Feature Writing Work Sample

1. Jamie Miller
Pam Greenfield maneuvers smoothly from the back of Bucers Coffeehouse to the front.
The barista at the counter looks up as she passes by and nods to him.
“Bring me my coffee to my table, okay?” she said.
She slides into a leather seat that accompanies a table marked, “reserved”. She leans back
in her chair, comfortable in the coffeehouse. She should be, she owns the place.
Greenfield has run and maintained Bucers ever since it opened 15 years ago. The
coffeehouse’s atmosphere shares little resemblance to the modern and icy feel chain-shops like
Starbucks have.
Greenfield is the reason why.
Every detail of Bucers is intentional, and placed there by her. The leather seats are a
warm, brown color. The brick walls and the towering bookshelves give the coffeehouse
character.
However, it’s the long, wooden table that sits in the middle of the shop that Greenfield
has put the most work in. The table is big. She said the table holds 23 people. The point of it is to
make customers, strangers who wouldn’t normally sit with each other, talk to one another.
“We don’t want to be the modern day, isolated kind of people,” said Greenfield. “The
kind of people who don’t think they need anybody.”
Greenfield said a world that lives like they can do everything by themselves just can’t
thrive.
An elderly couple compliment a young mother’s baby. Three college aged students
huddle over one textbook. The table makes people have to sit together, Greenfield said.

2. “I hate that one quote honestly. The one that says it takes a village,” said Greenfield. “But
it’s true in a sense. If we lived alone on an island, we would shrivel up and die.”
Greenfield believes everything in life should be intentional.
Starbucks buys their beans pre-packaged, whereas her coffeehouse holds an actual
kitchen, where the beans they use are made from scratch. She said she believes that is the
purpose to Bucers.
She set every piece of furniture in carefully picked places and provides desserts made
from scratch, because the goal of Bucers was to make it feel like home. It isn’t a place for
someone to grab caffeine and just leave, she said.
The books that line the many bookshelves found in the shop hold only used books.
Greenfield said they all have history to them. They all come from somewhere, all have a story.
Greenfield purposely stacks specifically used books to remind people where they came
from.
“No one begins from nothing,” Greenfield said. “So whatever people choose to do with
their life they need to remember why they do it, and where they started.”
Greenfield sits relaxed in her chair, sipping her coffee as she watches her coffeehouse at
work. It’s 10 a.m. and the shop is already full of people. People laugh with the baristas, others
talk with friends, and the atmosphere is full of energy … Just as she had built it.