Hey, starter! Read on for…

—Danny (say hi via email, LinkedIn or IG).

P.S. Some links weren’t working in last week’s edition. Sorry. That’s what I get for editing late at night...

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1. Main Street magic. A former film and TV producer is building a candy shop in Sleepy Hollow, New York… and using incredibly nostalgic Nora Ephron-esque narrative storytelling on IG in the lead-up. I’m extremely invested in the story and fate of The Village Confectionery. I mean, just look at how well done this is. Doors open in June. (Thanks to FS subscriber Katharina Hahn for sending my way)

2. World champs. Close your eyes and think of where the world's best coffee shop might be. Melbourne? Tokyo? How about Rogers, Arkansas? Onyx Coffee Lab, founded by husband-and-wife team Andrea and Jon Allen in 2012, just topped The World's 100 Best Coffee Shops list – the first American cafe to take the top spot, beating out 15,000 nominees. The Allens started out as baristas who bought a roasting machine they barely knew how to use, and built from there.

Today they’ve got 8 spots across Arkansas – no investors, no franchises – with a flagship that houses a roastery, bakery, taqueria, mezcal bar, tasting restaurant and barista training school under one roof. They publish all their trade data online (what they paid each farmer, the commodity price, import costs, etc). Beautiful.

3. Tinker tailor. In December I wrote about Cat Goetze – aka digital creator CatGPT – who built a bluetooth landline phone brand called Physical Phones. Now, Cat’s launched a wildly ambitious project called Cat Labs:

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