Yasmen Hassen, the UMKC SGA president, and Lujyn Elsayed turned an impromptu barista experience into a full-fledged cafe venture after their matcha drinks became a hit.
Matcha is a Japanese green tea powder with a slightly bitter, earthy taste and a vibrant green shade. Typically whisked with hot water, HerCafe serves their ceremonial grade matcha over ice with milk and cold foam for more of the latte experience.
Over the summer, the pair of friends attended a retreat that hosted a “meaningful talks and mocktails” hour. Hassen and Elsayed were assigned as baristas for the event and served up the matchas that would kick start their new venture.
“Everybody really liked it. They were like you guys should start a cafe. We were like, yeah, okay, we laughed it off,” said Elsayed, cofounder of HerCafe.
What began as an afterthought manifested itself into an opportunity for the Hassen and Elsayed.
Three weeks ago, they were contacted to serve their beverages at the Islamic Society of Greater Kansas City (ISGKC). With barely any time to say yes and a short turnaround window, they quickly got to work and produced one of the busiest pop-ups in the afternoon on Sept. 7.
Titling it HerCafe, their first endeavor is serving HerMatcha. Though they hope to provide more drink options like HerRefreshers and HerBoba, HerMatcha is the first of many delicacies.
One bystander referred to HerCafe’s set up as, “the table with the longest line,” when directing others to find the popular, frothy green drinks.
Hassen and Elsayed said their support system has been insurmountable. Their friends have served as taste-testers and helped to blow up the women’s social media account for the business.
“We just got an opportunity to pop-up at a 5k event that one of our friends connected us with,” said Hassen. “It just goes to show this has been in talks for a while, but we are actually solidifying it. People are rallying behind it.”
Although they are just doing pop-up events around the city for now, they intend to get a functioning mobile cart up and running soon for a smoother process.
“The goal is to expand and grow, but we really want to enter the event space, and create aesthetically pleasing drinks for whoever our clients may be in the future,” Hassen said. “ It’s just creating a space where people can get together, have a really nice drink and bond over that. We’ve seen that through just making drinks for our friends.”
HerCafe’s next event will be on Sunday, Oct. 27, at The Spirits Run 5K in South Kansas City. Follow their Instagram account for more updates.
