Jeanne Williamson, co-owner of Press Room Coffee and Books, gives a tour of the new cafe and discusses her inspiration behind the shop housed in the historic Elks Building in La Grande Thursday, Oct. 26, 2023.

LA GRANDE — David and Jeanne Williamson have a vision for a more vibrant downtown La Grande, and out of that vision a new business was born.

The Press Room Coffee and Books is debuting with a soft opening inside the historic Elks Lodge building, 1124 Washington Ave., La Grande.

“We bought the building for our company, Evermine Labels, but this building is gigantic, and there’s all this extra space,” Jeanne Williamson said. “We decided to use the extra space for a coffee place, where people can come in and interact with the building and be part of it.”

Creating a coffee space wasn’t the couple’s original intent.

“It was kind of the obvious thing that needed to happen here,” Jeanne Williamson said. “One of the things we would like to do for La Grande is bring more people downtown so this is going to help do that.”

The cafe bar will be a large part of the offerings at the Press Room Coffee and Books. Cafe manager, J.R. Bennett Jr., was hired this past summer, and he brings with him nearly a decade of management experience at Starbucks in Springfield, Missouri, before relocating to La Grande in late August.

The Press Room occupies two rooms, including about 1,400 square feet of the building.

“We have the room with the initial seating and the espresso bar, and then we have the annex, which is a huge seating area with couches, chairs and tables, some desks and even some swings in front of the big picture window facing Washington Avenue,” Bennett said.

The ambiance of the Press Room will be a little more upscale, Bennett said, because the owners wanted something more than just a typical coffee shop. They wanted to add something to La Grande’s offerings and not just duplicate things.

“There’s not a lot of places to just go and chill, get on Wi-Fi or do work or a place where students can come down and study,” he said. “We also have room for small events there.”

At present, the Press Room has a 26-person seating capacity and employs Bennett and four others. Bennett said they have some interesting offerings in the cafe, including free drip coffee for on-duty police officers who stop in on their shifts, and discounted beverages to health care workers, veterans, teachers, nurses, firefighters, all those who serve the community.

“There will be just about every espresso you can imagine, flavored lattes, cappuccinos, cafe au laits, and specialty drinks for the winter like eggnog lattes and for fall, a caramel apple cider,” he said. “We also offer drinking chocolate, a melted Hershey’s bar in a 4-ounce cup. That’s plenty rich and all you would want.”

In addition to the cafe service, the Press Room Coffee and Books has a unique offering: locally authored books for sale.

“This has been part of the vision of Jeanne Williamson,” Bennett said.

Both of the Williamsons are avid readers of history books, and they wanted to feature books on the history of Oregon and the Oregon Trail in the Press Room. To date, they have collected about 150 titles from local authors. They will put them on the shelf for sale when they are fully organized for selling books.

“There are loads of local authors here who write about history and also people who are just authors who live in this area,” Jeanne Williamson said. “It would be great for those local authors to have a place here to sell their books and also have a place for books about this area, the history of Oregon and the Oregon Trail.”

Local authors are welcome to stop in and talk to Jeanne Williamson about their publications, if they would like to sell them through the Press Room Coffee and Books.

More usable space planned

The Williamsons have plans in the works for remodeling the front of the building facing Washington Avenue. They would like to convert the elevated driveway into a large flat open-air patio with a retaining wall.

“That whole space will be the level of the front door and there will be space for tables, a railing and room for plantings,” Jeanne Williamson said. “It will be an outdoor space for gathering, for musicians to perform, outdoor food carts and for dancing.”

The Williamsons are waiting for the city’s final approval of the building plans once they are sure everything meets code. Then their contractor will proceed with the transformation of the 1914 historic building.

“We have a grant from the city for this, which is just wonderful,” Jeanne Williamson said. “We need to be finished with this by the middle of June next year, which will easily happen.”

During the remodel, the Williamsons also want to paint the exterior of the building, put the new name on the building and then have an unveiling event.

“I don’t want to tell anybody what the new name is, but it’s really special,” she said. “It has to do with the history of our area. This new name honors a person, who may possibly be unfamiliar to some.”