To set itself apart from other breakfast concepts, Maple Street Biscuit Company also serves its own private label coffee. The company invested in a Florida coffee purveyor to ensure each restaurant brews coffee with fresh batches of roasted beans, which are grinded daily in-store.  “It’s the freshest coffee you can get,” co-founder Scott Moore said. The coffee got so popular, the company eventually launched online orders.

Customers at the counter-service restaurant are not assigned a number or name. Instead, cashiers ask them a unique question such as “What is your dream vacation.” Their answer, which is shouted out when the order is ready, “gives us insight on who they are,” Moore said. Answers also spark conversations.  For example, one customer answered, “The Beatles” when asked “What was your first concert?” Curious guests asked him what that experience was like. “How many restaurants can you go to that make that kind of connection?” Moore said.

Each main menu item has a flat dollar price to keep it simple. Biscuit sandwiches, for example, range from $6 to $10.  The best-selling item on the menu is “The Squawking Goat,” shown. The biscuit sandwich is layered with breaded chicken breast and a grilled goat cheese medallion and pepper jelly. Chef Amanda Frieteg gave a shout out to savory breakfast sandwich during a Food Network show about guilty pleasures.

Maple Street deals with labor challenges in multiple ways. First, it’s only open six days a week for breakfast and lunch – for a total of 44 hours. That results in work-life balance for employees. Community leaders are also offered profit-sharing after their first full year. “They can do really well financially,” Moore said.