WHEATLAND – Going into their fourth year of ownership, Becky Hilty, from day one had it in her mind that their coffee company would be successful enough that it would need room to grow.

Last week after months of building and planning, the grand opening of the new Western Coffee Company came to fruition with a ribbon cutting ceremony and welcome from the Platte County Chamber of Commerce. 

Western Coffee Company that was in a smaller building on Gilchrist Street were outgrowing that building from the moment they opened. The new building and expanded parking area is now located at 86 16th Street in Wheatland, directly across from the Maverick gas station.

“It was too busy and too crowded for the girls,” Hilty said. “To be able to produce good, effective times to get drinks out we needed bigger facilities. We will be able to do more for the community. We had the idea for expansion immediately. Robert and Bruce (Hilty) owned this lot for a while and wanted to do something with it. So they toyed with the idea of whether or not to put a sit-down here or another drive through.”

The Hilty family decided to just expand the drive through space and they have added additional parking spaces.

Although the idea has been there for almost four years, construction did not begin until May of 2022. 

“They put all the water in and then laid the foundation in May,” she said. “Then the building started going up immediately, as fast as we could. Within two weeks we had a shell.”

The project took approximately seven months to complete.

“We had to have town contractors come in and inspectors and then had to have everything according to code,” Hilty said. “That all takes time. Our biggest challenge was the excitement and the wanting to get into the new building. The community was really behind us, but they were also like, ‘when is it going to happen?’ So it was like a lot of pressure, but really great pressure. The biggest thing was making everything come together so we could open and things could just go great.”

Along with the new building, with the same friendly and expedient service, there are new items Hilty is excited about.

“We now offer cold brew coffee,” Hilty said. “It’s all in-house and Emily (Hilty) has her own special recipe that she does for her cold brew. We are selling it here at the coffee hut in individual servings but we are also selling the growlers with can be brought back in and refilled. They can buy the growlers and then they can come back and get a refill as long as it’s in the growler.”

The growlers have been handed out to businesses and people that have supported the fundraising that Western Coffee Company has done in the community.

Cold brewed is brewed cold instead of hot and has a different, smoother and less acidic flavor. It is actually cold water that filters through the beans.

“It’s brewed with cold water over a long period of time,” Emily Hilty, co-manager of Western Coffee Company said. “Usually 18-24 hours. You also want minerals in the water that helps to take the acidity out. If you use purified water, the coffee will actually be more acidic. Because it’s brewed for a longer period of time, it actually pulls more caffein into the coffee than a house drip. It’s going to have a smoother taste and creamier. The flavor profile, we feel is going to attract a lot of people here.”

Many more things will be added within the next month as the shop takes shape and develops its own identity. Hilty is thinking perhaps adding to the breakfast menu, but nothing is set in stone quite yet.

Because of a more visible location in a high-traffic area, Hilty has added more staff to accommodate the customer base.

“We are training more people so we can have more girls in here,” Hilty said. “It will be able to speed up the process and there will be new learning as we go in the transition but we will now have two girls at each window.”

The idea of a great cup of coffee without the wait-time of a Starbucks is what this industry has been looking for and it looks as if Western Coffee Company has fine-tuned the processes and perhaps could give the entire coffee world a lesson or two.