Monday 10 December 2018

Grace and Gratitude

Greetings from Venilla, Anbalagan and Sridhar.

Hooray!!... We are so excited to let you know Daily bean is celebrating its first birthday on December 13th.
As I am writing this blog I’m just so overwhelmed. I am reminded of this verse that God gave us when we started this cafe, it’s from Zechariah 4:10. It says; Do not despise these small beginnings, for the Lord rejoices to see the work begin.... what a great year it has been.  We are so grateful for God’s favour over this cafe. Honestly speaking it wasn’t easy for us to start this on our own, we have had lots of ups and downs but through it, all God was with us. He’s been so faithful and provided us with the strength that we needed. We are so thankful to God for giving us excellent mentors to guide us and help us through our hard times.
 
Celebrating Venilla Birthday
Since last December God’s shown himself to be our teacher. He’s also shown himself to be a leader since he set that example, we are able to be leaders like him. It’s really encouraging to see our employees try to follow in our footsteps in our work ethics, responsibilities and our relationship with each other. We can’t wait to see what God’s going to show him as in 2019.
  We want to wish all of you all a very blessed Christmas and that this season will be a wonderful time with your loved ones.
November staff meeting

Hope you are doing well. We’ve had a crazy yet a wonderful month. Our sales have gone up and we have been getting bigger orders. Our best selling products this month were the pumpkin pie, pumpkin spiced latte and the pumpkin cupcake. We introduced a new drink this month, it's called peppermint mocha. It's been a big hit amongst the customers.
One of the hardest things in business is losing good employees. This month we lost two of our employees. It was really fun to have them working with us. We loved spending time with them. Sridhar spent time mentoring them and guiding them to grow deeper in Jesus.

To celebrate our big day, we are having free pies lucky draws, 10% discounts, free Christmas sugar cookies and acknowledging our loyal customers. We are so excited and can’t wait to let you know how our celebration went in our next blog. We are expecting it to be a big celebration.

We are so grateful for the employees that stuck with us from the beginning. We see a lot of growth in them. We are so amazed at how God used some of them to teach us also. During our staff meetings, we ask one of our employees to share what God’s been teaching them in that month.
Mac and Hula our employees.
This month Manju shared about how God gives talents according to our abilities and how we need to use it to our fullest. This was really encouraging to us as we can apply this to our employees and help them work accordingly. We love our team and are proud to see how much they have grown this past month.
A customer with their wall of fame mug
We want to thank you so much for being a part of our big dream. Thank you all for your prayers and continual support. We believe it’s because of your prayers and support that we are able to carry this out.
Prayer requests:
1.       Please pray for the three of us as we walk into the second year of our business. We are seeking for more wisdom and grace.
2.       Please pray that God would send us employees that will stay longer.
3.       Please pray for favour with our landlord.
4.       Please pray for God’s presence to be in the cafe and that people would experience it.

5.       Please pray for our team as we start looking into expanding the business this following year. 

Friday 2 November 2018

Celebrating God's Goodness

Greetings from Venilla, Anbalagan and Sridhar.

How are y’all doing? We at the daily bean are doing awesome. Thank you for your continuous support and love.  We had an amazing month. We went to the Golden triangle, visited the Taj Mahal, Jaipur and Pushkar. It was beautiful.  It was such a blessing to be with the whole family. We were celebrating the 20th anniversary of our home. God has been so faithful in leading the home for 20 beautiful and adventurous years. We got to spend time with our brothers and sisters that live away from home. It was an amazing trip.  We were also refreshed and are able to work better since being back after a week of break from the business.
Family photos at the Taj Mahal

We finally started roasting our coffee beans. It was a fun learning process.  We had fun trying to roast different kinds of coffee beans. We love using our coffee roaster. It has a very cool look to it. We want to be able to roast coffee beans for customers and grow our business this way. 

Amazing news that we want to share is that Sridhar got engaged on 6th October.  We love his fiancĂ© and are so happy for them. Pray for them as they go through this season of getting themselves ready for marriage.
Sridhar's Engagement

We are excited for the season that’s ahead of us. It’s crazy that it’s going to be almost a year since we started daily bean. It looks like we just started a few days ago. What a blessing to go through this adventurous year with God leading us day by day. Thank you for praying for us. Prayer makes a huge impact on our business. We feel so blessed to be covered by prayers. When we compare our first few months to the present months, we see a ton of growth in our business. We are so happy to be doing what we love to do. We have hired a few more members to our team, so happy that we get to be a part of their lives.
Sridhar, Venilla and Anbalagan

We believe in the gift of celebrating birthdays and we use these opportunities to celebrate them. We want to be the people that create a community that shows love the way the father would do.  We celebrated three birthdays this past month. It was nice to see them happy and loved.
Celebrating Birthday

 Prayer points:
1.       Please continue to pray for our family and for God’s protection over each life.
2.       Please pray for Sridhar and his new journey he has stepped into.
3.       Please pray for our business and our team.
4.       Please pray for Anbalagan, Wilson and Amung as they have stepped into a new year in their life that God’s blessings will be abundant in their lives.

5.       Please pray for God’s Wisdom on the three of us as we continue to work and see our business grow.

Tuesday 9 October 2018

September Update

Greetings from Venilla, Anbalagan and Sridhar

Hope you are doing well. Thank you for taking your time to read our blog.

We want to take this opportunity to share how the past month has been. We have seen so much growth in our business. We are so thankful to God for constantly taking care of us and giving us the right wisdom to help our business move forward. We have introduced our very special Pumpkin spiced latte and our very own pumpkin spiced cupcakes. This has been a great hit among our customers. We can’t wait to introduce our Pumpkin pie this following November.
Pumpkin Spiced Latte

This past month 3 of our employees choose to move forward in their dreams. It was wonderful working with them. We are so happy that we got to spend time talking to them and encouraging them as they continue to follow their dreams. It’s so awesome that we get to play an older brother/sister role in their lives.  
last day with the crew

We are super proud of Sakthivel, one of our best employees who left recently. He started working in a gym. His passion is to become a professional gym trainer. He’s doing a great job and loves what he is doing.  We also loved having Retina and Kekhrie with us. They were working with us as part-time employees. They study in an animation school. It was so fun working with them because they always asked a lot of interesting questions about Jesus. It was a great time for us to share our testimony.  Ritika is from a Hindu family. It was so interesting to see how curious she was about Jesus. She knew who Jesus was because she heard some stories, but she was really confused about how we could have a relationship with a God that can’t be seen and how that’s even possible. 
Sakthivel

We had a fun/good time answering those questions even though some questions were hard to answer. We are so happy that she’s curious and we got to share Jesus with her.  She still comes to the cafe often and we get to talk to her and answer her questions. It’s really nice that we get to still keep the connection.
At Santhiy and Danny's wedding

This month we got to celebrate Sridhar’s birthday. So thankful for all the hard work he does for business. We are so thankful for his leadership skills and his servant's heart. This month we also had a wedding in our beautiful family. It was such a beautiful celebration.  
Sridhar's Birthday

Thank you for taking your time to read our blog. We have some exciting news to tell in our next blog. Thank you so much for the love and support.

Prayer points:

1.       Please pray for the three of us as we continually seek the Lord for wisdom to keep our business growing.

2.       Please pray for God’s protection from any evil eye and anything that is designed to bring us down and also for God’s presence to be in and around our store.

3.       Please pray for the Sakthivel, Ritika and Kekhrie as they continually grow in the gifts that God has given them.

4.       Please pray for our owner that he would encounter the presence of the Lord and that we would have favour with him in every way possible.


5.       Please pray for the newly married couple that they would see Jesus in their marriage every day and that God’s protection over their new journey.

Saturday 8 September 2018

Reconstructing Our Identity in Christ

Greetings from Venilla, Anbalagan and Sridhar,

I hope you all are doing well. Thank you for your continual support and love.  We are so blessed with so many people covering us in prayer as we run the cafe.

Guess everybody needs to take time to renew their hearts and look back at how God’s been leading you so faithfully. It’s so important!
Jesus at the centre of our identity


This past month has been a very refreshing month.  We attended the sons and daughters retreat which was by far one of the best things that happened this year. It was a time where we didn’t have to worry about the cafe and just focus on Jesus. We were able to focus on our identities in Jesus rather than our identities in the cafe which was a real struggle for the three of us. We are so happy that we got free from that. It was incredible to hear from our brothers, sisters and friends (who attended the retreat) about their work in the mission fields. It was encouraging to listen to their hearts, their joy and struggles. We had an amazing time praying and prophesying over each other.  
Retreat 2018

We were able to share our hearts with the others and let them pray over us and hear from God for the three of us. We had a powerful time praying over the cafe and acknowledging God’s goodness over the cafe. To be honest we’ve grown a ton in the management of the business compared to the first few months where we were not sure about so many things. Guess you learn a ton from experiences. Overall, we are very thankful to Jesus for his unfailing love, mercy and guidance over these 8months.
Our Cupcakes

We had a great time at our monthly staff meeting this month. It was a blessing to hear from Manju as she shared about what God’s had been teaching her this month. We started letting our employees take turn and share about what God’s been teaching them. We want to give them an opportunity to share and bless the others. She spoke from Psalms 27:14. It says wait for the Lord; be strong and take heart and wait for the Lord. It was really encouraging because one of our employees was struggling with this and she was asking God to speak to her and after Manju spoke it was like a confirmation of her prayers.
Venilla, Anbalagan and Sridhar

We also started taking the time to have one on one with our employees.  We usually take them out for a small snack or lunch and we spend time talking about their lives and praying for them.


The business is doing really good. Our newest item is the pumpkin spiced latte which has been a crazy hit amongst our customers. We love to talk to our customers and get their feedback. We still love doing what we are doing.  
Pumpkin spiced latte


Here are a few of our prayer requests:

1.       Pray for the three of us to continually be focused on Jesus and not let our identities get messed up.  

2.       Pray for our team that we would continually keep lifting each one of them up and be able to speak life into them as well.

3.       Pray for our landlord that we would have favour with him in every way possible.

4.       Pray for the word that was spoken over our team that we would continually learn to wait on the Lord for all his perfect will to take place.


5.       Pray for The Holy Spirit to dwell in our cafe at all time and that every customer will continually be blessed as they walk through our doors. 

Sunday 12 August 2018

July update

Greeting from Venilla, Anbalagan and Sridhar

Hope you are all doing well. We want to take this opportunity to share how the past month went. In our Business aspect, we’ve been doing really well, we had many new customers. We’ve been able to expand our business through Swiggy and even though its monsoon we’ve been able to have good sales through our delivery partnering company.
Our storefront

It’s been about eight months since we have started this business and we’ve had so many challenges that taught us to stick together as a team and many more opportunities for us to grow as well. We are so thankful to God for his grace and wisdom that has been leading us day by day and each step as we continue to grow.
Team gathering over a meal.

We have been able to share the love of Christ in our monthly team gatherings and also on a day to day work hours.  We have continually seen our team grow in many ways and it encourages us to continually give our best to be there for them and to uphold them in our prayers. This past month one of our employee was able to share with the whole team what she has been learning and how God is taking her through a season of sacrificing and being able to submit to the authority that God has placed over her life for this season.

We were able to enjoy with our team by playing a few icebreakers and fellowshipping with our team over a good meal.
icebreaker time


The three of us are really looking forward to the upcoming retreat where we will be able to just relax and enjoy with our friends and missionaries. We also want God to renew us mentally, strengthens us physically, emotionally and spiritually. We want God to pour more of him in us so we can give more to our customers, business and employees. 
Deep cleaning our kitchen



Prayer points;

1.       Please pray for protection over our business and for the father’s favour to continually be with us.

2.       Please pray for the 3 of us as we are looking forward to this upcoming retreat to be able to receive everything the Lord has for us.

3.       Please pray for our employees as they continue to grow in their skills and that they will continually be able to see the father’s love in their lives.

4.       Please pray for more favour from both God and man in every way possible.

5.       Please pray for more wisdom over the three of us as our business grows so that we would be able to see the hand of God over everything that we do continually.


Tuesday 10 July 2018

Growth and Blessing's

Greetings from Venilla, Anbalagan and Sridhar.

This month has been a very special month for the business as well as for one of our partners. The last few months we have seen a drop in sales, but this month we have an increase in sales, with colleges and schools opening and families back from their vacation. 

We were glad to see our regular customers back. The response towards swiggy has been very positive and we could see new customers becoming our regulars. We were able to introduce new items to our menu based on our customer’s feedback. Some of those items were English breakfast, salted caramel mocha cupcake, peach ice tea, different flavours for our coffee etc... 
Salted Carmel cupcake and our English breakfast 

 The English breakfast has been a huge hit amongst the customers who drop by before heading to work. The English breakfast comes with two sunny side up omelettes, hash browns, sausages, toasts and coffee. It tastes so good.

We had a really good time at our monthly staff meeting. We let one of our employees cook the meal, he did an amazing job. He made beef biryani and curry. Sridhar led our meeting and took a small devotion for us. He spoke about how sometimes we are so used to the regular routine of our lives that we hate when sudden changes occur. He challenged us to accept those seasonal changes and trust God without a doubt. We spent more time just connecting with our employees, having fun talks and laughing. It was fun to see our employees being themselves rather than being professionals.
Team gather over dinner.

We are so glad to announce that Anbalagan and Jessica are happily married.  It was such a blessed moment for all of to see how beautifully the day went without any Rain and any other kind of disturbance. We are so happy for the both of them and can’t wait to see how God continues to keep being faithful in each one of our life. Thank you so much for upholding us in your prayers and for making this a memorable day.
Anbalagan and Jessica 

Prayer points:

1.       Please continue to pray for the newly married couple Anbalagan and Jessica as they start this new journey of their lives. That they would continue to depend on God for everything.

2.       Please pray for our land lord that his heart would be softened and would be able to help us and be easier to work with.

3.       Please pray for wisdom from above as we take this opportunity to reach out to our employees in our day to day interaction and with encouraging them continually.

4.       Please also pray they God would open up more opportunities for us to also to reach out to our customers as well.

5.       Please pray for the three of us and over our personal lives as well that we would learn to have a properly balanced life despite the continually in our business.


Monday 11 June 2018

Month of celebration

Greetings from Venilla, Anbalagan and Sridhar.

We’ve had a great month we were able to see how our team is growing and with this growth, we are growing with our responsibilities.
Family photo at the wedding
This month has been filled with celebrations in which The Daily Bean has been able to be a part of. We were able to supply over 200 cupcakes as the wedding treats, and everyone loved them. This month one of our brothers from our loving family got married.
Dessert Table

Guess what??... We finally tied up with Swiggy (delivery service). This has been an awesome way to market our business, since then we’ve been so busy at the cafe.

This month we were able to reward one of our employees for being the best employee of the month, we gave him a 500rs gift voucher. 

This month we also had to say goodbye to one of our employees as he got an offer from a cooperate company, He was with us for the past 6 months and has given his best. We were able to minister to him as he is starting out a new journey in his life and how it’s important to not be easily influenced by the ways of the world but to stand firm on the values he has.

We also recruited 3 new employees and it’s good for us to restart all over again. We are starting to realise that we don’t really have much time with our employees.
There is always a new season starting with everyone’s life. We need to make the best use of the time that we get with them and pour into them as much as we can whether it’s in a big or small way. We are playing a huge role in their lives.

Prayer points:

1.       Please pray for more wisdom and grace for the 3 of us.
2.       Please pray for us as we take time to invest in our employees’  lives.
3.       Please pray as the business is growing that we would learn to keep leaning on the Lord for more wisdom.
4.       Please pray for our business as we slowly start opening up to new opportunities around us and that we would have favour with these new changes as well.

5.       Please pray for the blood of the lamb to cover us in everything that we do.  

Monday 14 May 2018

Humility is the Key to growth



Greetings from Venilla, Anbalagan and Sridhar.

This month has been very challenging, yet a month of grace. It’s hard when God teaches about humility. Not everyone wants/is willing to accept it.  We’ve been praying as a team for wisdom because we needed it so bad and it says, ask for wisdom and it will be given to you, so we prayed continuously for wisdom. And this is what God showed us.

 It’s from Proverbs 11:2, it says when pride comes, then comes disgrace, but with humility comes wisdom. That’s when it hit us, we prayed so hard for God’s wisdom not realising there might be another problem that was hindering that wisdom. We had to pray and get our hearts right. We felt so good after that. We are so glad that God showed that and helped us deal with it.

This month we had to let go of one of our employees due to certain reasons. It was hard for us because this was our first time firing someone. Trust us it wasn’t easy but a great learning experience.  It was really discouraging because we put a lot of time training him and he was one of our best employees, but we had to do it. Thank God for his grace during that time.

We had some major work that needs to be done in the kitchen area. The kitchen gets really hot especially now that it is summer, so we had to install exhaust fans. We got that installed and now it’s much cooler.
The Final look from outside
 We had an awesome time at our staff meeting. We got more time to connect with our employees. We spend time praying for them and encouraging them. We really feel like God’s using this time as we put into their lives. We also took them to a nearby restaurant and had some really good food. We went around sharing our high and low of the month. We had a really good time.
Daily Bean Crew

We are so excited to let you know we tied up with swiggy (delivery service). Since our seating area is small we decided to go for the delivery service option, hopefully, this will help us expand our business. We are so grateful for our mentors who help us brainstorm different creative ideas to solve our problems and encourage us to keep going. We love doing what we are doing.
Our Delivery partner

Prayer points:

1.       Please pray us as we learn to grow in the humility that God wants us to be in.
2.       Please pray for our team that we would continually have a learning heart and a heart to keep growing and not to be satisfied with where we are.
3.       Please pray for more wisdom and more grace to face each day and see how we can start reaching out even to our customers.
4.       Please pray for good health for the whole team. We need strength to be able to work and to be able to pursue even through tough days.
5.       Please pray for our business that we would continually keep reflecting the love of the Father.




















































































































































































































































































































Monday 9 April 2018

April Update

Greetings from Venilla, Anbalagan and Sridhar,

We have had a super busy month since we had to close our cafe for 3 days due to some maintenance work. Since the summer has started, our kitchen has been super hot, and it was hard to work in this condition. We were able to get some exhaust fans installed to help keep our kitchen cooler.
Kitchen project 

During the 3 day break, we had to upgrade our menu with the tax, and we also were able to add some new items to our menu. So far, we have seen both positive and negative feedbacks from our customers. We were also able to meet with two different people who have lots of experience in this business world, hear some tips from them, and pick up lot of ideas and help from them, which was a great eye opener for the three of us. We realized we still have so many ways we need to improve as young business owners.
Our updated menu board

We’ve also been learning a lot about the joys and struggles of employee management. On the last Tuesday of the month, we have a team meeting to talk about the business and job performance. It’s a great opportunity for us to give a small message to speak life into our employees and also to recognize positive job performance. We also enjoy sharing a meal together in the evening, which helps build community and we can learn more about them outside of work. This last meeting, we noticed that one employee in particular showed a lot of improvement in attitude, timeliness, and leadership in the kitchen. We wanted to celebrate and recognize this improvement, so we gave him a gift voucher for the cafe. We hope this will motivate and encourage others to have this same attitude and positivity in the days ahead.
Chilling with the crew

We would appreciate your prayers for overall health and healing. Several of our employees, including us, have been sick. Please pray also for continued peace, grace, and wisdom in dealing with situations that come up. Thank you so much for praying for us and continuing to encourage us.

Please be praying for:

·         Committed, hardworking employees who will join us at the Daily Bean
·         Growth in business with the increase in item cost and addition of GST
·         Opportunities to pour into employees and customers who come to the Daily Bean

·         Grace and wisdom for us in our daily lives at the Daily Bean—especially in applying everything we’ve learned to put it into practice in our business