HYDE PARK — Hyde Park café Sip and Savor is taking over the south lakefront, announcing two more locations in the past week and a third in the works, and owner Trez Pugh III isn’t even going at it full time yet.
On Monday, Pugh said the coffee shop’s third location would open on Oct. 15 at 2239 S. Michigan Ave.
Pugh announced Friday a fourth location is in the works for the Rosenwald Court Apartments, 4600 S. Michigan Ave.
He said he’s got a potential fifth location in the works, too.
If that sounds like a lot, imagine doing it while also working a full-time job as Pugh does.
He said he can retire in approximately three years from his day job and in the meantime is running his coffee kingdom in his free time.
“I haven’t been sleeping at all — the last two years I’ve just been taking cat naps,” Pugh said.
He said the difficulty of running a small business in Chicago and getting a loan means he can’t quit his job. He said he needs to make sure he can put a quick injection of cash into any of his businesses that may need it.
The new South Loop location will be on the ground floor of a South Loop Pressure Point recording studio where Pugh will sell coffee during the day before the space converts to the Bassline lounge in the evenings.
Pugh said the idea is similar to a Starbucks locating within a Whole Foods, a style of collaboration he said he’s increasingly interested in as Sip and Savor expands.
Next year, Sip and Savor will open a new location in the newly renovated Rosenwald Apartments in one of the storefronts on the 47th Street side of the building closest to Wabash Avenue.
Once open, the Rosenwald location will be Sip and Savor’s fourth location. Pugh said he’s already working on a collaboration that will likely be the burgeoning chain’s fifth location.
Pugh will also open a corner grocery store in the development, adding to a list of grocery stores where he’s a partner in East Dundee and Kenosha, Wis.
He said while he’s working his other job, he’s taking opportunities as they come and isn’t thinking yet about franchising or a more aggressive expansion.
“I’m just going to play it by ear right now though everyone’s saying to franchise,” Pugh said. “I’ll go where it makes sense, I’ll even go to the North Side.”
He said right now he’s focused on the attention to community that he said he thinks is the reason people have sought him out when looking for a coffee shop.
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