Marcus Ellery Vance
Co-owner, espresso
Ran the bar at a Valley cafe for eight years before this. Obsessive about yield, suspicious of oat milk until he tried the good one.
Since 2016
About Pivemon, a small coffee bar in Brisbane's CBD
Pivemon is a family-run coffee bar on Queen Street in Brisbane, opened in 2016 by two baristas who got tired of working rooms they did not own and wanted a short menu done properly.
The story
A lease, two grinders and a stubborn idea
Marcus had been pulling shots in Fortitude Valley for eight years and Priya ran the brew bar at a roaster in West End. They met at a cupping in 2015, spent six months arguing about which blend to open with, and signed the lease on Queen Street in the spring of 2016. The room was tiny. It still is. We squeezed a bench along the window, put two grinders on the counter and hoped the office crowd would notice.
The first few months were slow. Then someone from the building across the road started bringing colleagues, then the crew from the hotel round the corner, and by the second winter there was a queue at 7am that ran into the doorway. The idea never changed: fewer items, made carefully, priced so people can come back tomorrow.
Today there are four of us on the floor most mornings. We still roast with the same small roaster in Nundah that supplied our first bag. We still taste every new delivery. The furniture is a bit more worn than when we opened, which we take as a good sign.
2016
First day of trading
4
Staff on the floor
2
Roasters we work with
1
Shop, no plans for more
The crew
The people behind the machine
Four people run everything. If you ask for a specific drink and one of us is on a break, the other three know the recipe.
Priya Nandakumar
Co-owner, filter and pastry
Came from a West End roaster. Builds the filter menu, does the buying and makes the jam that shows up on the toast.
Tobias Lindqvist
Lead barista
Weekday closing shift and workshop host. Genuinely enjoys explaining why your home shot tastes sour.
Mei-Lin Cho
Barista, catering lead
Handles the mobile cart on weekends. Has never once been late to a site, even on the 5am jobs.
Philosophy
Short menu, honest prices, no gimmicks
We could add twelve drinks and a rotating dessert cabinet. We do not, because every extra item pulls attention away from the thing you came in for. The menu fits on one small board above the grinder. If a drink is not on it, ask anyway and we will tell you honestly whether we can make it well.
Alt milks cost the same as dairy. A reusable cup gets you 50 cents off, no card or app required. If your coffee is wrong, tell us before you leave and we will remake it. Small business stuff, but it adds up to a shop worth coming back to.
Fewer things, done well
Two espresso blends, one filter, a small pastry case. That is the whole offer.
Prices you can plan around
No surge pricing during events, no hidden charge for oat milk.
Beans from close by
Two roasters in Brisbane and northern NSW. We know the people who roast them.
A room you can sit in
Twelve seats, a bench by the window, no music loud enough to drown out a conversation.
Milestones
Things we have actually done
Not a highlight reel. A list of the jobs that took real work and taught us something.
Brisbane Festival morning rush
Three years running we have set up at 5am on the South Bank end for the opening weekend crowd. The 2023 run broke 900 cups before lunch on the Saturday.
900+ cups in a morning
Local latte art comp
Tobias took second place in the 2022 QLD regional latte art heat. He still has the trophy bag somewhere in the storage cupboard.
2nd place, 2022
Waste not
Spent coffee grounds go to a community garden in New Farm every Friday. Pastries that do not sell get picked up by a food rescue van at 4pm.
Zero pastry waste since 2021
Training, by accident
We started workshops after enough people asked how to make the shot at home. Now it is a steady part of the calendar.
Over 400 graduates
Portfolio
Some of the events we have poured at
These are the bookings we still talk about, mostly because the logistics were interesting. Weddings, product launches, a school fete that wanted 400 babycinos by 10am. Every job started with a list of questions and a rough cup count.
- Warehouse launch in Fortitude Valley, 180 guests
- Garden wedding near Samford, 140 guests, no mains power
- Office rollout on Eagle Street, 12 floors across two days
- Sunday market stall in New Farm, every second month
- School fundraiser in Woolloongabba, 400 babycinos
140+
Events since 2018
2
Carts we run
Come by
Want to talk coffee, book a workshop or plan an event?
We are on Queen Street from 6:30am. Send a message through the contact page and one of us will reply the same day. Anything you send stays between us and the shop, as explained in our privacy policy.