Oxford’s Cups Espresso Café Gives Back to Locals

Started in 1993 by two avid coffee lovers, Janice and Dennis Cameron, Cups Espresso Café hit the fan, but in a good way. The couple opened up their first spot in the Fondren neighborhood in the heart of Jackson. Many requests were made to open up more stores in the Jackson area. Lee and Teri Bowie, Cups Espresso Café of Oxford, bought a franchise to bring to the Oxford area a little over a year ago.

As art lovers, the couple express a deep affection in giving back to local artists and the community.

“We let local artists hang their art on the walls for free,” barista Zack Grossenbacher said. “The arts council put a vending machine in here where artists can sale their work through it. All proceeds go to the arts council.”

“We’re all about local products,” Lee said. “We get our baked goods from Honey Bee Bakery, our honey from Mardis in Taylor and diary products from Brown Family Dairy in Tula.”

The coffee house gives off a unique and admirable vibe in its own way.

“Since we let local artists hang their art on the walls, it’s gives the cafe more personality and makes the place look better,” Zack said. “The coffeeshop atmosphere creates the perfect environment for people to work in or just be.”

One unique and exciting thing Cups offers is a 24/7 coffeeshop the week before finals and of finals. Zack said you’d be surprised at how many people actually come to the cafe in the wee hours of the night to get a paper written or cram that last little bit of studying in.

Another cool event the café is doing is its relaunching their Open Mic Night at 9 p.m. Wednesday, April 1. They welcome anyone and everyone to come play or just come and listen.

“In addition to doing open mic night, we host local musicians to play ever Wednesday night,” Lee said. “Like I said, we love staying local with the arts, products and musicians.”

When asked if the Cameron’s had any influence on their cafe, Lee replied, “It wasn’t intentional to follow along their footsteps, but we ended up with the same concept and I have to say it’s worked out well for us.”

Zack gives us the scoop in “layman’s terms” of what latte art actually is.

Brittany Bugg is a HottyToddy.com staff reporter and can be reached at brittany.bugg@hottytoddy.com.