How to Start a Coffee Cart (Special Education)

Starting a student-run coffee cart can be a fantastic way to teach life skills to special education students and create a sense of community within your school. If you’re a special education teacher looking for a unique project, consider starting a coffee shop right in your classroom. Here are some tips and tricks on how to start a coffee cart in special education classrooms.

The internet is littered with stories of teachers or businesses that employ students with special needs, but how do you start a classroom coffee cart that’s special education inclusive?

Starting a Classroom Coffee Cart

When you see inspirational articles online, they always fail to talk about all the lead-up to the cart… all the work put in to make it a success. If you are thinking about starting your own classroom coffee cart for special education students, then there are a few things you need to know about how to start a coffee cart so you can be your own success story.

Seven Steps to Starting a Classroom Coffee Cart

1. Get Admin Approval

Before you even start planning your menu and setting prices, you need to get your campus administration on board. Most campuses or districts will have guidelines about how you collect money. That’s especially true if it is considered fundraiser money or program income. There are also rules on what you can do with the proceeds.

I suggest you start with your special education department chair and set if they have a setup guide for how to run clubs or organizations. Although you are not technically a ‘club’, some of the money guidelines may apply to you. You may have to designate a staff member who is the contact person and in charge of the project and money.

Also, if your campus serves breakfast or lunch, they will probably have extra rules about food. Most of these are about when you can serve what and to whom (specifically students). You may not be able to serve the general education students during the lunch hours. You may also find out that you cannot serve them cups of coffee all day #Caffeine. Campus admin may keep your cart limited to just first period or they may want you to restrict to just teacher’s orders. They could tell you that other clubs are fundraising, so you can only serve on certain days of the week, like Tuesday mornings. 

With all this in mind, before you even get going, make sure you’re not going to get shot down. Check with campus administration and the principal to okay the cart. I love to send them a formal letter and plan when setting up new projects so they know the great work we are doing benefits students. Sending classroom project requests also looks great as a teaching professional and can be added to your portfolio to use during teacher evaluations. #WinWin

2. Mastermind Your Menu

You are going to want to pre-train skills with your students, so what you plan with the menu will matter. I remember when I first started my coffee cart, I really wanted my students to make all the menu items. It was fun… for about 30 seconds. Then the hard grind of having to coordinate and monitor all the students during the cooking process and finish what they didn’t or couldn’t become oppressive. Remember the point of the project: To build social skills, money skills, and job skills in your students. To do that, you don’t need to serve ALL the things!

I remember one year our coffee cart business couldn’t serve hot beverages until October! In August, it was just a disaster waiting to happen. My students needed to build better safety skills first. What do you serve without coffee and hot chocolate? Well, you start to get creative. You have to! The most important thing is that your crew of students are learning skills, not just handing out coffee cups. 

When you are first starting out, the training of students should be the most important task at hand as you build their vocational skills. Save yourself a lot of heartache and start with mostly prepackaged food. You may even start with canned or bottled beverages. Then, as you begin to see your students build their skill set, add to your menu. Choose what to add by asking potential buyers what they would like to see more of. Taking the menu in baby steps will help you be successful!

3. Decide on the Delivery Model

Your students and their skill level will determine what delivery model will work best. As you work through how to start a coffee cart, consider student mobility. The two ends of the delivery spectrum are to physically push a cart to your customers. This may be to the office, attendance, or to teachers on their conference. Otherwise, during a specific time window, you can offer online ordering and delivery. Remember, you don’t have to serve every day. You may decide to only operate your cart at the end of the week (like just Friday Mornings) or just one period a day (opt for second period, not first). It’s all what works best for you and for students. 

I have operated both and there are pros and cons to each, especially for students. If you are working with students who struggle with maneuvering in the school or have a higher likelihood of having behaviors, you may want to run an ordering system. This model also lets you target certain students with specific skills within the comfort of the classroom. Those students who are able then delivered as an individual, pair, or small group with or without supervision.

You will also have to consider how people will place orders. Will you go to them? Or will they fill in an order form? Will you accept digital orders through a Google Form? All of these are viable options and it’s a great idea to consider how all of them could work with your special needs students. 

4. Decide on the Jobs and Start Pre-Training

When you start your coffee cart, you want as many students as possible to be involved to work on skill-building. It becomes essential to sit down and think about how many tasks are involved in the overall operation. Then you are able to assign some students to inventory. Others may be responsible for counting the money and balancing the ledger. And others will work on actually making coffee. Suddenly the cart is inclusive of everyone! There’s an opportunity for students to learn skills in a lot of different vocational areas.

The coffee cart positions listed here also include job descriptions and assignments. This can help you to build your coffee cart schedule. The key is to remember that operating this small business is how you can build a variety of skills in students with mild to severe disabilities. That means keep it fresh and let everyone try every position.

5. Start Small, Expect Failure

Failure feels like a four-letter word, but it truly isn’t. I was recently in a classroom with a teacher who was just starting out. They planned on taking the cart out the very next day for its first run. He told me all the places he planned to take the cart, how many students, and how many products… I almost had a panic attack listening to him! 

The first time you go out is going to be overwhelming. You’re suddenly going to come face to face with all the things you never knew and everything you’ve forgotten. Building a successful coffee cart is a slow process.

Start small! The first time you go out maybe the only thing you offer is coffee and tea as opposed to all of the other menu items you decided to include. You could try everything on your menu but only go to one or two buyers as your first attempt. Maybe you just have one coffee cart day for the first month you go out so you can continue teaching skills and keeping the rest of your vocational programs running. 

However, you choose to start small, realize that there are a lot of moving parts and operating a classroom coffee cart and you won’t know where the hiccups are until you get out there and give it a shot. Just don’t be surprised when you come back to class with sweaty pits, an eye twitch, and some very tired students!

6. Refine & Expand

Once you’ve gotten into the groove, your classroom coffee cart should start to feel like a well-oiled machine… mostly. Once you’ve got things going, reflect on what’s working and what’s not and take an opportunity to expand your menu, your clientele, or the number of students that go out on the coffee cart every day. At the end of the school year, reflect on what worked, what didn’t, and what you’d like to do differently. This will help you at the start of the next school year; being able to reflect on the last school year and what you can do differently or better. 

7. Plan for Profits

I have found over and over that coffee carts are a very profitable vocational training activity. If you choose the right products and really examine your overhead, which includes choosing supplies and materials that are cost-effective, you can make a pretty good profit. In the Complete Coffee Cart Setup Digital Download, there are several suggestions for products including cups, lids, and coffee makers that will keep your overhead low.

Once you officially turn a profit, celebrate with your students by having a party! Order pizza, some sweet treats, or different things your students choose. Or allow students to earn a dividend by paying them. Then take those hard-earned dollars out on a field trip to see a movie or out to eat. Otherwise, you can reinvest in the business. Whatever you choose, make sure your campus administration is aware of where the money is going and has given you their blessings. Communicating this information is critical to keeping your business operational. 

How to Start a Coffee Cart in Special Education

There you have it, the seven steps you’ll follow to start a classroom coffee cart. This model will also work with a snack cart, or most other enterprise activities you are choosing to start in the classroom.

Classroom enterprise activities are great for vocational training and getting students with disabilities to interact in their school community. Plus, they’re perfect for adding revenue to your classroom so students can have more community experiences.

So, if you have never thought of starting a classroom coffee cart or enterprise in your Autism unit or special ed classroom, I highly suggest you think about it! The benefits to the students are profound.

Original post’s citation (updated in 2023): Ayo Jones. (February 27, 2019). “How to Start a Coffee Cart”. https://www.noodlenook.net/how-to-start-a-coffee-cart/.