You’ve seen her face behind the counter since Press Coffee’s inception seven years ago. Some of you know her as a dog lover, or a knitter, or a Hawk fan, but did you know she was in the hospital on the shop’s opening day? Or that she played roller derby? Or that as of August she took co-ownership of Press? If not, catch up on that announcement, a few words about the other owner (that’s me!), and then read on to get to know Katie Ford better.

If you fancy yourself a coffee aficionado, you probably remember the first coffee drink you discovered and clung to or the coffee shop you considered home base. For Katie growing up in Wheaten, Caribu Coffee was the place and Mint Condition was the drink. High school consisted of many of these Andes Mint flavored mochas, playing the trumpet in marching band, and doing color guard for a drum corps called the Colts, a youth organization for kids ages 16-21 in the tri-state area. The group has been around since 1963 and has seen significant competitive success. Participation often brings entire families into the fold, as was the case with the Ford family: Tom drove the bus while Bev worked the food truck. The organization also has a strong alumni association, often witnessed at the shop when former Colts drop to say hello to Katie.

As many of us have come to find out, we go away to college with one goal in mind and it spits out in a different direction. Katie set out to the University of Iowa majoring in Music Education and Trumpet Performance but now finds herself a coffee shop owner and dog collector. (I don’t think she would have it any other way.) Her start in coffee came after graduating while seeking out an hourly job to pay the bills. She first got hired at Mumm’s Saloon, an Iowa City staple that was located on Benton Street next to the river for many years, but the place abruptly closed before she got started. Instead, she got a job at Java House as a barista.

Katie is an ardent planner and organizer which is likely why inventory drew her interest. After a year she advanced to Assistant Manager of the Mormon Trek location before moving on to manager of the warehouse. There she was in charge of ordering and tracking inventory for the half dozen Java House locations. Unfortunately, this meant that she started taking work home with her, causing her to eventually “quit the internet” to avoid working from home, an unthinkable concept these days. However, it eventually became time to move on to something more structured and Katie took a job at a lawyer’s office.

Always a dog lover and not yet a dog owner, Katie was referred by a college friend to dog-sit her parents’ yellow lab, Xantho. She became their go-to sitter for as long as they had him, sparking her dog-watching side hustle. Her client list grew quickly by word of mouth which meant now and then a certain gaggle of guys went out of town at the same time, resulting in overlapping duties and doggy sleepovers. Since 2004 she has cared for 47 dogs, 8 cats, 3 horses, countless fish, and one hedgehog.

In 2010 Katie was done playing the Iowa City apartment game and got more for her money by buying a home 35 minutes away in Kalona. Although most of her life took place in Iowa City, she welcomed the buffer zone between home and work and was often staying in town overnight with dogs anyway.

A coffee opportunity presented itself by the time Katie decided to leave the law office. Ben Pierce, a former Java House co-worker, was approached by his financial consultant to help open a coffee shop in a building he owned. Ben agreed to manage the place but recommended Katie to run it with her extensive knowledge and contacts. (That consultant was Chad Andrews and the shop was Press Coffee! In case I was being too vague…) She was thrilled to get back into coffee and felt her strengths were more useful for this type of industry. Unfortunately, she had to miss Press’s opening day to get her gallbladder removed and was out of commission for a while after.

Katie couldn’t recover from surgery at home alone so she stayed a week in North Liberty with a friend. Ben had to open Press by himself but stopped by to see her frequently with coffee and updates. Even just an outing to Walgreens took her two hours to get ready, followed by a nap before she could even leave the house. Finally, she was cleared to go home but called Ben later that night to return her to the hospital for kidney stones. Three days later at 4 a.m. she passed the stones, felt like a million bucks, and drove straight to the shop to sink her teeth into all the things she hadn’t been able to do since it opened.

For years Katie didn’t think she needed her own dog when she could just love on everyone else’s. But then came Rilo. Katie was smitten from day one, visiting her pup once a week before bringing the floofy golden lab home and surprising her parents with their first grand dog. Two years and a litter of puppies later, Stormi not only made Katie a two-dog owner but a show-dog mom. The following year Katie drove to Des Moines on a whim and brought home Roxy. I then forced her to stop looking at dog rescue Facebook groups.

A year before Katie started Press Coffee with Ben, she was out at the Deadwood with some friends when the topic of roller derby came up. A friend had a pair of roller skates in her trunk and after rolling around the parking ramp that night, Katie marked her calendar for Old Capitol City Roller Derby tryouts. By then, I had already been part of the team for a few years and helped organized new skater training. Katie claims I was “really scary” because I knew what I was doing but I was just like her in that I hadn’t roller skated since I was very young. (Her childhood skates were much cooler though.) When I eventually came to Katie for a job, she obliged but we were both secretly apprehensive about needing the same weekends off and the power dynamics of her as my boss and me as her coach. During initial paperwork, Katie found our equalizing factor: both our birthdays were November 22nd.

Katie’s strong coffee know-how and business contacts are what make her a successful owner-operator of Press Coffee, but it’s her thoughtful, and loving personality that has cultivated the amazing clientele of regulars who have stuck by us this year. I’m so grateful to find myself by her side as we take Press into the future. Stay tuned!