Javastop cafe receives notice to comply over signage - Longmont Times-Call

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Longmont’s Javastop coffee shop on Monday was served a notice to comply by its landlord over a claim of unapproved signs displayed outside of the business’s rented space.

The notice gave Javastop owner Kurt Collins three days to remove the advertising or be subject to grounds for eviction from the Main Street building the business calls home.

According to the notice, the cafe’s signage, which Collins said has been in place for more than 20 years, needed approval by the landlord prior to posting and violates his lease.

The signage under contention is a neon sign reading “Javastop” imbedded in a window on the building’s east-facing entrance and a small sign also reading “Javastop” on the west-facing entrance. The notice also asks that flyers and other advertisements for the coffee shop were also asked to be removed from the building’s main hallway. The main entrance to the coffee shop is off Third Avenue.

“Some of my signage is actually built into the windows and archways off the building,” Collins said. “It’s actually like a permanent part of the structure. We’d have to remove windows in order to get them out.”

While Thursday is the end of the three-day window Collins was given by the notice, he said he plans to keep the cafe open under normal hours, from 8 a.m. to 3 p.m. Tuesday through Sunday, for as long as possible.

Collins’ landlord is Sarah Carrillo, owner of The Speakeasy bar underneath Javastop, who bought the building in early June. Collins said Carrillo wants the signage taken down so she can put her own up, referring to the city’s limit on the number of signs that can be attached to commercial properties.

Section 15.06.060 of the city’s Land Development Code allows “one (sign) per sign wall … plus one additional sign for each 100 linear feet of sign wall” for single-tenant properties in mixed-use and nonresidential zoning districts.

Carrillo declined to comment on the notice Wednesday.

Collins said the Javastop’s long-term options are to either hire a lawyer to refute the demand or remove the signage. He said he has letters from the building’s previous landlord stating the signs are approved if he chooses to go the “legal route.”

The coffee shop and community gathering space at 301 Main St. has been a staple of downtown Longmont since the early 1990s. Collins took over as owner in 2020.

“Everyone there is very careful of everyone else,” said Laurel Van Driest, a Javastop regular for three years. “It’s always been a lovely community.”

She stressed that the customers don’t want to come across as hostile to the building’s ownership. Instead, they want to band together to keep the shop open.

“Whatever we can do to help, we will,” Van Driest said. “… It’s not an adversarial thing, it’s more, ‘This is causing problems for an established installation, and maybe these problems don’t need to be caused.’”

The cafe is also frequented by a small group of locals who call themselves the Old Guys. The group has been meeting for decades to socialize over coffee at a table in the building’s lobby, which is not part of Javastop.

“I loved walking to (Javastop) every Saturday morning from my house just seven blocks away on Third Avenue,” wrote Chris Colelli, a longtime member of the Old Guys, in an email Wednesday.

Colelli moved away from Longmont in 2010, but added, “I still drop in on the occasions that I come to town every year. It’s like I never left.”

Collins said he appreciates the support he’s already received from the local community and said he wants to keep the cafe’s legacy going. He said Javastop staff will do everything they can to keep it running.

“It’s been such a local mainstay for so many people who have actually grown up here, (and) I plan on continuing to fight to keep Javastop open as long as possible,” he said.

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Javastop cafe receives notice to comply over signage - Longmont Times-Call
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