On Friday, much-loved cafe Trader & Co celebrated five years of serving coffee to the people of Yass and its surrounds.
Moving into an old hardware store that had been vacant for seven years, it’s pretty incredible to see what the cafe has become. Owner Daniel Neuhaus, who started the business with no experience working in cafes, said that despite it being a little bigger than what he had imagined, the venue’s general feel is everything he had hoped for.
“We’ve been through a lot of evolutions over the last five years and changed the layout around.”
“I think probably when we started, our vision was a bit smaller and I guess we just knew what we knew. We’ve grown and changed with our customers, and the town,” he said.
When asked what makes Trader & Co special, Daniel’s answer didn’t require much thought.
“Definitely the community! Our customers and the Yass community. It’s just exciting to be a part of the Yass community and I guess we also have our own community here at Trader & Co,” he said.
The recent lockdown has meant a difficult period for the hospitality sector. Those who follow Trader & Co would’ve seen the extra effort they’ve been going to find different ways to serve the community.
“We’ve had to evolve again, and change what we do. We’re currently not doing takeaway food, we’re doing take-home meals and dinners that we cook and prepare and that’s obviously a bit different,” said Daniel.
Despite the success of their take-home meals, Daniel remains eager for the “fun part” of his job to return in the near future.
“It is hard because the community is obviously the fun part about what we do here and we can’t really have people just gathering in here. It’s definitely a challenge but I think it’s definitely still nice for our customers to just be able to come for five minutes and get a coffee and have a quick chat while they’re waiting,” he said.
Lastly, Daniel wanted to reiterate the great work of his prior business partners, Sophie Peer and Kate MacMaster. He believes both Sophie and Kate were instrumental in making Trader & Co what it is today and what he hopes it will be for many more years to come.
Max O’Driscoll
