A commitment to quality
Adam and Shawna Palmer living their dream with Abstract Coffee
Adam and Shawna Palmer’s only measure for success at Abstract Coffee is to provide a community space where people can enjoy high quality coffee.
“We have something to provide the world,” Adam tells Cumberland Wire. “And it’s exciting to get it out there.”
The Palmers own and operate the Amherst café, where they specialize in espresso-based beverages. They also serve filter blend coffee and tea, iced drinks, mocha and customs, and also serve freshly made sweets and treats daily.
Every serving is fresh, made to order and brewed with the utmost care to ensure the best possible quality cup of coffee.
“It’s a very aggressive method of brewing coffee,” explains Adam. “It’s 120 pounds of water pressure put through a cup of coffee and if that coffee isn’t ground properly or distributed properly, you can end up with really off flavours. Each step of the way, scientifically, has to be exacting to get that consistent result.”
Shawna adds, “Every day he is refining exactly the grind setting on the beans and then all kinds of settings through the espresso machine. He’s tasting that shot every morning and there are little fluctuations to make it taste good every day.”
All the tasty treats and sweets are made fresh, as well, with Shawna’s sister Heather doing most of the baking.
The Palmers also have a strong sense of ethics and they make sure to partner with companies who treat people well. Appreciating the farmers who grow the coffee is of the utmost importance.
To supply their coffee, they partner with a Vancouver company called 49th Parallel. The Palmers credit 49th Parallel for establishing an empowering relationship with the farmers to grow quality and sustainable coffee while providing the farmers fair trade value for their coffee.
Meanwhile, Angry Alpaca, a tea company in River Hebert, provides the loose-leaf tea.
The Palmers partner with them because of their relationships with local charities.
“I never liked coffee before. But they were hardcore into coffee and it was a different perspective on what coffee could be. That led us on this crazy journey.”
Adam Palmer On his and Shawna’s introduction to espresso coffee by friends
The Palmers opened the café last November, but their journey together, as well as their dream for a café, started across the country.
Shawna was born and raised nearby in Colchester County, while Adam hails from Fort McMurray, Alta. She met Adam after moving to Fort McMurray for a teaching job.
They married, had children and developed a shared passion for espresso coffee after they were introduced to it by some friends. Adam never knew coffee could be so good.
“I never liked coffee before,” he admits. “But they were hardcore into coffee and it was a different perspective on what coffee could be. That led us on this crazy journey.”
They quickly became espresso aficionados, over the last 14 years buying and upgrading their commercial espresso machines for their own use and perfecting the science behind cultivating the most refined cup of java.
A dream emerged to establish their own café in Fort McMurray, but it wasn’t viable there.
It re-emerged after Shawna found a full-time teaching job in Amherst, where they moved in the summer of
2020.
However, Adam could only find work in his profession in Halifax or Fredericton and determined that was too long a commute. He thought about some options for work and that’s when they revived the café dream. They started reaching for locations and landed upon a space at the Town Square.
CBDC Cumberland played a big role, helping them iron out their business plan, connecting them with resources and support mechanisms within the community.
Renovations were required as they wanted to ensure the bathroom was wheelchair accessible.
They painted the space and re-built the countertops and cabinets.
Shawna credits Adam for all the work he put into it.
“Adam poured all the concrete countertops, he designed our logo, he created the font in our logo, he designed our menu,” she says. “He was both on the creative design side and also the construction of everything that happened in there.”
During the COVID-19 pandemic, they have had a capacity of about 21 seats to allow for social distancing. They feel the word of mouth they’ve been getting is “golden.”
“It gives us that instant feedback so we can change and adjust,” says Adam.
With the restaurant adjacent to the community college, they expected plenty of student customers. But they have been getting people who are 60-plus who are loving their products.
Even before they moved, Adam and Shawna were feeling embraced by the community.
“We purchased the house a couple months before we moved and our family was helping us mow the lawn and stuff like that, but even the neighbours next door would come over and mow the lawn for this family they had never even met before,” says Shawna. “Just taking care of us and our property. And when we moved in, all the neighbours came over with food for us.”
They see themselves as the beneficiaries of East Coast hospitality.