Rose's nabs county courthouse cafe deal

New proprietor Rose Habermehl has gutted the café, stripping it down to bare walls and floor, with the help of her husband of 32 years, contractor David Bales of Railhead Home Repair.

Armed with more than 30 years’ experience in the hospitality industry and a $90,000 loan backed by the U.S. Small Business Administration, Habermehl’s plans for the space include seating for 26, laptop-friendly countertop dining with Wi-Fi access, a panini grill, an espresso machine and new décor.

The food-service operation has been closed since previous operators Troy and Danielle Kelley were dismissed for failing to keep regular hours of operation. A court order directed the Kelleys to vacate the premises by Dec. 31.

“They were unable to keep it open routinely because of family matters, which I totally sympathize with,” said Tim Smith, administrator of resource management for Greene County, noting that having food service available on a consistent basis was a necessity for the county.

A winning proposal

Habermehl’s proposal to run the courthouse food service was one of 10 Smith received. Her selection was based on several factors, including “her track record, and particularly the remarks we had on (Café 641) she operated down at the Library Center,” Smith said. “We heard nothing but good.”

The county wanted a more balanced, nutritional approach to food service, and Habermehl excelled there, as well, Smith said. She was willing not only to provide healthy alternatives for breakfast and lunch, but also to provide full nutritional information to patrons on request.

Habermehl’s menu will feature daily specials for breakfast and lunch, and the shop will be open 7 a.m.–4 p.m. Standard breakfast items will include bagels, wraps and seasonal fresh fruit; lunch will feature a variety of fresh salads, sandwiches and wraps.

Finally, Habermehl’s willingness to make a substantial investment in the business, and her knowledge and experience, including her sophisticated approach to marketing, tipped the scales in her favor.

“One of the things that impressed me with this operator is their marketing savvy,” Smith said. “I think they will get the word out that they are here.”

Filling a niche

For Rose’s Courthouse Café, the market in and around the Government Plaza north of Chestnut Expressway is wide open, Habermehl said.

Plus, walk-in traffic is only part of the picture: Habermehl has great expectations of the café’s catering business.

“I hope to pick up business meetings from the Busch Building and from City Utilities,” she said, as well as meetings at the Midtown Carnegie Branch Library.

The café will employ seven or eight, and it will be a family business. The general manager will be Danielle Bales, Habermehl’s eldest daughter, who is now studying journalism at Missouri State University. David Bales, in addition to serving as general contractor, is a graphic artist and screen printer and is designing the café’s new logo and handling screen printing needs.

The couple’s youngest daughter, Jordan, is a student at Parkview High School, but she plans to pursue the culinary arts program at Ozarks Technical Community College with an eye toward the family business, Habermehl said.

Opportunity knocks

Habermehl is a Springfield native who graduated from Glendale High School in 1975. After graduation she married Bales, her high school sweetheart, and moved to the Kansas City area. She earned a bachelor’s degree in hospitality management at Johnson County Community College, and then spent the next 27 years in hospitality, including stints with JJ’s restaurant in midtown Kansas City and Brookridge Country Club in Overland Park, Kan.

Four years ago, the couple returned to Springfield to care for Bales’ elderly parents.

“Upon coming to Springfield, I found a hard time meeting the pay scale that I was used to up in Kansas City,” Habermehl said. She “bounced around from job to job,” from tending bar at Schultz & Dooley’s to running the catering department at The Clarion Hotel.

She had essentially retired from the business in late 2005 when the Springfield-Greene County Library found her résumé online and contacted her to run the Café 641 at the Library Center. Early this year, however, she heard about the opportunity at the courthouse. Downtown icon Mudhouse has filled the Library Center’s void by opening in the former Café 641 space.

While Habermehl took an entrepreneurial approach to her job at Café 641, taking the next step and actually pursuing her own business seemed like a big leap, she said. Financing was one of her biggest concerns.

“I originally started out with a venture capitalist, then that fell through for me,” Habermehl said. She had heard about SBA loans, but “I was very scared about getting an SBA loan because I’d heard that they were very difficult to do.”

She turned to the SBA’s SCORE program, which offers free counseling for businesses. Counselor Ned Meyer helped her flesh out her ideas, while counselor John McKearney helped her learn to use the Ultimate Business Planner program to draft a comprehensive plan.

“It was a pleasure working with her, because she was just so responsive and focused on what she wanted to do,” McKearney said.

Longtime friend Valorie Simpson of Mr. Copperfield’s Chimney Sweeps invested $12,000 in Rose’s Café, and Habermehl took her completed business plan to Liberty Bank, where she secured an SBA loan for $90,000.

Although she had dreaded the loan process, it turned out not to be as difficult as she feared. And, according to Kade Scrivner, commercial lending officer at Liberty Bank, an SBA loan is smart money, minimizing the borrower’s cash injection and extending the repayment terms beyond what banks alone typically offer.[[In-content Ad]]