GENEVA – When customers enter Coffee Drop Shop in Geneva, co-owner Judy Jendro strives to make them feel like family.
Coffee Drop Shop opened its doors in 1980, thanks to Jendro and her husband and co-owner, Jerry Jendro. This year marks the 35-year anniversary of the store being open.
Earlier this year, three customers who were close with Judy Jendro died, one of whom was a father. After Judy Jendro had written sympathy cards to the families, she said a customer’s daughter came in and commented, “That was such a beautiful card you sent my mom upon my dad’s passing.” To which Judy Jendro replied, “Well, he was in here every week, driving me crazy crazy for his coffee! He was just a member of the family. He was like one of us.”
Since 1982, Jerry Jendro has been roasting all of the coffee at the store after he and Judy Jendro attended a coffee seminar, where they realized it was the only way to make money in a coffee shop.
This allows Coffee Drop Shop to make special blends for customers.
“My husband will do special blending when we need to because when you own your own and you do it yourself, you can do it your way, and that’s what makes us different from other shops,” Judy Jendro said.
Customers can ask Judy Jendro to make a special blend they found at a competitor for a higher price, and after searching for the ingredients on the Internet, she is able to make and sell it at a lower price.
Additionally, Coffee Drop Shop offers a variety of tea, tea pots and kitchen accessories.
The idea for the family-centered shop first began when Jerry Jendro decided he wanted to create his own business.
“We’d actually been looking at a hot dog stand that we were gonna put out in Sycamore, and the day we were supposed to rent the building it was rented early in the morning before we got to it in the afternoon,” Judy Jendro said.
After looking for a new space, the Jendros soon found another location where they could start their business.
Judy Jendro said Terry Grove, former owner of The Market in St. Charles, was looking for a new type of shop to open in the space – more specifically, a boutique shop where women could sit down, relax and then go to other shops in The Market.
When they heard about what Grove had in mind, Judy Jendro said her husband asked, “How about a coffee and tea shop?”
Grove agreed with Jerry Jendro about opening a coffee shop, and that marked the beginning of a business that continues to exist 35 years later, Judy Jendro said.
“We always feel that God’s blessed us with a good location and good customers,” she said.
If Judy and Jerry Jendro had rented the building in Sycamore, they may have opened a hot dog stand instead of Coffee Drop Shop.
The business relocated in 2008 from St. Charles to Geneva.
Coffee Drop Shop is at the Berry House Shops on 227 S. Third St. in Geneva and is open from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Sunday and from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. from Monday through Saturday.