The Good Life Cafe, formerly owned by Booksmart owners Brad and Cinda Jones, is under new management as of August and is now being called The Buzz Stop.
The Joneses opened the cafe in September of 1994. They sold the business to Morgan Hill residents Linda and Buzz Sarll at the end of July to consolidate their operations under one roof. Booksmart moved into its temporary location where it will open its bookstore and toy store on Aug. 28 at 80 E. Second St. Violet Boutique will open at the location they’ve occupied for the past several years at 17415 Monterey Road.
The Sarlls have increased the cafe’s hours of operation and the beer and wine offerings. They’re also selling organic and fair-trade coffee and have doubled the amount of staff working at the cafe trying to provide better customer service.
The Sarlls are actively promoting the “street cafe” theme by having more tables and chairs outside the business. The cafe also has a new E-Z Pay service for those in a hurry, allowing them to use their credit cards to make their purchases. The cafe has several selections of coffee and iced tea. It also offers organic herb teas and English teas to go along with pastries delivered daily from Morgan Hill Bakery. Customers can also purchase sandwiches, paninis and salads. The Five Star Mushroom soup continues to be one of the cafe’s popular dishes and is served daily with another alternative. Clam Chowder is served on Fridays.
The cafe has also introduced live music evenings. Customers can sign up for e-mails for notification of these events. Every other Thursday of the month, the cafe offers “Blue Grass” evenings. Customers are encouraged to enjoy the show and dance.
The cafe has also started an aggressive recycling program with the help of Andi Borowski and Maija McDonald through City Hall and Julie Alter at South Valley Recycling.
“It’s very important to us to keep our landfills free of recycling materials. We are looking for volunteers to remove our organic coffee and food waste, this makes wonderful compost and at the moment there is no recycling of food waste for businesses,” Linda said, who’s originally from England.
The business hopes to go 100 percent organic in the future, and has found a national food service that’s environmentally friendly and will sell them disposable plates, flatware and trash bags completely biodegradable, made of raw cane sugar fibers.
“We love life, and love to have fun. We want to bring a special kind of hospitality to the downtown of Morgan Hill,” Linda said. “We have lots of plans for the future of the cafe.”
“We are enjoying so many aspects of the community, it’s amazing about the history of the building, so many wonderful people with great memories and stories to share, we hope one day to make a book about one of the oldest buildings in Morgan Hill,” Linda added.
The cafe’s Web site, which is under construction, is www.mybuzzstop.com. Details: (408) 782-1029.
