Source: Words and picture by Angela Skujins
Percolate and Preach: How Larry & Ladd’s co-owner balances two passions
You may know Billy Hogarth as the friendly barista taking your coffee order at café Larry & Ladd, but the business owner lives a double life as a pastor for a local Christian church. When we ask Billy Hogarth if he ever finds himself preaching to customers from the Larry & Ladd service counter, he says: ‘People that come to a coffee shop aren’t asking for an encounter with Jesus … people just want a good coffee.’ During the day, Billy makes lattes and cappuccinos from the café’s Synesso Factory coffee machine on Grenfell Street, Adelaide, while his business partner Carlos Astudillo organises the food options offsite, which spans sweet treats to fruit salads to bowls of granola. But from Friday to Sunday, Billy adopts a different persona. He becomes the pastor of the city branch of local Uniting Church, Journey. Although these parts of his life – coffee and church – are very separate, they occasionally interact. ‘I want to serve people and I want to serve them well,’ he tells CityMag. ‘One of the reviews we get here at Larry & Ladd the most is that our staff are just awesome with customers, and that we give people the time of day and that’s something that me and Carlos are really big on.’
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