When Claudia Shivers thinks of a great cup of coffee, she imagines the home kitchen of her grandmother, Queen Esther. The air would be warm from the heat of the oven and she can almost smell her grandmother’s fresh-baked blackberry cobbler.
Shivers, 49, is a founder of Queen Coffee Bean, a coffee company in High Point, North Carolina. Her menu is creative —customers can flavor their espresso drinks with Ethiopian cinnamon buttercream, candy apple, chocolate cherry, and more. The coffee shop is cozy, often cluttered with board games and customers who like to stay and talk for a while. Shivers wants each latte she serves to capture the comfort of Queen Esther’s kitchen.
“What kind of delicious beverage can I make for you today?” Shivers asks every time the door opens, and a new customer walks in, whether it’s one of her regulars or a weary traveler on a road trip.
Shivers started Queen Coffee Bean in August 2020 after being incarcerated for nearly a year for a non-violent crime. After reentering the workforce, she held 4 a.m. shift at Starbucks. She wanted a change or to launch her own business, but worried about being denied a chance at other jobs because of her record. Today, Queen Coffee Bean averages $2,500 a month in sales, though Shivers said the amount can vary.
Her experience isn’t uncommon for people who have been incarcerated. According to data published by the Bureau of Justice Statistics in 2022, about a third of formerly incarcerated individuals aren’t hired in the four years after their release. Meanwhile, the nonprofit Prison Policy Project found that formerly incarcerated people are nearly five times more likely than the general public to be unemployed, and many earn low wages when they do land a job.
Circumstances changed for Shivers, however, when she enrolled in Inmates to Entrepreneurs, a nonprofit that trains formerly incarcerated people in business skills.
Shivers said she took an eight-week course through the program in the fall of 2020, with classes in sales, accounting, marketing, and customer service — all while she was crafting her own business plan. She said her experience in prison informed her vision for Queen Coffee Bean.
“I want them to feel like they’re at home,” she said about her customers. “When you’re an inmate, you only want to go home.”
The organization told Business Insider that 471 people registered for classes in August, including groups at five correctional facilities across the US.
Shivers hopes Queen Coffee Bean will build community and create local jobs
In the early days of launching her business, Shivers roasted coffee beans in a popcorn maker she bought from Amazon. She couldn’t afford to buy her a professional coffee roaster, and she said it worked fairly well.
Before she offered made-to-order drinks, Shivers’ main source of revenue was selling her own roasted coffee beans. These sales, along with her own savings and some donations from friends and family, allowed her to launch Queen Coffee Bean. She also works every Sunday at a local church and uses that income to supplement the coffee shop.
While she was responsible for funding the business on her own, Shivers said the Inmates to Entrepreneurs program provided her with training and community. For her, the organization was a “safe space,” where she could learn without feeling like she “had a scarlet letter,” she said. She wishes more people understood the mental toll of experiencing prison — and the importance of resources that help formerly incarcerated people build confidence.
“I’m an entrepreneur,” she said. “Being an inmate was a small part of my story.”
Shivers scaled her business in the last few years to include her brick-and-mortar shop alongside a line of house-made coffee roasts. She said the business’ growth is due in part to one of her early customers selling her the professional coffee roaster she needed at a discounted price.
Shivers also said her shop is intentionally located in one of High Point’s low-income neighborhoods. The area is underserved by many chain businesses, she said, and she hopes Queen Coffee Bean can be a local place to build community and create jobs.
As Shivers sees her own business thriving, she has joined the board of Inmates to Entrepreneurs to help other formerly incarcerated people. She encourages hopeful entrepreneurs to learn quickly, invest in their customers, and build a caring community.
“That’s really the mission of Queen Coffee Bean,” she said. “The foundation of everything we do is love: you’re gonna love this drink, you’ve gotta love yourself, and you’ve gotta love other people.”
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