Plans brewing for Wyoming's first 7 Brew, latest in coffee kiosk boom

May 21—CHEYENNE — With coffee shop culture on the rise and many drive-through businesses popping up on random corners of every city as a result, one can only expect the same would happen in Cheyenne, but on what grounds?

Nick Colsch, director of the Wyoming Center for Business and Economic Analysis, said a study came out about 10 years ago saying Cheyenne was underserved when it came to coffee shops. To fix this issue, the city had to put in the work to attract coffee shop business to the capital city.

Another large factor in the recent boom in coffee shops, Colsch said, is that Wyoming is a cold-weather region, which means that if it is cold six months per year, coffee would sound good six months per year.

"The second thing is the convenience of a drive-through," Colsch said. "If you think about a person, the typical coffee drinker is someone grabbing it on their way to work. You don't want to get out of your car, especially in the winter. You'd much rather just order (at the) drive-through and have it in a couple minutes."

Last year, Cheyenne saw the opening of its first Scooter's location and a second Ziggi's Coffee. Just this past March, a third Ziggi's location appeared. A Dutch Bros. is under construction on the city's east side.

Colsch said it's cheaper to establish these drive-through-only coffee shops because there only needs to be a small building with enough room for cars to drive around it, plus a small parking lot for workers to park, rather than a large one for customers to access.

Now, Cheyenne is preparing to welcome a coffee shop that is brand new to Wyoming: 7 Brew.

7 Brew is a popular drive-through coffee shop that began in Rogers, Arkansas, in February 2017, and has locations mostly in the eastern half of the United States. While the company is known for its coffee, it also offers other beverages, such as energy drinks, sparkling flavored water, teas, lemonades, smoothies and shakes.

The Inta Juice and Subway on the corner of Dell Range Boulevard and Bluegrass Circle closed permanently Tuesday, with plans made to replace the two food services with the 7 Brew.

While Cheyenne has many Subways throughout the city, this Inta Juice location is the only one in the city, with the nearest being in Laramie, and all other locations in Colorado and Texas, according to the Inta Juice website.

The Cheyenne Planning and Development Department's ArcGIS map has two project items listed at the location of the Subway/Inta Juice. The Cheyenne City Council approved one of the items, PUDC-23-189, which is a request to change the zone from Neighborhood Business to Community Business. According to the Cheyenne Planning Commission staff report, the purpose of the proposed zone change is to allow for a drive-through restaurant with more appropriate design standards.

The second item, PUDC-24-43, was still under review as of March 1. This item is for the redevelopment of the property into a drive-through coffee shop.

Erin Fagan, a Planning and Development Department planner II and the case planner for PUDC-24-43, said 7 Brew approached the Planning and Development Department and let city staff know they were considering buying the property to build a store, asking what steps they would need to take to add a location.

Fagan said there is a third review being done on the site plan right now, and they are awaiting comments back from their reviewers, which she expects to have next week. As of right now, the plan is to demolish the existing building and build a new one in its place that fits 7 Brew's style.

It's too soon to predict an opening day, Fagan said, because they need to finish going through the approval process and then apply for building permits.

"Once we get building permits, we will be able to start building," Fagan said. "And then (it's up to) however long their construction team takes to build it."

Whether Cheyenne has an overabundance of coffee shops at this point depends on what community the capital city is compared to, Colsch said. For example, he said compared to a colder-weather place such as Ann Arbor, Michigan, Cheyenne doesn't have enough coffee shops. But compared to places such as Casper or Laramie, Cheyenne may have too many.

"It's really a preference, and how many people like coffee compared to the taste," Colsch said. "And if it's a more affluent town than Cheyenne is, there might be more disposable income that you'd go and buy coffee every day."

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Alyssa Crutcher is the Wyoming Tribune Eagle's summer intern. She can be reached by email at acrutcher@wyomingnews.com. Follow her on X at @alyssasadie03.