"A-Cup" of Joe

Java and Jugs. 

Caffeine and Cleavage.

The headline potential for this post is endless.  The subject matter, on the other hand, is unique -- a topless coffee shop in Vassalboro, Maine.

What?  

You read it right: a topless coffee shop.  No booze, no bar food just coffee, tea, dough nuts and bear-chested waitresses and waiters!

Where?

Vassalboro.  If you're like me and the town name doesn't ring a bell, it's because it's not a major city where you might expect to find new ventures into adult entertainment.  Rather, Vassalboro is a small rural town with a population just over 4,000 people nestled into a little more than 1,500 households.  

I first heard about Vassalboro and its new coffee shop when I was in Poland (the country).  Its grand opening made the international edition of CNN and I sat in my hotel room in Warsaw stunned, mostly by the mention of Maine on the international news but also a bit by the oddity of the news.  

When I returned to NYC, I heard about it again on the Taxi TV news, same story just a different venue to watch it.  I didn't really understand what all the fuss was about but then when I found myself in Maine with a sunny Saturday afternoon to kill, I convinced my husband and 2 friends to check it out with me.

The Grand View Topless Coffee Shop is the official name.  It's housed in log-covered former motel on the side of the major route that runs through the town.  At 2:30pm last Saturday all its booths were full.

The main dining room was small, about 15 booths, but there was a buzz in the room as the wait staff chatted with their puzzled customers.  There were about 5 waitresses and 2 waiters on duty when we were there and just as CNN reported, they were all topless. Yet, they didn't seem fully comfortable.  They were clearly happy with what they were doing, but they were hesitant, almost as if they feared that the next person at their booth might just be someone they knew.  

Our waitress was embarrassed only once, she said, and that was when she walked up to a booth to find a former teacher sitting there.  Her biggest fear, she confided, is that her grand mother will find out what she's doing by seeing it on the David Letterman show.  The Letterman crew hadn't shown up to film the place yet but she was told they were going to come very soon.  She just needed to know exactly when so she could take that day off.

She also shared the cringe-inducing details of her many piercings and seemed genuinely interested in why we were there.  When I told her, it was pure curiosity because I had heard about the grand opening in Poland, a look of fear crossed her face.  If there were other distant relatives to be concerned about, my news may have just forced those names onto her worry list.

On our way out, the doorman told us the owner was inundated with calls from the media and that it was true that David Letterman's crew was coming.  The Howard Stern show was also trying to book a time. 

As a fan of Howard, I could see him loving the concept of this place.  However, I think he might be disappointed because there's more innocence at The Grand View than sexuality.  In fact, there was nothing overtly sexual about the place at all.  Only one woman on the staff had surgically enhanced d-cup balloons. Everyone else had a- and b-cup proportions and the dimpled imperfections of everyday people you'd see on the beach.  

The atmosphere also isn't Howard Stern-esque. No club music, no pedestals for dancing, just fast-food style booth and fluorescent lighting.  There was a lot of chatting going on the afternoon we were there, purely for good tips I'm sure, but the chatting wasn't flirtatious and neither was the body language of the waitresses and waiters.

What the owner of this coffee shop has created is naked tourism.  It's now listed as the town's only "attraction" on Wikipedia and from the conversations I overhead while we were there, the customers are coming from all over to see this odd new place in a town they hadn't known how to get to in the past.  

It's clearly put Vassalboro on the map and if they're smart, they should keep the atmosphere innocent and draw in the thousands of tourist that drive by on Route 95 every day on their way to or from Bar Harbor.  I don't think anyone who visits will rave about the place but like me, I think everyone will say they never saw anything like it b4. 

Have a comment?  As as always, I'd love to hear your thoughts on this post or other subjects.  So please click on the headline above, scroll down and add your thoughts in the comment section at the bottom of the page.

Comments

[Joe]

You go all the way to Vassalboro and don't even bring back pics?! What's next, you're gonna go to Budapest and not hire a prostitute?!

What is the world coming to???