GREAT FALLS — A unique coffee shop is now open in Great Falls, as Luna Coffee Bar hosted its grand opening Friday. Located at #9 5th Street North in downtown Great Falls, it's modeled after coffee shops in Europe.
Co-owner Sam Aarab, who hails from Norway, currently works at a law firm in the building upstairs and decided now was the time to introduce Great Falls to tastes and traditions from abroad.
“I’m from Norway...and I was raised in a coffee shop more or less. My father used to run them. My family used to run them. And when I emigrated to the United States - ten years ago at this point - I wanted to bring a little piece of home,” Aarab said.
Aarab has long dreamed of the day he could use coffee to infuse parts of his own culture within his community: “I always thought it would be nice - to pass down that experience that I had to my children and bring a little bit of Europe and Italy to Great Falls,” Aarab said.
He said the soft openings prior to Friday’s grand opening went really well. "We tried to fine-tune the process of ordering, making sure we eliminate as many sources of frustration for our customers as possible,” Aarab said. "It’s been wonderful and I've had a lot of help from my family members, a lot of help from the community.”
Aarab also plans to embrace Europe’s model of speedy service using simple ingredients - including bread from Great Harvest Bread Co. and coffee from Al Banco. “When I say speed and simplicity, it’s going to be focused on getting you what you want, when you want it, and quickly,” Aarab said.
While Aarab hopes to provide his customers service as efficiently as possible, those customers wanting to stay a while longer are welcome to do so.
“For the people who want to stop by and chat and learn more about what we’re doing and how that’s going to work and why this is special, I think they’ll get that one of two ways. One - by just seeing what this place will eventually look like in hopefully a few weeks…[Two] They’ll have an opportunity to learn more about us on our website as well and also by chatting to our staff who will be specially trained for this kind of coffee shop,” Aarab said.
The coffee shop has also been designed with coronavirus guidelines in mind, including social distancing.
The cafe will be open from 7 a.m. to 4 p.m. every day, beginning Monday, November 9. Click here to visit the website; click here for the Facebook page.
From September 11:
