Coffee cola’o with sandwiches at dawn. If you talk regarding entrepreneurship in Cayey, the story of Ángel David Martínez Ríos, 28, cannot go unnoticed.
The young man is the creator of the concept “El Cafecito en la Luz”, founded in 2018, where he sells his colaʿo coffee and some sandwiches to make the morning easier for those who pass through the municipality of Cayey.
When this young man from Cayey decided to locate himself under a bridge on highway #15, in addition to carrying a small table and his coffee, he came loaded with a lot of faith and a desire to move on. However, he never imagined that this idea he had would become his main source of income and the support of his three children.
“When I started, I had three jobs and it was very exhausting for me. My wife was pregnant and I have two children from my first marriage and I said: “Well Lord, somehow I have to generate a little more money. Give me an idea. And I was just passing by the bridge where I am located and I saw a man who was selling cookies and everyone knows him in Cayey, but he was there in the followingnoons. So I said: ‘what if I post myself there every morning with coffee very early for those people who rush to San Juan and Caguas? Maybe they stop because they go for miles and can’t stop anywhere.’ And I said: ‘Well, I’m going to sell coffee there,’” said Martínez Ríos.
And so he did! On April 12, 2018, she began selling her coffee on the street. And, although his beginnings were not easy because he did not have much sales volume, Ángel David remembers that he was always grateful to be able to sell, even if it was just one coffee a day.
“In my first week I only sold one coffee and really many people told me negative things like: ‘don’t expose yourself at that time for a coffee nothing else. How is it possible that you were there from 4:00 am to 9:00 am for just one peso?’ But I was very happy and told them: ʿeven if you don’t believe, someone has already stopped, someone has already tried my coffee and that might be the ideal person to tell others,’” the man from Cayey recalled.
However, the story changed the second week when a grateful customer made Martínez Ríos’ work at El Cafecito en la Luz known on the networks and the “post” went viral, unleashing a “boom” for his business.
“On Friday of the second week a gentleman asks me for a coffee and when he goes to pay me, he pays me with a $20 bill and what they had was regarding $9 that he had made for me there. I told him: ‘I don’t have change, but take it and pay me later’. He didn’t want to and he told me that the following week was going to happen and he was going to pay me, but that man took a photo of me, uploaded it to Facebook and put a message asking them to support me and that photo went viral, he took regarding 30 a thousand likes, that was one thing… Wow! That day I was at work at night in a cafeteria and my boss tells me: “Angel, you are viral on the networks.” The next day my phone wouldn’t stop ringing,” said the young merchant.
The following Monday, Martínez Ríos went from selling four and five coffees to selling 64 and thus he continued to increase his average sales, he continued to make himself known and a certain moment came when what one day was his fourth job became his business and the sustenance of his family. That success is attributed to the fact that he never stopped believing.
“I am a person who is a believer, I serve God and when I started the coffee I left everything in God’s hands and said: ‘Lord, I know that you have a purpose with me.’ When I was selling a daily coffee, maybe two, something inside me told me hold on, hold on, don’t give up and I kept going. He did it with so much joy and so much love, it was already an obligation with those people. When I started to see that ‘boom’ I said: ‘this is the result of my consistency, that I am believing in my business, but more than anything, this is the result of my faith in God’”.
Martínez Ríos attests that following that his life changed because he was able to quit his three jobs and dedicate himself fully to establishing the concept and, not only that, but he has also managed to employ his brother-in-law, Miguel Rosario, a 20-year-old who studies Audio Visual Production and Cinema at the Universidad del Sagrado Corazón, and who helps him every day to distribute his coffee.
New momentum following the pandemic
The challenges have been many for this merchant, because following almost two years with his business, the pandemic hit El Cafecito en la Luz hard and took him back to those first days when he started.
“It was a very hard moment for all the small businesses. I was from March to September without working and what I had saved I used up. So, I went back to work and the first day it was like starting all over once more. Nobody stopped. My business was down 80% and I remember one person telling me: ‘someone will see you once more’, and they did. Someone saw me and put on the networks ‘El Cafecito en la Luz returned’ and everything began to flow once more thanks to God”, said the head of the family.
Currently, the merchant works his business from Monday to Friday from 5:00 a.m. to 8:30 a.m., but he also offers his Coffee Bar service in private activities, weddings and fifteen-year-olds. Also, when things get slack, especially in the summer months when there is less vehicular flow, Martínez Ríos looks for them on the side washing cars and cutting back.
In the future, this young Cayeyan entrepreneur hopes to be able to move his coffee table from the bridge and establish a business in four walls, either in Cayey or in the neighboring municipality of Caguas, where he can receive his clients. But his greatest desire is to be able to reach the capital.
“I have 110,000 followers on my Facebook page and many are from the metro area. My dream is to be able to set up a Coffee Shop at El Cafecito en la Luz in Old San Juan to serve all those followers and I know that I will achieve it one day with God’s help,” said Martínez Ríos, who in passing urged those who have an economic need and a desire to undertake, to launch themselves, but he also gave them his best advice.
“I always tell him the first thing you have to have is that God be the center of your business, you cannot take God out of the equation. What a thing that my business is just a table under a bridge… It is God who makes it a blessing, “concluded the young man, who can be contacted through his Facebook page El Cafecito en la Luz or by calling 787 -590-4716.
