Pump It Up Coffee Shop reopens
The West High coffee shop, Pump It Up, is reopening after a year and a half of closure due to COVID-19.
The mobile cafe is stationed outside the business rooms.
November 19, 2021
West High’s beloved coffee shop is reopening on Nov. 18. Around ten years ago, Diane Fickel, one of West’s business teachers and Business Professionals of America (BPA) advisors, brought to the school’s attention that West could benefit from a coffee shop located in the school so that students wouldn’t leave campus as often to get food. Fickel hired BPA members to work at the coffee shop to give them real life entrepreneurship experience, as well as a scholarship opportunity for BPA competitions. The revenue from the sales go directly into the employee’s state and national competition fees.
Since then the coffee shop has relocated three times. “10 years ago, we opened near Ms. Hudachek’s room where there was a closet with a window that opened and we worked out of that,” Fickel said. In 2017, the business grew tremendously, and they relocated to a computer lab. The computer lab allowed for a cafe set up with a seating area. A year later, Pump it Up moved to the back of the library due to the remodeling of West. The library served as a major hotspot for staff and students which increased revenue for the BPA students employed at the coffee shop. This year, Pump it Up will act like a food truck, where there will be a mobile cart, mainly outside the business classrooms.
Due to COVID-19, the business shut down for a whole school year plus another trimester.
“We had to pivot for COVID, so now we’ll be wearing gloves when we’re handling all the food and obviously we’ll be wearing masks. We’ve been discussing individually packaging the cookies and pastries,” Jada Dachtler ’22 said.
With the year-long hiatus, “I definitely want to be able to be just as successful as we were our junior year. A lot of kids don’t know that we have a coffee shop since they haven’t seen it before,” Payton Davena ‘22 said.
Pump it up will be open from 8:30 am, up until seventh period, excluding fourth period. Make sure to keep a lookout for the mobile coffee shop, outside of the business classrooms, on November 18th, the first day of the second trimester.
