Octopus Coffee to relocate to Historic Lowell School

By NATHAN DEAL

Nathan.Deal@gjsentinel.com

Octopus Coffee has entered an agreement to relocate to the Historic Lowell School Building, two months after announcing an impending closure.

The cafe, which has called northern Horizon Drive its home for a decade, will soon move across Grand Junction to the downtown area, becoming the newest tenant of the Lowell School Building. The company had announced it would close at the end of November 2024 because of a dispute with the property owner, but it was able to remain open after a surge in business.

The timeline of the move is subject to construction schedules as the new space is prepared, but Octopus Coffee owner Alexis Bauer hopes that the cafe will end its Horizon Drive operations around mid-to-late February and open at the Lowell School Building around March 1.

“We have won our fight against our annihilation. I’m really excited for that. We signed a lease with the Lowell Building (Sunday) morning after reaching a deal Friday afternoon. We’re excited to be going into this extremely collaborative, artsy space with a huge outside lawn which is perfect,” Bauer told The Daily Sentinel.

See OCTOPUS, page 10A ➤

The Historic Lowell School Building in Grand Junction will soon become the new home of Octopus Coffee.

NATHAN DEAL/ The Daily Sentinel

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“One of the things about Octopus is we try to create that radical participation piece like Burning Man is famous for, where it’s a creative use of commerce where we create an environment where people who may not know each other meet and exchange and have those happy moments that make life delightful.”

Octopus Coffee will be renting its space in the Lowell School, which Bauer welcomes because of the current cost to buy a property and relocate. Because it’s renting a space in “a community of really creative, collaborative businesses”, Octopus Coffee has no plans to raise prices on any of its products.

Bauer said that Lowell School Building owner Jeremy Nelson reached out to her after seeing The Daily Sentinel’s original reporting in November on Octopus Coffee planning to close.

It was an ideal match for Bauer and Octopus, as other landlords she had conversations with became hesitant with some of her ideas, such as a potential move to a worker-owner model to provide employees equity stakes in the business.

“I almost died of shock because a proactive landlord is a unicorn,” Bauer said. “Jeremy reached out, not even looking for a permanent tenant. He saw our business as a business in distress and offered his resources as a temporary spot while we looked for something more permanent.... (The school) kind of blew my mind. He’s got this really participatory, inclusionary landlord model going that’s like a perfect fit for our participatory, inclusionary business model.”

Bauer sees Lowell as a good fit for the business, as it will share space with Gemini Beer Company and some food trucks. It will also give Octopus patrons, as Bauer estimates, 500-1,000% more space to enjoy their drinks compared to their small Horizon Drive space, thanks to seating spaces inside the former school as well as the property’s lawn.

Nelson likewise sees Octopus Coffee as a natural addition.

“We’re excited to have them join us and the other local businesses there in the building. We still have to go through our approvals process with the city and county and public health and building departments, so we still have some work to do, but they’ve made a commitment to the building and we’re excited to have them, and we hope to get them open as soon as possible with the help of the city and county,” Nelson told The Daily Sentinel.

“We’re also looking forward to having them participate in some of the events we hold out on the Lowell Village Commons, the front lawn of the school. As we’re growing our events, whether they’re small meetings in the building or large events out on the lawn, I think the food and beverage options Octopus brings will be a nice compliment to those events.” Bauer mentioned potential new events for Octopus to host at its new space, such as croquet Tuesdays and frisbee golf Fridays.

Octopus will be fundraising for the move through a collaboration with Grand Junction-based Be One Design Co. in the next week or two.

“The town loves us so much,” Bauer said.