MACEDONIA, Ohio — For Brittany Wiley and her husband, Dre, it did not take long before they realized something about the city where they were building a home. 

“We Googled ‘coffee shop.’ As we all know, there's a few chains here in Macedonia, which are absolutely amazing as well. However, I wanted something different. I wanted a local coffee shop. There wasn't one,” said Brittany Wiley. “There was not a local coffee shop in Macedonia and ever since then, our wheels had been turning.” 

The couple decided to bring something unique to the community, opening The Mocha Coffee Company in December.

“It did not look like this. We ended up, of course, having to get our food service license. We did all of the décor. We built everything from scratch and got everything we needed all at once,” she said. 

Wiley said the shop is doing well, but it’s hard to ignore the current economy. The Consumer Price Index reports non-alcoholic beverages rose 0.8% in December 2021, while food prices rose 0.5% in that month and were up 6.3% on a 12-month basis. 

“Inflation is definitely a concern,” she said. “We just found out that the price of our coffee that we're importing will go up a dollar a pound really, really soon. And that's not something that we really planned for so soon after opening.” 

She said she remains hopeful. 

“I'm a very optimistic person in general, and that translates from my personal life to my professional life,” she said. “I have a saying that my mom kind of coined and it's ETR — enjoy the ride — and that basically means live in the moment, live for now because, you know, life is short, nothing is promised and we have a great thing going on here.” 

She also said representation matters.  

“It is important during this crazy time in the world where there's so much racial injustice going on for me to be a really good representation for people of all demographics, all colors, you know, women and men and people of all ages to be a good representation of what an educated black woman can do in the power that she has to bring great concepts and community to the table,” she said. 

Wiley said if coffee is not someone’s specialty, she and her husband also opened two wine shops called Magna Wine Boutique. 

“We categorize our wine by the continent,” she said. “We have North America on top, Australia, Africa, Asia, South America, Europe and then home. Home is where the heart is. That is where we keep all of our Ohio wines. We try to do our best to take the intimidation out of wine. That means when you come in, it's not going to be scary. You should not have anxiety trying to figure out how to pick wine as a gift or wine for yourself.” 

Mocha Coffee Company is located at 777 E. Aurora Road in Macedonia. 

Magna Wine Boutique is located in Bedford and Cuyahoga Falls.