A motorsports-themed café has just opened in Parksville. And there are NoXcuses why you shouldn’t go and try it out.
NoXcuses Motorsports, which opened on July 17, is located on 1-464 Island Highway East. It features freshly brewed coffee using 49th Parallel beans and it also offers rentals of exotic vehicles and motorcycles for a day.
It’s an unusual concept that owners Jordan and Cora Garraway have been dreaming of in the last 20 years since they gave up their coffee shop in Alberta and took on regular jobs as they had three small children at the time. They moved to Nanaimo 10 years ago and now with their children old enough and working, they decided to pursue their dream of opening a coffee shop. They weren’t able to find a suitable place in Nanaimo and when they found this location in Parksville, Cora said they went for it. And that’s also how they got the name for their unusual business venture.
“We have looked at different business ideas along the coffee/café idea and it was Jordan that came up with it,” Cora explained. “It just kind of became fitting when we decided we were actually ready to do this… no more excuses, it was time to go for it. That’s how our business got its name.”
They chose the Parksville location because they got the zoning they needed to combine the coffee shop and also their vehicle rentals operation.
“It was hard to find a place,” said Cora. “We looked all over in Nanaimo and in Coombs but we couldn’t find a place that could accommodate both. When we found this place we were excited to have the garage bay doors and it had everything we kind of wanted. It’s a fabulous location. It was like it was it was meant to be.”
The Garraways have a love of classic cars and also a passion for riding motorcycles. They want to establish a place where people can stop and meet.
“There’s just not a lot of great places,” said Cora. “We just wanted a place that we’d like to go and hangout. It’s just a bit of all of our passion mixed in together. We really love good coffee and we knew we wanted to give people something like that.”
The Garraways decided to add vehicle and motorbike rentals for a day to the mix as well as a retail shop and also a VIP room they called the “Crash Pad” that they would rent out to people and groups for meetings or get togethers.
“We’ve been told all along that we are kind of crazy,” said Jordan. “A lot of people didn’t get the concept. They kind of thought, there is just no way you can fragment a business this many ways but our business views were exactly the opposite. We need multiple reasons for people to come. You might come in today just for regular coffee and maybe next time it entices you to try something new, maybe a lunch, for entertainment, to go buy a t-shirt and eventually go rent a car for a day.”
The inside decor of NoXcuses has a nice industrial kind of setting but one that is cozy and comfortable for those who love a good cup of coffee ranging from light roast to dark roast. For food, there is a variety of pastries, desserts, and wraps for lunch.
“We made a decision early on not to come in here with a huge menu with a hundred different things that we weren’t sure off,” said Jordan. “We want to be very confident with what we serve. So we are keeping it small at the start and we want to perfect that make sure it’s good every single time. As we go along we might increase the menu.”
Jordan, Cora and their three children — Kaeden, 18, Jaia, 16 and Maitlin, 14 — are all helping with the business, making it a family-run operation. But Jordan said, they will be hiring people down the road.
The vehicles for rent at NoXcuses include a limo-like classic car that could be rented for weddings, anniversaries, graduations or for touring around the Island. Rent is $129 an hour and it comes with a driver.
The two convertibles are 2001 BMW Z3, which is an automatic, and a rare manual 1996 Fiat Parchetta, which is one of only 12 in existence in Canada. They can be rented out for $179 a day plus $25 for insurance. There’s is a mileage limit of 200kms.
The two motorcycles for rent for a day are a 2012 Triumph Bonneville and a 1999 Kawasaki Drifter, created in the classic style lines of the 1940s Indian Chief. The rent fees is $149 a day plus $25 for insurance.
For those wishing to tour the Island in one of the motorbikes or convertibles, just for this month of July the base rate is $99 a day plus the $25 insurance fee.