By Andrea Louise Thomas Photos Yanni
M
ount Martha couple Tom and Shannon Wicks found themselves a sweet spot in the local gourmet coffee culture with their hugely popular specialty coffee and food truck, Bussy McBussface. Located at the North Car Park at Mount Martha Beach for the past three years, Bussy is being temporarily retired, but the business is not. The couple are rolling on to a new location opening a pop-up café in Main Street, Mornington.
What makes their coffee business different is the quality of what they serve. “We’ve been producing café quality coffee out of a bus that was fitted out with the best equipment on the market. No other mobile coffee van has the machine we use. We use Commonfolk Coffee which we think is the best. We are just taking all that to a new spot,” Tom says. One of the many things their Mount Martha customers loved was the fact that Tom and Shannon knew all their regulars. As soon as they saw a customer’s car pulling in, they’d start making that order. The coffee was ready and waiting. Neighbours from across the street would often preorder and cross the road, cup at the ready. Tom and Shannon hope to establish that same rapport in their new location. The couple know the value of great customer service as they come from generations in hospitality. Shannon is from Mount Martha and started working in hospitality at a local bakery. She then moved over to Commonfolk Café in Mornington. “There I fell in love with hospitality,” she says. In less than a year she moved into management. She worked at Commonfolk until she and Tom purchased Bussy. Tom is from Port Fairy. His greatgrandfather opened the iconic Chitticks Café in Warnambool in the 1930s. Tom’s father also ran a café for a while. That’s where Tom first learned about the café business. Tom had planned to become a physiotherapist, but changed his mind. Instead, he started a Business and Arts degree at Swinburne which he’s still working on.