Astute Coffee is a social enterprise nonprofit that helps young people who have aged out of the foster care system, giving them steady employment to help them develop job skills as well as life skills to young adults who have not had the chance to learn them elsewhere.

Formally The Bike Union, a bike shop blended with a coffee shop, Astute has been serving the community for eight years this September. With the opening of their second location last year, they decided to pivot to being solely a coffee shop. Their program is typically a six-month to one-year employment program, although this is not hard-and-fast, people can stay for as long as they choose to.

Astute Coffee teaches not just job skills, but financial literacy, cooking and nutrition, mindfulness and meditation, and educational tutoring. There are mentoring opportunities with Astute as well, helping those who are wanting to go to college or get their GED. They also help individuals who do not have access to a government-issued ID or birth certificate with filling out the paperwork needed to obtain it.

Miah Sommer, the founder of Astute Coffee, spoke on why he felt driven to create his nonprofit: “I felt it was an opportunity to work with people like me,” he explained. Sommer had grown up in poverty and had experienced food insecurity and uncertainty in his younger life, and wished to help those who had experienced trials growing up.

“I made it a place I belong, that they belong. A real ‘Island of Misfit Toys’,” Sommer continues to describe Astute Coffee and its workers as a “journey together”.

The coffee shop has twelve employees, with ten of whom were or currently are a part of their program. Their employment program currently sees about ten people a year, and has seen steady growth in the last few years.

If you want to support them, Sommer says the best way is to come in and buy a cup of coffee. “The more people come through the doors, the better.” Astute Coffee is covered both by grants and through the people who come by to purchase something to drink. “Coming in is the biggest way to support. If I had to pick between someone writing a check and buying a drink, I’d choose the coffee. You’re gonna meet [the people], their world gets bigger, [and] your world gets bigger.”

Their current goal is to manage and maintain the two shops they currently have, with the hope to add more classes and learning programs in the future.

Above all, Sommer wants to make sure that people come into this with treat the young people here, who have left the foster care system, with “dignity and a non-pity approach” and that this is “something that happened to them, no who they are.” He pointed out how hard it is “to get services for those who are no longer legally required to get them.”

Josey, who joined the program in November 2021 and is now a full-time supervisor, added that it is important that these kids remember to “invest in yourself” and that “you’re taking away something, and not just a paycheck.”

Astute Coffee has two locations: their original at 1818 Dodge St, which is open from 8am-4pm Monday through Friday and 8am-1pm Saturday and Sunday; and their new Atlas location at 2929 California St Suite 1001 which is open from 7:30am-2pm Monday through Friday.

If you would like to learn more about Astute Coffee, you can go to their website at astutecoffee.org, or follow them on Facebook at Astute Coffee or Instagram @astute_coffee.