Coffee shop owner working on opening
Staff writer
The owner of a soon-to-open coffee shop in Marion intends to create a comfortable place for people of all ages to gather for coffee and companionship.
Kirsten Dahlgren, formerly of Vermont, wanted to move to Kansas to be closer to her daughter, Dru Day, who has lived in Gardner for five years.
Looking online for real estate, she found the former home of Kari’s Kitchen. It seemed ideal.
“I don’t want to label it as a café or a restaurant,” Dahlgren said.
She named the coffee shop “The Sit Down.”
Her logo is a rendering of her black Labrador retriever in a chair. That chair, in the entry room of The Sit Down, has a pillow marking it as belonging to the dog.
She wanted a comfortable, casual place for people to sit down and enjoy coffee, conversation, and even board games available there.
Besides coffee, she will serve sweets and air-fried food.
She said the menu would be changed up, not set in stone.
The coffee shop décor includes antiques Dahlgren brought from her former home in Vermont.
Regular hours will be 8 a.m. to 1 or 1:30 p.m., but hours will be flexible until Dahlgren gets a better feel for customer demand. On some dates, the shop will remain open in the afternoon, and it will sometimes be open evenings for special occasions.
“It would be a good first-date place,” she said.
Her hope is to create a place that will appeal to both locals and travelers.
For more information, Dahlgren could be reached at (620) 957-4181.