Fireside Bakes & Brews  has expanded to a new location in New Franklin. The popular coffee shop officially opened for business last Wednesday at 108 East Broadway in the heart of downtown.

Nichole Atkins, who owns the business with her husband, Ryan, said that Wednesday’s opening went well, and she is excited about the opportunities a larger space offers.

“We’ve been really steady all morning, and we couldn’t hope for anything more,” she said.

Fireside originally opened as a mobile business, serving coffee out of a trailer in May 2021. On October 20, 2021, the Atkins’s opened their first brick-and-mortar location on Church Street in Fayette, a half a block off the downtown square. A second location opened in Glasgow last summer but was later purchased and reopened as River Brew Coffee Company.

Fireside’s newest location in New Franklin offers significantly more space. The larger storefront has more tables and a couple of couches for customers to relax and enjoy their coffees.

“We’re trying to create a place to gather in another small community,” Nichole  said. “People can come here and work. If you work from home, come here and work and just get out of the house a little bit,” she said.

Another benefit of the new location is a large kitchen. The building previously served as a restaurant and boasts a full kitchen.

“The opportunity presented itself to own a larger location and with a larger kitchen so that we’re able to do more food items,” Nichole ole said. “That has been the plan all along. When I first opened it, we did a lot of little sandwiches and stuff. We just didn’t have the space to do it, so now we have the space.”

She hopes to expand in other areas as well and aspires to one day roast their coffee beans on-site. 

The New Franklin shop will serve as the headquarters for food preparation, which will eventually serve both locations, allowing customers in Fayette to enjoy more breakfast and lunch items.

The New Franklin location will be open from 7 to 11 a.m. Wednesdays through Fridays, and 7:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. on Saturdays. But Atkins said the coffee shop will be open more as additional equipment is installed. “We’ll expand those hours pretty quickly.”

For now, Nichole hopes to serve up fresh coffee to those morning commuters heading out of town for work in Boonville and Columbia. But once the hours expand, Fireside will be a new location to grab a quick lunch or coffee for an afternoon pickup.

“Thank you to the community for accepting us and welcoming us,” Nichole said. We’re really excited and just blessed to be a part of another community.”