Evening Echo

Right brew for ladies!

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URBAN, Hockley’s new licensed cafe, has worked exactly as planned, except for one not insignificant detail. The place was never intended to be a cafe. In its first week of opening, Urban was almost full, and more than 90 per cent of the clientele were fem

Owner Claire Fowler, 38, says: “That’s how I envisaged it – as a place where women could feel comfortable and secure.”

Urban is a successful business and Claire is very much in control. Yet, she is still quite surprised to find herself running a cafe.

When she started up at the premises in Spa Road, four years ago, she was in a wholly different line of work “but the cafe just took over”.

The original business, Urban Home, specialised in home furnishings. Claire saw it as a spearhead for breathing new life into Hockley town centre.

“Residents tend to go to Southend to shop, but I thought Urban would encourage other similar businesses to open up, and help make Hockley more attractive as a shopping centre,” Claire says.

The concept worked for a while, and a couple of boutiques opened up in the wake of Claire’s pioneering venture. Then came the recession and “the boutiques didn’t last”.

Claire was discouraged enough to contemplate closing and returning to her old job in customer care in London. But while customers were slow to buy into the notion of Hockley chic, there was one product locals clearly did crave. Claire observed something unexpected about her own business.

“I provided a space where people could sit down and have a cup of coffee in the back of the shop,” she says. “It was to make them feel at home and encourage them to linger.”

Customers were lingering all right.

Claire says: “There was more of a buzz around the coffee machine than in the main shop.”

Realising she had stumbled on an untapped market, Claire developed a new business model – a cafe and lunchery aimed primarily at women.

“Wine bars and cafes can be quite intimidating places to women, especially if they are by themselves,” she says.

“I wanted an attractively decorated place where a lady can go for a cup of coffee, a glass of wine, or lunch, and feel comfortable and secure and unpressurised."

The coffee facility that originally occupied a small corner of the premises has now taken over the business.

Claire intends to continue selling home furnishings at special parties, but the cafe is now at the core of her operation. Over the next year, Urban is set to open for weekend evenings, and will also run attractions such as “chick flick nights”.

Eventually, Claire envisages a string of Urban cafes stretching far beyond Hockley.

“Women everywhere want a place like Urban,” she says. But for now, Hockley’s the place for ladies who want to lunch.

As for Claire?“I’m not going back to work in London now,” she says.

See www.urbanbarcafe.co.uk