Golden Cup was a hub after Tops shooting. Months later, their story reveals broken promises

In Buffalo, the East Side’s only coffee shop sits at the corner of Jefferson and Utica avenues. It's inside an unassuming tan building, you might walk by without even noticing it. But neighborhood customers are in the know, pushing open the shop’s door to unleash the aroma within and pick up a ”golden cup.”

Jackie Stover-Stitts, 66, and Larry Stitts, 75, founded Golden Cup Coffee over a decade ago with the intent of offering freshly roasted coffee from various regions of the world — they currently source from about 15 places. Patrons can choose from Golden Cups’ special blends and other flavored coffees or from their international pure blends.

When people from across the country flocked to the East Side after the racially motivated shooting at the nearby Tops in May 2022, many of them stopped at Golden Cup for their morning coffee. In the months since, Stover-Stitts and Stitts have had a front row seat to the promises made to their neighborhood and the few they say have actually been kept.

How Golden Cup Coffee was born

The coffee shop bug struck Larry Stitts first. After meeting coffee farmers and learning more about the crop on a trip to Cameroon, he came back to the States with a new interest in the drink. He started practicing and learning how to roast at home. He took a course and attended a roasters’ event in Florida.

“He likes trying new things,” Stover-Stitts said of her husband’s early interest in coffee. “I was thinking I'd better get involved because he’s spending a lot of money on roasters and roasting equipment, so it can’t just be a hobby.”

Entering the coffee business was a world away from what the couple had previously done — Stover-Stitts is an attorney by trade while Stitts owns a compliance monitoring firm — but they committed to overcoming the learning curve.

And, after over a decade, they are still at it.

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Golden Cup: A neighborhood coffee shop

On a warm afternoon in early November, Golden Cup is full of customers. People occupy each of the tables surrounded by the warm, golden yellow-painted walls of the shop, and a couple stands nearby, waiting for their order to be served.

The smell of black eyed peas and collared greens, chicken gumbo and turkey chili hover beneath the bold notes of freshly brewed coffee. The television is on, but no one's watching.

Two people, sitting beneath the television screen, are engaged in a rousing conversation that ping-pongs between voting and football. At another table, two men sit with their faces bent toward their laptops, seemingly oblivious to everything else. Here there is a space for everyone.

Golden Cup Coffee has been in this location for four years now. In that time, Stover-Stitts says, the community has been a great support.

“It’s nice to have someplace that people can come and communicate with each other and enjoy the coffees and desserts that we offer that are fairly unique to coffee shops because they all have a Southern flavor to them,” Stover-Stitts said.

Though Stover-Stitts is from Buffalo and Stitts is from California by way of Chicago, they both enjoy eating Southern cuisine at home, and their Southern inspired soups and sweets — they partner with local bakeries to provide sweet potato pie, caramel cakes and coconut cakes — have been a huge success.

Gold on the horizon

Golden Cup Coffee is only a block away from the Jefferson Avenue Tops, where a racially motivated massacre took place in May. Stover-Stitts says it is the saddest day she remembers in the neighborhood. She remembers, too, how many people came into the neighborhood after the shooting.

“The fact that it brought attention to this side of the city has been both a good thing and a bad thing,” she said. “Initially everyone was here. All of the news was here. The football team came. Different vendors from throughout the city came. But no one stayed. No one made that investment into our community.”

The only change Stover-Stitts said has happened in light of the shooting is at the Tops store. It was remodeled and reopened. But other promises were made, she said, and they haven't been kept.

"It’s still very sad and it’s still, for me, just a photo op," she said. "They promised, (they would) invest in the small business. ‘We’re going to do this and that,’ but we don’t see any movement. It was a one-shot deal in a lot of ways."

It's disappointing to the Golden Cup owners, but not, unfortunately, a surprise.

As a locally-owned small business on Buffalo's East Side, the Stitts have sought partnerships with city institutions including colleges, hospitals and businesses to distribute their coffee, but despite high interest in their freshly brewed coffee with 100% Arabica beans, the deals always seem to fall through, and large vendors take the spot.

“(Institutions) will come into our community and they make promises that we—not just Golden Cup—but that they will use locally owned businesses,” she said. “And they will start off (doing so) and then they go back to the big box.”

The East Side needs investing in, the Stitts said. More businesses like theirs could help bring more customers to the area, and help boost the neighborhood.

When people from across the country flocked to the East Side in the wake of the shooting, many of them stopped at Golden Cup for their morning coffee. Public figures, including Hilary Clinton and other state, local and national politicians have visited the shop over the years. It brings people in.

But Stover-Stitts wants to make sure that promises are followed through and that people truly invest not only in Golden Cup, but in the East Side and in East Siders, in general.

“The thing I’m most concerned about is after 5/14, all the promises made," Stover-Stitts said, "and how many are being kept."

This article originally appeared on Rochester Democrat and Chronicle: On Buffalo's East Side, coffee shop thrives despite broken promises