After facing several hurdles to open a full Washington Court House location, the owners of Orion Coffee and Tea decided to close shop locally, leaving regular customers to ask questions about where they went.
Eric and Sharayah Irwin, a couple from Xenia, are the owners of Orion. The Washington Court House location was the third location to open.
Sharayah explained via email: “Unfortunately we decided we had to shut down the Orion in WCH. The trailer was doing a lot less than we had hoped – we were losing money on it every month between payroll and rent. Traffic just never picked up the way we hoped, especially once we got out of the winter months, and we expected to see an increase.
Essentially, and as previously stated, the building Orion was going to be located in was on South Elm Street across from Washington High School and College. Constant setbacks were recorded throughout the COVID pandemic, especially as construction took longer than usual.
Although the building is taking longer than desired and expected, it was decided to open a trailer in the parking lot of the building early last year. Baristas who already worked for the company and lived locally were in charge of the trailer and customer service.
“When we considered how many thousands of dollars it would take to complete the building (especially with equipment and construction costs going up to 50%), and how many times busier we would need to be each day just to break even and begin to recoup our investment we decided it was wiser not to continue there it makes us so sad because we had wonderful repeat customers there and had a nice vision of the building. But that doesn’t seem to be the case,” Sharayah wrote.
Where will the Orion drive-thru trailer be located now? He will not return to Washington Court House. Orion has a location in Cedarville, a drive-thru in Jamestown, and a Roastery in Springfield.
“We are working on opening the trailer as a drive-thru at our coffee roastery in Springfield. Our landlord there generously offered to let us park it and run it for free,” Sharayah wrote.
Contact reporter Jennifer Woods at 740-313-0355.