Cafe Church

Costa Coffee and Gloria Jean's have set up a system which allows church groups to set up cafe churches in their buildings. It's quite a neat little scheme that gives them a way of extending their business and offers churches the opportunity to engage in a bit of fresh thinking.

What I like about this scheme is that it seems to be set up with a certain amount of training and quality control built in. Before you're allowed to hold an event, you have to attend or host a training event - presumably so that the coffee house can ensure that their expectations are met and that the event is of sufficient quality and won't embrace the local churches or the companies in question. It's administered by an organisation called the cafechurch network.

I've been aware of this possibility for a while but haven't known what to do about it. There seems to be a group who are interested, but they may need some partners to work with them - particularly if they're to finance a £300 training session. Anyone for coffee?