How to differentiate yourself? Itโs the question on the lips of all small-business ownersโespecially those in a specialty coffee landscape as densely packed as that of todayโs New York City. But for Little Skips owner Linda Thach, the answer to that question always came easily: just be who you are, especially if who you are is full of positive energy.
When last we checked in with Little Skips in 2014, Thach had made a name for her coffee spot with a good-vibes community atmosphere nonpareil, in what seemed then (or when it opened in 2010) to be an unseemly, askew-angled intersection underneath Bushwickโs noisy J/M/Z trains. Today, Skips is a three-shop tiny empire, a family of charming cafes all a bit differentโLittle Skips, Baby Skips, and 2017โs Little Skips Eastโeach of which effuses the authentic charm and positive energy of the first Skips. And though every new shop is sleeker than the last, they all feel like youโve stepped into someplace like home, someplace different than everywhere else to get coffee in New York City. And yes, theyโre all still camped out under the elevated train tracks.
โWhen I opened [the first] Skips, I loved the Brooklynness of the space,โ says Thach over a sunny morning chat in her newest location, Little Skips East at Broadway and Covert Street. Inside Little Skips East, few traces of her flagship cafeโs boho charm remain, instead making way for new touches such as bright white walls and tile and a lively mural. Accent walls are painted in a vivid aqua Thach tells me is called Poolside Blue, a color that echoes, at least that day, the highlights in Thachโs own hair. Bright orange mini Le Creuset pots dot the tables, part of the ownerโs affection for vintage. They form a straight line from her fondness for things old, and loved, to her awakening to more sunny, vivid spaces.
At Little Skipsโ original location, Thach says she was enthralled with keeping its original elementsโa wood floor patinaโd with years of motor oil, brick walls, and the signage from the carburetor shop it once was. โBack in the day when you came to Brooklyn, youโd think of places like that,โ says Thach. โNow the shift is happening and you expect places to look like this and Baby Skips, and I enjoy brighter spaces now.โ
The brighter spacesโstill full of their own unique characterโthat make up todayโs Little Skips family also includes Baby Skips, a pocket cafe adjoining Banh Mi fusion restaurant Little Mo, both of which recently reopened after a months-long Metropolitan Transit Authority project removing part of the M train infrastructure directly overhead. During the shutdown, the MTA covered Thachโs rent, allowing her and business partners Mitch McCann and Hector Marcel to focus on opening the new Little Skips East.
At Little Skips East, youโll find Counter Culture Coffeeโas at the other Skipsโprepared (obsessively, Thach might say) with skills a cut above cafes in the neighboring Bushwick and Bed-Stuy communities. Youโll also find feature roasters here, like Brooklyn locals City of Saints, and vegetarian-forward food options such as a tempeh BLT with vegan cilantro aioli or microgreen-sprinkled avocado toast. The menu realizes the coffee and love portions of the shopโs would-be mantra, COFFEE ART LOVE, painted broadly on the storefront. And the art?
Art was โthe reason I moved to New York, the reason I moved to Bushwick,โ says Thach, seated in front of billowing wall art by Morgan Winters, whose work festoons the walls of Baby Skips as well. Little Skipsโ original store has an exterior mural that rotates throughout the year, and hosts live music and open mic nights as part of its evening entertainment. For Thach, bringing art and artists into the fold is a big part, but just one part, of the essential community-building she works toward at each of her cafesโsomething hard to do in the crosshairs of rapid gentrification.
โThe neighborhood wasnโt gentrified when I opened Little Skips and we had a more diverse clientele then,โ Thach admits. โI was able to go down the block and offer our neighbors coffee and invite them in. But thatโs something we strive to do still. We look for opportunities to work with people in the community. Thereโs a womenโs shelter down the street that we take food to every night,โ Thach says, though she is aware that much has changed in the eight years since Skips was a newcomer.
โIโve been battling this since I opened and had so much criticism and this and that, and I say look, I didnโt come to gentrify anything, I came to open a business and this was the only place that I could afford,โ she says. โPerhaps the neighborhood received me better because Iโm Asian. I watched peopleโs kids, I was invited to BBQs on the block. I really seek out events like that to make sure weโre doing our part and not just existing here and not realizing where weโre at. Itโs the responsibility of a business owner to make sure that youโre aware of your presence and your surroundings.โ
For now, the surroundings of Little Skips East still donโt feel that gentrified. There are still plenty of 99-cent stores, discount clothiers, and nail salons under these shadowy tracks. But as the shop moves forwardโThach and her partners were just approved for a beer and wine license in early Januaryโits founder emphasizes her hope that itโll grow in tandem with the neighborhood, not just as a capsule within it.
โWe have to allow for integration, no matter who it is,โ she says. โIf youโre only surrounded by the same type of people, your field of view is just so narrow that you canโt understand someone else. If you have neighbors who are diverse and are different, I feel like everyone should be open to it. If youโre in someoneโs neighborhood, everyone needs to be open.โ
And will her neighborhood always be this secret playground stretching under the J/M/Z tracks?
โIโm never leaving this train,โ Thach says, laughing. โThe J/M/Z is just my whole life.โ
Liz Clayton is the associate editor at Sprudge Media Network. Her world coffee guide with Avidan Ross, Where to Drink Coffee, is out now on Phaidon Press. Read more Liz Clayton on Sprudge.
