wasn't alone. It was really with a group of people kind of surrounding me and help develop me, and also just my husband being there and being a great partner. As I rose up the ranks, got up to the top, didn't feel great.
Honestly, it didn't feel great. It wasn't what I thought it was going to be. It took me further away from people, and that's what I love. I love being with people. And so 2020 came and it was time to make a change. I think we could all agree with that. 2020 really left me questioning a lot my purpose, why am I here? What am I doing?
We all had a lot of time to think. I just went it there. We thought a lot and it was time for me to make a move. And this opportunity came and we went ahead and we took it. We didn't know what we were doing, we didn't know how it was going to happen, we just knew that it was time to do it and I'm so thankful that we did that. We listened and we did it. So that's who I am. Yeah, along with Black Coffee, I also do. My husband and I started a step team, a drill team of a performing arts program Back in 2000,. That was our first nonprofit and it's now since turned into the nonprofit that we have now at Black Coffee.
But I love dancing, I'm an artist. I love singing, I love music. So does my husband. We're church kids. I like to say that we grew up in the Black church, so it was lots of singing and music and performance and art, and so that's what we love, and so we love to share that with kids. And we did a music video with Lizzo about the artist Lizzo, about community healing, and so I love the fact that it was noticed in Hollywood from Little Old Shoreline, which is a small city, and so you know, that's the good work that I love to do and why I keep doing it.
Nora:
Wonderful. I actually would love, Darnesha, if you could share a little bit about the story of the challenges that you faced and that led you to decide to set up the coffee shop. In particular, I remember from our conversation the funding that you used to establish the coffee shop and that's just such a beautiful use of the funding. If you could share that story with our audience, I think it's just so important and such a beautiful story to share.
Darnesha:
Yeah, absolutely I would love to. So our coffee shop is located in Shoreline Washington, which is a really small suburb of Seattle. It's about 20 minutes north of Seattle and it's not a very diverse place. It's about 6% black people and my family is black, and so we're in a place where we're not seeing very much, there's very little representation, and so, you know, we, when it was time to open black coffee, people heard the name. They were like, oh, black coffee, that sounds great and it's not black coffee.
And then, when they saw who we were right, when they saw who we were, it changed abruptly, and so the questions started to come. People started to say, well, why would you call it black coffee? And people were like that's racist, why would you say that? Why would you do that? And so we started getting opposition very quickly, and I was expecting it, but not at that level and not at that rate. And just to remind, we were back in 2020, everything was shut down. The world had changed. There was a huge racial uprising happening, there was a lot of things going on in our local community and in our world actually, and so when we decided to open the shop at that time, we knew we were going to have some pushback. We just didn't know that we were going to have that level of hate. We did not know, and so that came out, you know. But on the other side of that, a lot of people started to show up and say we do want change, we do want good in our community, we do want things different.
And so we did some crowdfunding and we did raise, you know, our first. I think it was like $50,000. We raised our first $50,000 crowdfunding on Facebook and it was just we just put it out there like we got this coffee shop. The community knew who we were because we had been doing community work in that area and organizing for over 20 years through our step team. So they had seen us out in the community doing the work. My husband has played Black Santa multiple years because we wanted kids that look like me to have a Santa Claus that look like them. We had done community events for multiple years and have been consistent in our work and so people you know did so. You know they sewed a seed into our vision and that first $50,000 is really what helped us kind of open the doors and get us get ourselves running.
So there was a community that we're opposing it and the community that were for it and supported it, and the beautiful part of that is that people just kept coming and coming and coming and the more they hate came. There was an attempted arson in our building. Before we opened, someone literally tried to burn it down and there's video of that. Like you hear it, we were there, but then when I sat back and watched the video, I was like, wow, that is a level of hate that I've never. Literally looked at a business is like I want to burn that down because of what they look like, because they are in our community and they are Black.
We had swastikas drawn in our building, we had multiple windows broken. We've had multiple things happen, but on the other side of that, we have so much good that's coming out of that space. We have so many people who are showing up saying we want change, we want different, it has to be different. We have so many people of color, we have so many Black people that come and say I feel seen, I feel heard. For the first time ever, I can go into a place and not be the only one, and so I never will let the bad outshadow the good and we just use that as fuel to continue to tell the spirit that opposition will come, opposition will show up, but if you're doing the good work, just keep doing it and keep going and remain strong and it will always work out at the end.
Nora:
Thank you so much for sharing that story, Darnesha. I really love what you've highlighted, that, despite the challenge, the most important pieces, the direct impact and the direct positive impact that this has done to the participants and the community itself, having a space that's safe, where they are feeling visible and then where they're finding the strength to fight back and advocate for no, this is something that we deserve, something that we need and something that we're going to continue to ensure that it's protected so we can have it for ourselves and for the community.
David:
And one of the things that's so interesting that we know about racism and bigotry. There really isn't a logic behind it and while Black Coffee Northwest has a focus on the Black community and Black excellence, if you look at your website and you look at any video on YouTube, it's very clear that your organization and you, yourself and Irwin, are welcoming of every human being that would walk through that door.
Darnesha:
When you walk into Black Coffee, you see everyone. I laugh sometimes when I look in the lobby. You may see someone sleeping on the couch, you know. And you may see someone in the suit doing work at a laptop. You may see students reading. You'll see parents, kids, crawling all over the floor, you know. You might see babies, you might see dogs, but everyone is in that space at the same time and it's peaceful and it's joyful and it's happy and we love that we've created that space so much Like I walk in and just like, wow, this is what it's supposed to be, this is what it's supposed to look like.
Nora:
Thank you so much for helping us visualize that space Like I. I just imagine it in my head and it brings like a really big sense of desire to be in that space and it's just like a lot of sense of serenity and acceptance overall it's.
Darnesha:
It's a beautiful thing it is. And when nonsense, you know, shows up because nonsense likes to show up, sometimes right, and my number one phrase is like we don't entertain nonsense, like I've seen a lot of time Engaging in nonsense right things, that people that just want it to be angry or people that just did not want to have any Understanding we just don't engage with that. We just simply ask people to leave, and they do, and it's because the whole community of our company inside We'll look at you like why are you here trying to disrupt what we're doing? And it's such a beautiful thing to see, and so I really love that our community holds itself Accountable for its behaviors and actions, and that's what it's supposed to be.
Nora:
That's very healthy, that's that's creating an environment of a lot of like. Well, first of all, for the individuals, and that's where we kind of want to ask you next, a little bit of like, what are some of the different services that are Offered? What is some of the development that is offered to through the coffee shop? But, before kind of going to that is just like that. Everybody that's in that space is having an opportunity to grow and to learn and understand boundaries in a very healthy way, in a very safe way.
As you had shared with David a little bit with us prior to this interview, like, your staffing consists of a variety of different individuals that you'll talk to us about. It's a really great opportunity to also develop that professionalism of like, how to handle those sort of situations in a way that isn't as stressful or scary or intimidating, that it focuses on respect, on, you know, the valuing of a human being, but also being very comfortable with Establishing boundaries of what one is willing and not willing to accept. Yes, that if you could talk to us a little bit about that. Next, Darnesha, a little bit of like, what kind of programs or what kind of supports? What kind of services are offered? There are so many we're excited to share with the audience.
Darnesha:
Yes, I love the services from black coffee. First, our team is, is, is, is is all young, the Gen Z, right, it's that age range that everyone's like they're so hard to work with. I don't understand them. You know it's that age range who fuels and drives our company, so I want to put that out there before I talk about the programs, because it's all from them, it's their vision, and so behind our coffee shops we have a coffee shop, a espresso cafe. We have tables and seating and, and you know, food and pastries. There's a door in our lobby. Behind that door we built a place called grounded and grounded youth development center. Behind those doors is a small library. We have a library of black authors back there. That's a part of King County library system. Our staff and team made an actual library site and so the library has donated Multiple books that people come and check out every single day. Behind those doors is a room that's painted bright yellow and it's called the situation room, and it came about because that was the room that we would always just take kids in or just have hard Conversations in, right like what's going on, and that space we provide free mental health camp for you. We have two therapists that are on staff with this that provide mental health counseling for students ages eight up to 24. We just expanded the age to 24 for that early college age, and so we have sessions available every single week for students. We also have mentorship that happens out of that room and small group therapy as well every other week.
In the next room we have a big red room and it's called our podcasting room. It's a podcast recording studio and a music studio, and that's where kids and youth who want to explore podcasting or just be creative. We have kids in there that are recording YouTube videos. You know social media and these platforms are lucrative and we just want kids to have access to that and say that you can, actually this can be your career, and so they're making like YouTube tutorials, makeup tutorials, all types of things, and they also have a podcast as well that's recorded in there. And then Mackie audio, which is another one of our local Spot our excuse me, our local partners is actually going to do a remake of that studio into a music studio, and so we're really excited to provide that opportunity, thank you, for youth who are interested in the music industry. My husband's a musician and audio engineer as well and so we're going to be doing some auto engineering courses we already started those. And we also have another room that's painted bright green and that's our music room where we have instruments. We have a keyboard, guitar, space guitar, a drum set and it's a place for people can just come be creative. Kids have music lessons in there. People just go in there and just play music and I love Sometimes you just walk in there, you just hear like a band playing and it's just like it's so amazing.
And then in our other, our meeting space, we have a toiletry or, excuse me, a hygiene area where kids are able just to grab Whatever they want or the hygiene kit. We have snacks every day. We're adjacent to a high school walking distance so students can come and just grab a cup of noodle, a Macaroni and cheese or chips and snacks and they can grab lunch if they need it no questions asked. You'll just see kids walk back there and walk out no questions asked if you need any hygiene things a toothbrush, deodorant, whatever sometimes I encourage the deodorant, but all those things are free for use. All of our programs for kids are free. We have our step team program that practices twice the week. They just did a parade yesterday, which on Wednesdays, which was super fun and they got second place out of the whole parade, which is really great. So you may walk into our coffee shop and see a dance team practicing, a band going on youth Reading in the library and it's just an active, robust place and it's the brainchild of our staff.
And my daughter, who's named a president of our company, she's our succession plan. We're building it for her. We're building it for that next generation, because we know changes need it. We got to do things different and we're creating a new normal and a new standard of operating a nonprofit Organization and the standard of creating an and also a new standard of running a business. This is the way that it's supposed to be done and now we have proven outcomes to actually prove that. And so we're year three in. I'm a nonprofit person, operations person that have data behind everything, and so we can prove and show that if you stand up and if you do the right thing and if you are on the the side of good, that everything will literally your business will succeed and can be successful.
Nora:
Thank you so much, Darnesha. This is just so robust and like, so wonderful to hear All of the services that are available and then to get the description of kind of like envisioning walking through the space. I love just how like, robust and vivid and full of life, the, the spaces and all the different types of services that are available. I kind of wanted to go back a little bit to the mental health piece and just kind of highlight just how Wonderful and the organization, your organization, is in terms of things connected to social equity, justice and inclusion. When we had the preliminary Interview, you shared with us a little bit about how intentional like you have been with Ensuring that the therapists that are working with the youth and young adults, that they are culturally appropriate. Can you talk to us a little bit about the background of like, the, the vision of that therapy and what you're providing through your therapist for just individuals with different backgrounds?
Darnesha:
Absolutely so we started thinking about what community needed back in 2020 and in part of 2020, right, mental health. We knew that mental health was screening at us. People needed support. Kids and youth needed support, adults needed support, and so we started to look at. You know, and even our staff was like you know, we're experiencing anxiety. Or you would hear these things like I need a mental health day. And I would hear when I was working for other organizations, I would hear people who, like, I don't understand what that means and what's the mental health day, and you know why can't they just suck it up and get over it? And I'm like things have to be different. If, if, if they're, if the community is screaming they need this, we have to figure, and that's what equity means. Equity means that we Take on the responsibility of changing. We don't, we don't force the community to change to fit in our box. We change to fit their needs, and so we have a room, we have extra space.
We found out about a new Behavioral health center that was black owned, that was small and in our community, and one of them and the co-founder or the founder of that, was someone that we knew and trusted, and we reached out and we say can we collaborate? Because collaboration is key in this work. And so we said can we? Can you provide the therapists? Because we can't afford to hire therapists, right, but we can write grants together and we can go after funding together to provide the service. And that is exactly what we did. We worked together, we went and found a funding for this program. We hired they have a therapist that is black American, that's born in America, that it comes from a black family. We also have a first-gen immigrant therapist who is an immigrant from Africa coming to this country Trying to figure out identity as a black person now in America.
And so those are two different communities, two separate. They have. They have two separate sets of needs and we recognize that and a lot of people just clump all black people into one category. Right, like you all look the same, so you all have the same set of needs and we are not, and so we are not a monolith. We are very layered and we have different sets, and so we need to make sure that we spoke to both.
Also around us, as a high immigrant population, we have a high first-gen population, we have a lot of first-gen on our staff and we want to make sure that those needs are met too, and so we have both of those therapists on staff and it goes really well. Those sessions fill up very quickly. Students are able to just request them on Instagram, they can go and fill out the form and they can get an appointment, and we have provided access and no barriers to that and it's going really well. We just had to add more sessions actually Because they fill up, and so it just goes to prove that if you are equitable and if you're working for deliberation and justice, then you'll make sure that all of your systems and every all your Partnerships speak to that, because if we had a partner that didn't understand that, we wouldn't be able to do the work.
If we had, if we weren't able to come together and co-write and get funding for it and the appropriate, we wouldn't be able to do the work, and so it was very intentional, it was very slow and we did that on purpose, but it's working really well and I and I love that kids just come to the coffee shop and have a counseling session. We took away the stigma as well. They can come in their lunch break, they can come I don't know when they come because I don't keep up with their schedule, but I'll just see them coming in and out and I'm like what a blessing. Like for me it's a blessing to be able to have the space, but our job was just to provide the space. I'm a grant writer. We can write the grant and we can find partners and do the work together.
Nora:
That's a wonderful and what a Amazing problem to have, to have to create more space so that more individuals, more of our youth and young adults can come in and receive services, and you highlighted. This is another really amazing Achievement is that you increase the ages to incorporate College age into young adults as well.
Darnesha:
Yes, we did yes because they were starting to come around. You know, we're very intentional about looking and seeing and trying to anticipate the needs of our community, and so we have a lot of college kids coming around one year, last year at finals time, it was just like stress. I could feel the tension in the room. I was like whoah, like these kids are stressed and so that's how you decide to kind of in in the hands or increase the age and they are coming and coming, and coming and I love that.
Nora:
I really appreciate your perspective on what you just indicated about the support that the college students are receiving. I currently work as a career advisor and one thing is that you know, when it comes to any individual like, a holistic approach is essential and when we're looking at college students going through finals and see that they're stressed, you know it can fail. But we can fail the students if we only just focus on the fact like, oh, they're stressed about an exam. And here, like, the perspective that you're taking is, hey, there's other things that these students are facing that is making them be even more stressed about an exam. For example, you mentioned a lot of first generation, that like feeling of like I can't fail.
My family yes, like, my family's worked really hard to get me to where I'm at. Like that pressure of like being able to be successful, which then comes with other layers of like financially, like if I fail, then I won't be able to go to school. So this support that you're being able to provide to the college students just addresses so many other layers that really take something that might look like, oh, it's an academic thing only, and really addressing other stressors, other barriers, other just life Things that, if they weren't addressed is not going to allow for them to stay focused in their academics and even complete their education. So just thank you so much for the work that you're doing.
Darnesha:
Thank you, thank you, and I learned just by listening and watching. You know it's my responsibility as the leader of this work and I take on that responsibility with pride and with joy that I have to be intentional and I have to watch and I have to pay attention and I hold myself accountable to that every day, that I don't get caught up in the weeds of it all, in the paperwork and the numbers and the data and the outcomes of it all, that they stay true to who we are. And I pay attention. And that's why I love having a younger staff around me, because one thing they will do is not let you forget what you said. Right, they will be like what you said and they also watch you and they watch how you move and they watch are you paying attention?
And I know that young people may not always have the language, they may not always have the words to say how they're feeling, but we can watch how they're acting and we can feel shifts in energy and I'm just really have trained myself to pay attention to that and to make decisions and ask questions on that. Like, hey, y'all, like I feel like everybody's a little stressed right now, like what's going on and just ask and they will tell you, and I don't just ask them to hear it and not do anything about it. I ask them and I hear it and I may say like I don't have a solution for that now. Thank you for telling me. I just needed to know and we'll work on something for that. Or how can we best support you and not just go off and make up things right, like I'm a non-proper person and that's what I was trained to do, like go create a program. Oh my goodness, you got to fix it. You got to fix it.
Nora:
Like the follow through is so important? Yeah, as you indicate, because it helps establish that trust, it helps establish the continuing to work on oneself and showing up and doing, because you're seeing that modeled, you're even seeing the model of like I don't always have to have the answers immediately, that's okay, but we will research it, we take it seriously and we come back to it. So that's wonderful and actually leads really well into the next question. So your program. You've already kind of discussed the importance of developing leaders and helping develop your staff. You had talked to us a little bit about, like, the social justice program. So maybe if now you could share a little bit about the social justice program and any other opportunities that are available through, like the coffee shop, to help the young adults and youth develop their leadership skills, their professionalism, like how you help foster those skills.
Darnesha:
Absolutely In 2020,. When we started this, you know, I was in, like I said before, a crisis of understanding, right, and everyone was in a crisis of like, what is going on around us? How does all of this work? There was so much like misinformation and chaos. And so what's going on? How do we unpack this?
And so we had a lot of youth in our area, who you know. We have a lot of activists, right, our coffee shop really does attract activists. It attracts people who have a cause and whatever that causes, they are passionate about it. And so we have a lot of young people show up and say I am passionate about environmental justice, I am passionate about, you know, social, economic, like the gap in our unhoused community and how does all this work? And so what I started to do is just train them and how systems work, how communities are put together, and I'm so thankful that I have so many great people around us that would come in and talk to the kids and I would say I don't know anything about, like how city council works, like, I don't know, but I have friends in city council that can talk to you and teach you how local government works. And so we just started connecting people to people to have these conversations, and so what it did?
It started affirming that, it started kind of highlighting the issues and the kids started understanding where they lied within the system and we just started equipping them and training them because one day, the goal is that they will disrupt that and one day they will go in and they will make the change that's needed, because there's no reason why we have to continue to be resilient in this fight. We don't want to be resilient anymore. We are we. I don't want to be resilient anymore, like my people have been resilient for a long time. It's time for us to break down those barriers and undo those systems and call things out and make change. And we had to figure out where you know where's the gatekeeping, where are, but where do the things live? And so I love studying and I love. I love politics in the way of not like. I'm not like. I love politics like that. I love to learn how things work. I'm curious. People may call me nosy. My daughter calls me nosy.
Nora:
Wait, Darnisha, you have a partner in nosiness. I don't know if you know a lot of things too.
David:
Yeah, in Spanish we call it “chisme”. There’s nothing wrong with it!
Darnesha:
There's nothing wrong with it. I like to research things and these young people have access to information. I never had that social media they have. They can go the before I would know things. They already knew things. I'm like, did you guys hear about? And they're like we already heard that on TikTok, we already heard that on Twitter. Like that was trending last night. I'm like, oh, by the time it got to like the actual news station, they already knew.
And so what we did is we created a social justice internship program for youth who are interested in social justice. And what does it mean to disrupt systems? And how do we even know where the harm is being caused? And the system is the system. It's going to do what it does. And once you learn that and you teach kids that they can't know it. They see it everywhere, they see it in their schools and they show up different and they talk different, and now they're putting themselves on ASB.
I have a student who, who started with us, was super shy. Now she started a black student unit at her school. I have another one that's the president of the blacks and I'm like, yes, like that's wonderful and it makes that makes me have joy and excitement because they're understanding and learning how to navigate and get themselves in positions of power, because that's the goal. They need to be in positions of power because they need to be the ones to say yes or no to things that are harmful. And so we have students who are now, you know, I have one that goes to school in West Seattle, which is like far away. She's been in our program her whole entire life and she's a incoming junior and is a leader at her school in every single way and is making decisions and is putting together like black, you know, mlk assemblies and Black History Month and celebrating Juneteenth for the first time, and it's also. We have students who are into like environmental justice, who are starting recycling clubs and having conversations, and I'm just like it makes my heart so happy.
Nora:
I wrote down some notes from our conversation last time and one thing that really stood out to me is the way you describe the youth and the young adults. You said they're magical, smart, gifted, they need to be heard, and that was just absolutely beautiful and you just summarized it so nicely and so, with that passion that you have in your work, I can only imagine how fulfilling it is to see them like, grow into and blossom in so many different ways. And I wanted to ask you, to Darnesha, if you would talk to us a little bit about cause. This is like a wonderful program.
But your program goes even into more things that might look simple, into really helping it develop, both like at a big scale as a professional and as a leader. But even in little things you talk to us about supporting with fun and engaging activities. For example, you talk to us about helping some of these young adults and youth explore and have experiences that maybe they wouldn't have like in an all exclusive trip to Disneyland. Now that seems okay, we pay for the trip and they get to go and have fun. But no, you take it a step further. Can you talk to us a little bit about how you help these like participants like further build their skills and confidence with such small little things and it looks like small, but it's not small.
Darnesha:
So for the past 20 years we've taken a group of kids and families on a trip every single year, literally every single year, and we found creative ways to fundraise for that. And so we've taken multiple kids to Disneyland and Universal Studios. And how they're able to do that is we find fundraising opportunities and so there may be like then we come together, we say this trip is $700, right, and we plan Disneyland every other year. So we're getting ready to plan Disneyland now for 2024. And so we'll say the package is $1,000 per student and that includes, like, hotel and flight, it's all inclusive, it includes your meals, because we get the good old Disney meal plan, which is amazing. And so we'll get the package and we'll set up like individual accounts for each student and as they fundraise and as they bring in money, as they find sponsorships, we help them write sponsorship letters for themselves. We help them put together all the fundraisers they get. The money goes into their accounts, quote, unquote, their member account, and they can see all of their hard work. And it just like clocks down and we see you need to raise this amount per month, right, so maybe you need to raise $100 per month to get there, or $200 a month or whatever it looks like, and we have members as young as like nine. It's mostly their parents at that age, but they able to go and they work and it goes into that account and they work up to it. And then the moment everything's paid for and we're on that plane and we get to Disneyland, they feel a sense of accomplishment and pride and they know how much is in their account. And sometimes they raise too much or they raise not too much, they raise over their goal, and then we'll go and we'll make sure they like get a gift card to like, you know, at the park to spend for the day. They get all of that money, and so I love that for them because it shows them that they can put in the work they can get first. They can set a goal, and I believe in everyday actions are what gets us there, and so we talk about that every single day. You have an opportunity to reach your goal. What are you doing to reach your goal? Is it writing a letter, is it sending an email, or is it sometimes rest? Sometimes you just need a day of rest to clear your mind, and so we ask them that. And so students who are struggling on their goal. If they're trying, we meet them there. If you're trying, you can go.
We have never, ever, not taken a child ever, and in 20 years my husband and I have never left a kid behind. And we say also as a collective if we have 30 students that want to go, either everyone goes or no one goes. We will never leave someone back. Because that comes from me growing up very not being able to do things Like. I grew up in a very affluent neighborhood and we were poor. We were homeless. It was. I was that kid on the scholarship. I was that kid on free lunch in an all white space. I was. I graduated in the 90s and so no one was paying attention to race, no one was paying attention to how it affected, and so I was that kid in class of all white students, affluent. They're pulling in school in their BMW and we're living in a shelter. And I wanted to be in the Trish Squad but I couldn't afford it. I wanted to take the trip with the band to DC, but I couldn't afford it. And so that's where that comes from for me, that we will never leave a kid behind, and we talk about that with everyone. And so then I see them start to help each other and they're like, and it's just natural, , and I'm just like it's beautiful to see. And then when we get there, it's great, and so I can't wait to go back.
Our first, we had planned a trip to DC. We were actually in North Carolina in 2020, right before the shutdown. We were there in Charlotte in February of 2020. I'll never forget, cause when we came back, everything shut down. Like we came back. Can you imagine coming back to an airport and it was empty. I was like what is happening? But we're gonna go back again. We had a trip scheduled in DC to go visit the national, the African-American museum, and then do we always include a black college tour as well? We always include a higher ed in every single trip that we go on, and so we're excited to plan for Disneyland in 2024. And we're planning that right now as we speak. So I'm really excited for that and we will never, ever leave anyone behind. And so everyone gets little ears. We make it a thing. We get the T-shirts, we go all out for the kids and it's a great time.
Nora:
Thank you so much for sharing, I mean, what you just shared. It just really highlights, first of all, like the part of, like the commitment and the love to the program, but then also again reiterates your commitment to empowerment, to access, to inclusion, because these things like having an opportunity to travel, having an opportunity to enjoy recreational activities or participation, and things that sometimes we don't have the opportunity to be a part of because of socioeconomic status and just different barriers that are placed on us because of social reasons. One of our last questions for you, Darnesha, is maybe if you can highlight some of the points that stand out to you I mean, there's so much that you've already shared with us about the organization successes but maybe kind of providing a little bit of additional if there's something that we haven't talked about, that highlights some of the achievements. In particular, I think I was really interested in you sharing with our audience the statistics in terms of graduation and then anything else that you can think of.
Darnesha:
Yeah, sure, I will say that I'm gonna read about one of my favorite quotes by Audrey Lord. It says when I dare to be powerful, to use my strength in the service of my vision, then it becomes less and less important whether I am afraid or not. And I love that quote because what it tells me is that I have to stay close to my community and make sure that my community is being served. And Black Coffee really is gonna continue to make that commitment to the community that we will continue to show up. Whatever way that looks like, we will be flexible and fluid in our systems and our processes to make sure we can show up. Black Coffee is the thought of one day we can house our youth organizing work and we can be really a place where people can come and organize. And I love back in the day, like in the Silver Rights Movement and many great movements, there were these places where people would organize Churches, people's houses, garages, and it's a joy that Black Coffee has become that place where people can organize and we can start to build a new normal. And the normal that we want is free of oppression, free of systemic racism, free of barrier and rooted in community and grounded in community. And the only thing I wanna do with Black Coffee and my husband and I is that we wanna leave a legacy, and we wanna leave a legacy of community and change and that we were a catalyst to change just using coffee.
And I like to simplify it, sometimes like it's just coffee, right, like at the end of the day, it's a coffee shop and what that does? It tells people that there's a place for you. There's coffee shops on every corner in Seattle. I don't know if you've come down here to visit it, but there's literally a coffee shop on every corner. And I know that because when I travel other places and I'm offended that there's not a coffee shop in every corner in every city across the country, I'm like where is the coffee? And so there's coffee shop on every corner in our area.
But what that says is that there is a place for you, there's a place for everyone in this work, and it says that you just have to be willing to face things to move the work of justice forward. And I would like to just leave that to say to everyone is what are you willing to face? What are you willing to give up? What are you willing to let go of. What are you willing to learn to continue to move us towards justice and liberation? Because until we're all free, none of us are free.
Nora:
Thank you , Darnesha.
David:
Oh, love that, and I think that segues great into our next question, which is how can the listeners of this podcast support Black Coffee Northwest?
Darnesha:
I would say the number one thing that we do need is all of our programs are underfunded, and so any type of funding or funding service is really helpful, and you can go right on our website and you can see how you can support us financially. You can also purchase our coffee. We have a subscription service. Our coffee is really delicious, it really is, and I will put out there. I will guarantee that you will love it. It's local coffee, it's locally roasted. We roast through Fulcrum. It's responsibly, ethically sourced.
We want to make sure that the farmers are treated well, that they are receiving money for the goods that we're purchasing from them. We really cut out the middleman and make sure that those farmers get what they deserve so they can also take care of their families and their communities as well. Awareness is also important. Just sharing our story, letting people know that we exist, is also important. And spreading, and then you continue to find your place and your space and use us as a motivation to do good within your community and to be motivated to do great work, and we would want nothing more than you taking away something from what we're doing, and you taking that and you doing that with your spirit influence our community, and that's how people can support us financially by buying from us, by spreading the good news of the work that we're doing, and then also by doing it yourselves and finding your place in this work, and those are the ways that people can actually support us.
Nora:
Thank you. And our last question, the most like could be the hardest question of all, Darnesha, what is your definition of love?
Darnesha:
Well, you know, my middle name is actually love. It's my name is. My full name is Darnesha Love-Weary, I know, and so my definition of love is empathy, is seeing people for people first, first seeing a human as a human. That is layered, complex, sometimes chaotic, sometimes not, but everyone has their own story, everyone brings their own stuff and we just love everyone.
Because you are existing and because you're here and because you woke up today, we know you have purpose and we hope that you know you have purpose and I see you as a person first, regardless of how you act, regardless of the hate that you spew, regardless of how you may or may not show up, I see you as a person first and I believe that that's love and that's what we need more of in our community is the empathy, and that we see people as people. I make mistakes every single day. I may not show up the when I'm stressed. Everybody is gonna see it, everyone around me is gonna know it when I'm stressed, and so I may not show up all the time on 10 and always in it, but I want people to see me the same, that I'm a person. I'm complex and maybe I'm gone through something.
And I want that to be, and that's my definition of love is that we see people as people and we love them. We love them through it, and I will never. I love when people say to me like I know you've got our back, like I know Black Coffee has my back, I know you guys got our back, and that just lets me know that they feel the love and that they see us. And even though these kids might one day, I just wanna like put everybody out and be like look, y'all are wild out today, like there is a lot going on, but I'll never, never let them go and I will never not be there to support them. And that's what love means to me.
Nora:
Thank you so much Darnesha, thank you so much Irwin, thank you so much Black Coffee Northwest for such a wonderful, beautiful, inspirational session with us today.
David:
Yes, thank you.
Darnesha:
Yes, thank you. Thank you for the opportunity and, yeah, thanks for opportunity. You had a great time we did as well.
[TRANSITION MUSIC]
David:
Nora and I have been really blessed to talk to some amazing people, and Darnesha is definitely in that category. So huge thank you to you, Darnesha, for sitting down with us, conducting that amazing interview and, most importantly, being vulnerable in that conversation. I know that's not always easy, but it's always good for the listeners to know where your own personal journey or how your own personal journey occurred, because you never know who else needs to hear that if they're currently going through that journey, which is just a big part of the Do Good Team people hearing their own journey and their own story in other people and seeing other individuals persevering through that. So thank you so much, Darnesha, for sharing your story and we're so excited to be sharing it with other individuals.
Nora:
Yes, we are very appreciative of the time that you spent with us and just definitely sharing your story and providing the leadership out in Shoreline and beyond to lead this wonderful effort and change that has definitely been needed for such a long time, and just thank you.
David:
After you listened to the interview. We always discuss with the listener how you can help, and we talk about that a little bit later, after we discuss our thoughts on the interview. But there's one thing that I do wanna mention upfront right now, which is, since we had the interview with Darnesha, the Shoreline location of Black Coffee Northwest has closed. Essentially, the lease became too expensive at their location, so they had to shut down their operations at the Shoreline location.
Now it's not all bad news. They will have a location opening up in the central district of Seattle. It's going to be located at 2300 South Jackson Street and, additionally, they will have a space open up on the Shoreline Community College campus. So that's an expansion that's occurring, which is wonderful news. But there is a transition period that's occurring where they don't have a physical space, and this is a short amount of time during the summer of 2023. And we're going to talk about that a little bit more in ways that you can help if you live in the area. So, but I just want to mention that onto. What are your thoughts on the interview? Nora, you were writing notes so much and very easy to do because, wow, Darnesha is super quotable.
Nora:
Definitely we had such a great time with Darnesha. Darnesha is extremely dynamic, a great public speaker, a great leader. Generally. There were many things that stood out to me, but I think that one that I'd like to focus on is a quote that seems short but very complex and takes many layers to dissect and to really come with a solution to this situation.
So during our interview, Darnesha mentioned, if you're working for justice, for those that are furthest away from justice, you'll capture everyone, and I think that with our interview with Darnesha, I really appreciated primarily the fact that we do need to focus on those groups that have been marginalized the most and the longest, as it has been the Black community.
I also really appreciated, looking at pictures online of everything that Black Coffee Northwest does, that there's individuals of different ethnicities participating in their events. I saw a picture of their step team and there's primarily, you know, the African-American community involved, but then there's also other children of different ethnicities. So this is a space that has been created to be open and inclusive and welcoming of everyone, and I just love what Darnesha stated is very clearly seen in the work that they're doing. Additionally, Darnesha mentioned what you will see when you're coming into Black Coffee Northwest and you'll see that diversity, you'll see use of different backgrounds, different ages, and working on having that inclusivity and making others welcome is just such a great value and so much love that is being expressed here that I just am so motivated by it.
David:
Yeah, absolutely. One of the things that I always say is that we, the royal “we” often talk about love and I think we talk about it in a very simplified form. But if you really think about love, it's a lot of work and it's a lot of sacrifice if you really truly are going to show love to somebody, especially if somebody is in need, and the work that Darnesha and, by extension, Irwin are doing really truly is a labor of love. You heard her stories that she was talking about Black Coffee Northwest suffering from an arson attack and then other racial discriminatory behavior against her and the organization and being able to move past that and still build a dynamic organization meeting the needs of not just the youth but also the Black community at large.
There was this great discussion about the counselors having on hand one Black counselor that was from here and another Black counselor that came here later on in life, because being an immigrant from another country as this other dynamic or lens that not a lot of people think about, and I really like the fact that she talked about the Black community not being a monolith.
I think that's kind of an issue that a lot of underrepresented minorities face. That you know, Nora, you're Mexican, I'm Mexican, I'm also Native American and we feel that as well, like, oh, you know, all Mexicans is just kind of this umbrella term. Native Americans is this umbrella term. No, there's complexity within each of our communities and I love how she really got to the heart of that by talking about, yeah, there's this lens of people who have been born here for multiple generations and there's this lens from people who are Black but came here later on in life that we don't think about. So I love that she got into that complexity. And another thing that she talked about that I think is so cool her step team did a video with Lizzo. How cool is that.
Nora:
That is amazing too. Congratulations.
David:
Yeah, congratulations and my ears popped up and Nora can attest to this that I'm a huge hip hop fan and I'm of the belief that if you don't like Lizzo because her lyrics are so upbeat, you know your perspective on happiness might be a little bit off because Lizzo I don't know how you can't, how you could dislike Lizzo and her music, but I'm a huge hip hop fan. I got my little Eric B and Rakim action figures in front of me that Nora got for me recently and my Slick Rick action figure. I like my old school hip hop and I shared with Nora that I've been secretly hiding hip hop lyrics for the past five episodes in these episodes.
Nora:
I wonder if anybody has noticed that.
David:
David, I don't know if anybody's noticed. You haven't noticed, but I've been. I've been hiding them.
Nora:
You've been telling me where you've been hiding them. So, audience, if any of you has caught these, please let us know.
David:
You've been telling me where you've been hiding them. So, audience, if any of you has caught these, please let us know.
Nora:
All right.
David:
All right, it's a surprise for you. You don't know when it's coming, but it's coming.
Nora:
I can tell, because I can tell from your face that you're doing something naughty.
David:
That's what my brother says all the time. He says I could tell when you're thinking about a joke before you say it, because you have this smirk on your face.
Nora:
Hi Nikki, hi Eireann.
David:
Eireann is our niece. Getting back to Black Coffee Northwest yeah, again, Darnesha, incredibly quotable. There's another quote that I wanted to share that was really meaningful to me, which was “equity means that we take on the responsibility of changing. We don't change the community to fit our box. We change to fit their needs.” So that was another piece of the love dynamic that I was talking about before, which is kind of that sacrifice and the work that you have to do to really demonstrate love to other individuals. There's some self reflection that you have to do, too to change who you are to meet the needs of other individuals. So I really really love that quote.
Nora:
Yeah, that quote. Like I really love that. You highlighted that, david, because one thing that was very evident throughout the interview is the selflessness that Black Coffee Northwest has. It is very clear that in the way that they structure their mission statement, that in the way that they structure everything that they do, it's centered around the community. It's centered around listening to the community, asking the community for feedback, actively engaging the community to understand their needs and to get them to share their needs, rather than trying to impose a specific view of change or services or supports that they think that the community needs. It's very much community centered.
David:
And then the last quote that I wrote down that really stood out to me was there's no reason for us to be resilient in this fight. My people have been resilient for a long time. It's time for us to break down those barriers, undo those systems, call things out and make change. So I really like this call to action that she's discussing going out and trying to break down those systemic barriers that prevent advancement of underrepresented groups. And you, everybody who's listening in, can help break down those barriers by purchasing somewhere their wonderful coffee and I'm reminding myself there's so much to talk about that I still have to give my coffee review.
Nora:
Yes, and before we get to that, how can you help out? Well, again, as David said, you can visit Black Coffee Northwest on their website www.blackcoffeenw.com . Backslash To donate and to purchase coffee and other items. We will include this link on the page.
David:
Yes, we'll include it on our. When we post this on iTunes or wherever you find it Spotify we will have the link in the description so you can click on it. You can read more about their organization and purchase yourself a darn good cup of coffee. I'll go in more to the other ways that you can help, but I got to sell this cup of coffee. So, okay, it's the Snoho Mojo Blend.
So drinking it right now and this is what I taste, I definitely taste a little bit of berry or fruit in the kind of in the background, which is definitely my favorite type of coffee. So this is already way up there for me. The other thing that I taste a little bit is is some earthiness in the cup and I think that's the nuttiness that for the macadamia, I'm capturing more like a like a earthy taste, light on the nuttiness, but I could see how that's kind of the description. That's probably aligned with it the earthiness I taste to the nuttiness. But overall I think this is an excellent cup of coffee. I made this in our French press at home, so ground up the beans, let it steep in some hot water for 10 minutes to let all that flavor kind of come out and make a nice cup of coffee. That's the way you probably should do it, to really make sure that those beans are really expressing their full flavor when you pour your cup of coffee.
But I think this is a really excellent cup. I do like the effects of coffee. This is getting me a little hyped up, so love that too. That's amazing. So I really do recommend this cup of coffee. And before I forget as well they and Darnesha mentioned this too just to reiterate this is an award-winning cup of coffee and they have not been around that long, comparative to other coffee places in Seattle, and, as we stated in the interview, seattle is a fashion of coffee. So for them to win awards this early on in their, since the organization has been around, is an amazing accomplishment, as we hinted at before, and I could totally see why, because the cup of coffee that I have right now is good. Well, it's not good, it's amazing. And it isn't the first time I had the cup. I may have made it sound like or just trying it out now there's been several cups before, so I think it was good. I couldn’t wait.
Nora:
We've had several. That is not a lie. Please buy it. It is amazing. You will not regret it.
David:
Onto other ways that you could help Black Coffee Northwest. I want to loop back into the closure that I was speaking about a little bit earlier. So they do need, in the short term, a location to house the performing arts, mental health, social justice and music programs. So if you're in the shoreline area, Washington area, and you have some space that you could donate for the short term, this is definitely a way that you can help Black Coffee Northwest until they're able to open up their other locations. They also need some storage equipment for supplies, instruments, and they did have a library on site, so this would definitely be a short term way to help.
Other ways you can help are, you know, of course, the standard ways you could buy the stuff that they have online. Of course, we talked about their beans. They also sell other things on their online shop. You can also donate directly and that's on their website, and again, we'll provide the link into the description of this episode, and then we always mention this. If you have any unique ability and you can volunteer your time, you know that's another great way to really help the organization. And, lastly, always, always, always, you can help out by sharing this episode. That's a very low effort way to help out Black Coffee Northwest and the Do Good Team podcast, to share the episode, because you don't know who can hear this, who can offer support through donations or offering their services through volunteer work, or there may be somebody out there in the shoreline area, the Washington area, who could be in need of use of the services they offer. So we really do encourage you to share and you know, like the podcast, so we can get the message out to more people.
Nora:
Yes, a really good way to share and spread the love.
David:
Nora. Have we missed anything with Black Coffee Northwest? Do you have any final thoughts, or did we cover it all?
Nora:
I think we have covered it all. We just one final thank you to the entire Black Coffee Northwest community and family. Thank you so much for your time and for everything that you're doing out there to support your community and bring about love and change.
David:
Alrighty On to, I guess, the post interview chat that we usually have. We call it house cleaning, but there's something that we do want to mention, which is thank you to our new listeners. We mentioned before that we can spy on where all of you are listening in from, and we noticed that we had a lot of downloads over the past month from Manteca, California. So if you're listening and you're in Manteca and you downloaded our episodes, we see you and we would love to hear from you. Shoot us an email, let us know what you liked, and thank you so much for listening in.
Nora:
Yes, thank you so much. Friends in Manteca, we look forward to potentially hearing who you are and thank you, keep listening to us and we appreciate your listening.
David:
But I also want to still reach out to our friends in Frankfurt, Germany. We haven't heard from you. If you're still downloading episodes and listening, shoot us an email. And also, we had listeners from oh, Rome, Italy. So until you reach out to us, whoever you are in Rome, Italy, we're still going to say that it's Pope Francis. So until you reach out, we're just going to say that the Pope potentially listens to us.
Nora:
He's just shy.
David:
Yeah, I think that's right. Francis is shy Onto the Real House Cleaning. Don't forget to follow us on social media. We're on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and LinkedIn. These links to the social media sites are in the description of this podcast. Please engage with us because it helps our podcast become better and we just love interacting with you. We've already had several conversations on social media and it's so cool just to talk to you, see where you're coming from and hear what you like about the podcast.
Nora:
So yes, thank you so much. We are super excited to hear feedback from you, get recommendations on organizations that you're familiar with, just hearing your feedback about what you're loving mostly what you're loving but also feedback on maybe what we could improve on. If there's anything that you feel we could improve on, though, it's probably very likely that you don't need for us to improve on anything, right, david?
David:
We're practically perfect in every way. We are definitely the Mary Poppins of the podcast universe. Most definitely, Please leave us a Fistar review. It helps other listeners find us. If you want to leave a bad review, that's fine. As long as it's not bad-meaning bad but bad-meaning good, that's okay. Leave that review, Nora, that was my hip-hop reference. What was the song? Not bad-meaning bad but bad-meaning good is a lyric from Run DMC's Peter Piper.
Nora:
You got us again.
David:
I got you again. Hey, if you've been hearing the hip-hop lyrics that I've been hiding, let us know. Let us know what it is. I'm embarrassed to say that I think the first one was a vanilla iced lyric, but I get better. Don't worry for those hip-hop aficionados. There was a tripe reference and a couple other more renowned hip-hop artists. I don't rely on vanilla ice solely.
Nora:
What do you mean by renowned?
David:
Better. (laughing).
So all right, Please make sure to email us at thedogoodteam@gmail.com and, of course, like we said, if you want to interact with us or also let us know how we're doing, as we've been saying this entire time, we want to hear from you. And the last thing that I want to mention is that I know we've been a little bit spotty with how we've been posting these episodes. The truth is, we're still learning right now about how much it takes to do an episode. It's really just Nora and I doing this right now, so it's a one-man, one-woman effort right now and it is quite a bit of work.
So the intention was to try to do two a month, but I think right now that's quite a bit of effort for just what we have going on. So we're going to aim at posting episodes once a month on the first Monday of the month. So you'll see this at the beginning, You'll hear this at the beginning of, or the first Monday of, the month, and then you'll should hear next episodes or new episodes the first Monday of every month, and thankfully we have some interviews already in the queue. So we should be good for the next several months and hopefully in the future we can increase our episode productivity if you will, but for right now we're sticking to once a month because that's what our schedule allots for and we can at least ensure that we have a high quality podcast by just having once a month right now. But we do hope and aim to increase that in the future.
Nora:
Yes, and we have, amongst working on the podcast, other projects and personal things that are happening that we hope to share with you, little by little, as you get to know us and as we get to share more about ourselves. Nothing bad, all good stuff. But in addition to what we're doing with the podcast, there's also other things that we're working on that we'll share with you.
David:
Thanks so much everybody for listening into today's episode and again a huge thanks to Darnesha for sitting down with us and spreading her message of love, compassion and breaking down barriers to advance her community and the community at large. Don't forget everybody to do some good and spread some love.
David & Nora:
Juntos somos un buen equipo. (together, we're a good team).
David:
Thanks, everybody, take care.
[OUTRO MUSIC]