MONROE — SharinaBean’s on Main is hunting for a new spot. The coffeehouse at 103 W. Main St. announced it will be closing Saturday, April 19 as its lease isn’t being renewed. It has been here 8½ years.
Owner Sharina McCrain still has a kiosk inside the EvergreenHealth Pavilion next to the hospital and a mobile coffee business, but the shop was the gem.
“We definitely want to stay and build up something as close to what we have as possible and continue to be a part of the Monroe community,” she said.
She said, though, some places she’s seen do not fit and some aren’t the right size.
Running a coffeeshop is “our way of serving our community,” she said, by offering a safe space with couches, comfort food and community events. The stash of board games and the piano are for people to play.
What will go in has not been publicly announced.
Top-selling real estate agent Adam Cobb, whose office is in Edmonds, bought the building March 4 from the estate of its prior owner.
“I love Monroe and want to revitalize downtown,” Cobb said about this building buy. He also owns the building next door that houses Lewis & Main Restaurant.
Cobb said last week he doesn’t have a tenant officially signed yet.
The building’s prior owner, Gregory Payne, died in 2023. His obituary praised him as uplifting small businesses.
The rent was month-to-month, the real estate listing said. McCrain said she sensed from conversations early on that her shop wasn’t part of the plan for the building’s future.
Independent coffeeshop Monroe Coffee Co.’s owner Heather Fulcher said she was sad to hear the news.
“We are all serving the coffee-drinking public and look at it as a camaraderie, in that it’s not a competition,” she said. McCrain is one of her “coffee sisters,” as Fulcher put it.
“It would be awesome if (McCrain) could find a space downtown,” Fulcher said. “The difficulty is finding one that’s built out” and already has a kitchen.
Coffee places don’t make a strong profit on coffee alone — it’s the extras such as pounds of coffee by the bag that pay the bills, Fulcher said.
A coffeehouse requires sinks and more. Finding a spot already equipped is ideal. Fulcher said from experience that building out the basic kitchen to serve coffee can cost upwards of $40,000; a full kitchen, for sandwiches and more like SharinaBean’s has, could cost beyond $100,000.
McCrain acknowledges the build-out cost may be a barrier. Her family members built out the current SharinaBean’s on Main.
But she’s hoping to not lose momentum, and is praying for success. She has a community of customers who have been coming for years.
With its living room feel, it’s to “feel like you’re coming into our home,” McCrain said.
“I think the hardest part is I built this (shop) for my daughter” to eventually take over, McCrain said. Ciarra McCrain’s been learning the trade for 11 years, and as a teen is largely running SharinaBean’s front-of-house.
No permits has been filed at the city planning department for changes at the building, the city confirmed.
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Story update post-publication: Jessika Quadri of Mrs. Quadri's Bakery, which will take a storefront in downtown Monroe, said publicly she is not moving into the 103 W. Main St. SharinaBean's spot, nor the home of the Sky River Bakery.
