Florida-based coffee shop Qargo Coffee to expand to downtown St. Pete

Qargo Coffee is planning to open a cafe at 924 Central Avenue in the EDGE District of downtown St. Pete by the end of the year | Qargo Coffee

Qargo Coffee, a small but quickly growing coffee company that’s headquartered in Miami, is coming to the EDGE District of downtown St. Petersburg, with plans to open a café at 924 Central Avenue, inside the 930 Central Flats apartment building, by the end of the year. The space is currently home to My Choice Marketplace.

It will be Qargo’s second location in the Tampa Bay region — the other is a kiosk-style café at the International Plaza and Bay Street mall in Tampa.

The St. Pete location, according to Qargo Coffee Marketing Director Sebastian Garcia, will be about 1,200 square feet in size and will offer around 20 seats inside and additional seating outside. Its menu will feature espresso-based beverages, drip coffee, cold brew coffee, and tea in addition to specialty beverages that are unique to St. Pete.

Qargo Coffee will be opening at 924 Central Avenue, currently home to My Choice Marketplace, in the EDGE District of downtown St. Pete | St Pete Rising

Garcia, in an interview with St. Pete Rising, said Qargo Coffee — which, in addition to Florida, also has cafes in Colorado and California and is developing additional locations in Fort Lauderdale, Orlando, Tallahassee, West Palm Beach, Michigan, Nevada, Texas, and Washington, D.C. — creates unique products for each store it opens.

“Each Qargo Coffee store has an exclusive product development process,” he said. “Each store has products that are designed for the store — we’re talking a whole set of beverages.”

The International Plaza location, for example, boasts four exclusive drinks: Guava Bay Spritz, Guava Bay Cold Brew, Choco Flan Latte, and Guava Java Latte.

Qargo gets its coffee beans from Lavazza, an Italian coffee company founded in 1895 and known as “Italy's Favorite Coffee” | Qargo Coffee

Qargo Coffee uses coffee beans from Lavazza, Italy’s most popular coffee roaster, in its hot and cold coffee beverages. It also offers Lotus Plant Energy drinks in a wide range of flavors, in addition to iced tea, hot tea, boba tea, and kids’ beverages such as Babyccino, Marshmallow Mocca, and Ice-Ice Baby.

If you want a snack to go with your coffee, Qargo will offer a wide variety of food such as fresh baked bagels, cookies, muffins, croissants, breakfast sandwiches, acai bowls, Italian pastries, and cakes including the famous tiramisu, red velvet cake, eclairs, cannolis, and carrot cake.

As with the coffee, most of the baked goods will come from Italy.

St. Pete, Garcia said, “is a great demographic for us. We’re growing fast on the east coast and the feedback from people has been extremely positive. Customers are loving the quality of the product, the Lavazza Italian coffee, and the top-tier products along with remarkable customer service.”