'Homey ... but not home'

A city shows its colors in its coffee shops.

In the variety and number of Muzak-filled dens, designed for sinking into comfy furniture, busting open a laptop and sipping on exquisite concoctions of beans, creams, sugars, whatever.

The goal?

Bliss. If bliss can truly be charged with loads of caffeine.

"It's nice to get out of your house, go to a place that still feels homey but is not home," said Maria Jenicek, owner of Calypsos Coffee on Lakeside Avenue. "You can take an hour or two and relax and have a good cup of coffee."

Call it the dao of coffee shops.

"Travel + Leisure" recently produced a list of the top towns teeming with soulful coffee shops.

The winners included the obvious: Seattle and San Francisco.

While the Lake City didn't make the cut, some might wonder why, as the coffee culture has been swiftly taking over here, Jenicek said.

"If you think about it, 10 years ago we didn't really have a lot of coffee shops, maybe one or two," said Jenicek, a Coeur d'Alene resident for more than 30 years. "In the last 10 years, a lot of coffee shops have popped up, whether they're coffee stands or shops."

Truly, this city is ready to keep its citizens up and up and up.

Jaded drivers can grab a caffeinated dessert at one of the drive-thru coffee stands prolific on city streets.

Hipsters and students veg at a multitude of coffee houses downtown and in shopping centers.

There's demand for them all, Jenicek said.

"We all have certain niches that people love about our shops," she said. "People are going to go to all the shops and try it out, and find one thing they love about each and every one. I love the fact that customers have that option."

A hodgepodge of coffee choices are necessary for a tourist hub, said Reya Whitcomb, manager at Bella Rose Bakery Cafe and Coffee House, adding that a large cluster of customers are from out of town.

"(Coffee shops) present a form of welcome to people. 'Welcome, come on it, we're friendly, we're open, we're relaxed,'" she said. "I just think coffee is a wonderful way to get to know a town."

And demand is constant.

Between 200 and 300 customers a day pull up to the Moosecreek Coffee drive-thru stand on Appleway, estimated owner Mariah Rigland.

Coffee is ritualistic, she explained.

"We get the same people. They're kind of like our friends, while we're making their drinks, it's 'Hi, how are you doing?'" she said. "It becomes a habit. People are used to it. It's like smoking, it's addictive."

There's an almost bartender-regular relationship that coffee drinkers have with their shops of choice, said Laura Quast, owner of the three Jitterz drive-thrus in Coeur d'Alene and Rathdrum.

"When I hire girls, I tell them, 'I want you to know everything about our customers,'" she said. "I have customers who pour their lives out to me. When they go on vacation and have kids. People like that, they love that hometown appeal."

Her three locations see hundreds of customers a day, she said.

"Everybody talks about the economy being bad, and we've never had a busier year than 2010, and I'm doing what I usually do for sales in the summer right now," Quast said. "I think they're just little treats you don't want to give up."

Admitted coffee addict David Brandi, 23, sat gabbing with friends Alyssa Kennedy and Mikey Hiebert on Thursday in Java on Sherman.

He needs his regular fix of raspberry mocha, Brandi explained, which goes well with the laid-back atmosphere of coffee houses.

"You can meet up with friends, and get out of the house," he said.

"Plus we're not talented enough to make our own mixed drinks," Hiebert said.

Natalie Reighard pored over fitness books in the midst of the raucous cafe crowd.

After hyperextending her knee, she said, she was eager to get out of the house to Java for her favorite drink, the Bowl of Soul.

"You always see friends when you come in," she said. "I wanted to get out and go somewhere fun, lively."

Coeur d'Alene coffee shops still have a ways to go, according to Bryan Arndt, a barista at Java.

He believes they should focus more on polishing their products, he said, creating more sophisticated drinks found in Seattle and San Francisco.

"Specialty coffee is new in Coeur d'Alene, compared to those other places," Arndt said, and pointed to the siphon coffee presser he brings in to occasionally expand customers' coffee palates. "It's an evolutionary period for specialty coffee in this town. It's time for business owners and baristas to grab hold and almost train their customers, introduce them to it (higher tastes)."

The 23-year-old acknowledged that coffee shops like Java, which had packed seats on Thursday, are the primary hangouts in town.

"This is about the only happening spot. During the day you go to coffee shops, and at night you go to bars," said Arndt, a Coeur d'Alene newbie originally from California. "It's the only place to go - which is sad, but also awesome. This is how I've met everyone, through this place."