The Books and Beans café has expanded from its cramped basement space at 158 Elgin Street to the building’s main floor.
“It’s so nice to see it full and everyone enjoying the space, and people have been complimentary about its brightness,” owner Liana Bacon told Sudbury.com at the café on Monday, a few days after last week’s grand opening.
The space is bright and white, with a large picture window letting in sunlight from Elgin Street, putting the space in stark contrast to its initial windowless basement location.
During Monday’s planning committee meeting city council, the group’s five members unanimously approved $14,500 in financial incentives for the café’s relocation, through a few community improvement plan programs.
This included a $1,500 building permit fee rebate, $10,000 through the commercial vacancy assistance program, and $3,000 toward feasibility studies.
The total work estimate was $57,000, yielding a public/private ratio of 1:2.93, though Bacon said the private cost ended up bumping even higher than initially estimated.
The city’s incentive programs were “hugely important,” in making the café a reality, she said.
“The investment that the city is making in the downtown through the CIP is fabulous, and people should take advantage of CIPs. ... If people are looking to move downtown, it’s a really great resource and people should tap into it.”
The newly expanded Books and Beans is a reincarnated version of a café that operated out of a space now housed by The Alibi Room, at 113 Durham St.
The original café opened in 1995 and was open until 2010, when Bacon, who’d owned the business since 2005, decided to close it for career reasons.
Bacon opened a new version just outside of the The Night Owl speakeasy at the basement of 158 Elgin St. earlier this year, which she jokingly referred to as a “front” for the evening drinking venue, styled after the prohibition era.
The tiny space came with its limitations.
There wasn’t room for a kitchen, and only those who could navigate stairs could get to it.
By shifting the café to a larger space on the building’s main floor, Bacon said there’s more space and it’s accessible at street level.
With a small kitchen, they’re now able to prepare certain food items the original café was known for, such as veggie and hummus sandwiches, soups and Matt’s Mom’s Chile, named after the chile recipe from a past staff member’s mother.
Bagel melts have also proven popular.
“I was very surprised to see how many people talked about the bagel melt on social media,” Bacon said. “There was a calling for the bagel melt.”
It’s a simple item, she said, listing its ingredients as a bagel with melted cheese on it and a tomato slice with salt and pepper.
The building at 158 Elgin St. is owned by three partners, including Dan Guillemette, and received an additional $74,000 in municipal community improvement plan funding through various streams earlier this year, plus a $47,500 interest-free loan.
This is against a total cost of $395,000 on various components of the building, including creating a speak-easy called The Night Owl located downstairs.
The building at 158 Elgin Street was the home of the Northern Life newspaper for more than 40 years. Northern Life’s parent company, Laurentian Publishing, was sold to Village Media and became the online-only Sudbury.com and Northern Ontario Business websites in 2020.
Guillemette and Bacon also recently purchased the Knox Presbyterian Church building at 73 Larch Street, which they plan on turning into an events venue.
Tyler Clarke covers city hall and political affairs for Sudbury.com.
