Good things brewing

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This article was published 04/08/2023 (883 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

The espresso machine gleamed on the counter.

Above, residents shuffled around their downtown apartments. They’ve been peppering Marcede Sebelius with the same question: when are you opening?

“I’d probably be the same way,” she shrugged.

Not yet, is the answer. She sat in Lavanda, her new café on the main floor of Smith Street Lofts, amid cardboard boxes and stacked chairs.

Sept. 9 is her planned opening date. By then, she expects to be ready to serve coffee, cinnamon buns and avocado toast to hungry downtown residents.

“Downtown Winnipeg is becoming a little bit more lively now, now that the pandemic has passed,” Sebelius, 27, said. “I think it’s a really good spot.”

She’s hunkering into a 251-unit apartment building that was fully leased in June, according to the property’s owner. Smith Street Lofts opened last year, replacing a Manitoba Housing site.

Across the street, 190 Smith St. holds luxury apartments. Steps away is Hazelview Properties, another apartment complex.

“There is definitely a community vibe here,” Sebelius said of Smith Street Lofts. “The addition of this café is going to make it even stronger.”

She’s banking on tenants, and other downtown dwellers, filling their coffee cups at her shop. A year ago, however, she wasn’t planning on owning a café in downtown Winnipeg.

“The spot just presented itself,” she said.

Edison Properties owns Smith Street Lofts. It was a client of Sebelius’; she freelanced as a digital marketer.

It was her job to promote a commercial space on the apartment’s ground floor. Perhaps a café?

“We were finding that… there wasn’t anyone wanting to lease it,” Sebelius said of the nearly 600 square-foot space.

Owning a café had been a dream of hers. She mentioned her vision to Edison Properties and, upon receiving encouragement, began Lavanda.

It’s not her first time diving into a business: she’s known at farmers markets as the face behind Spreads by Cede, selling jars of acai blueberry almond butter and chaga vanilla cashew butter.

“I just love to be creative, and that… extended into my parents’ kitchen (at the time),” Sebelius said.

It was 2018. Sebelius was finishing a human nutritional sciences degree, en route to become a dietician, when she started making her own nut butters.

She shared pictures of the homemade condiments online.

“People were asking me if they could buy it, and I was like, ‘Well yeah, I guess so,’” Sebelius said. “I realized that there wasn’t a whole lot on the market that was similar to what I was making for myself.”

Soon she was setting up at farmers markets and shipping to local stores. Spreads by Cede now takes shelf space at Red River Co-op and Vita Health locations.

After graduating, Sebelius veered away from her dietician certification, focusing on Spreads by Cede and working as a server.

Meantime, companies had browsed her social media pages and were reaching out, asking for help with their own platforms.

“It… became something I’m really passionate about,” Sebelius said, adding it “blossomed” into a full-time job.

She quit working as a server. She’ll have aspects of the old position — like serving customers coffee — once Lavanda opens in September.

Bags of Brandon-based Forbidden Flavours coffee beans rested on the café’s counter Friday. Sebelius plans to sell locally made cinnamon buns and oatmeal cups, and to use Spreads by Cede products; that business will continue when Lavanda begins.

Sebelius said she took loans from the Women’s Enterprise Centre of Manitoba and Futurpreneur to start Lavanda.

“I (am) super excited,” said Melanie Bernadsky. “I have my favourite local coffee shops in each direction but, man, to be able to run across the street is perfect.”

Bernadsky has operated Freshcut Downtown, a flower shop, at 190 Smith St. for two years. She’s clocked “a real uptake” in residents recently.

Downtown Winnipeg’s residential population grew to 18,000 in 2021, a gain of 2,000 people over five years, according to numbers the Downtown Winnipeg BIZ shared.

“I think (Lavanda is) going to do really well with the clients in their building,” Bernadsky said.

More than three years since the COVID-19 pandemic began, the business crowd isn’t reliable, Bernadsky explained.

“I still can’t figure out what people are doing,” she said. “Who’s at work, when are they at work, what day are they at work — it seems to be all over the map.”

One Wednesday might see few customers, while the next may boom with business, Bernadsky noted. Foot traffic was more consistent during her days in Portage Place pre-pandemic, she added.

“I don’t count on my walk-up traffic to be the bulk of my business,” Bernadsky said.

She hopes Lavanda will draw new customers to the area, which she described as a “nice little destination block.” There’s a suit shop and other eateries nearby.

“Any new business that comes to the block that seems to have a following and a plan, I’m hopeful that we can work together and help each other out,” Bernadsky said.

Edison Properties had been scouting a café for Smith Street Lofts, said president Frank Koch-Schulte. It has another opening for what it envisions to be a restaurant.

“I think (Lavanda) will benefit the neighbourhood as a whole, especially with a lot of businesses being forced to close down or limit hours after COVID,” Koch-Schulte said.

Andrew Hayes, a Smith Street resident, looks forward to a close-to-home coffee shop. His go-to has been a nearby Tim Hortons, but it’s “not the same experience,” he said.

gabrielle.piche@winnipegfreepress.com