Innovation Centre café opens, promising quality, diversity and sustainability

Mission Café is a new venture from three of the founders of Buna Coffee.

It aims to provide an evolving menu of speciality coffee, drinks and food, catering for the technology and digital businesses that the Innovation Centre will attract.

Co-founder Abdulrahman Razouk said: “Every few weeks we will change our offer, showcasing speciality coffees and food from different regions of the world. This University shows the positive value of “the world in one place” and we want to bring the world to our café.”

The café will offer at least two coffee options at a time and fresh bread will be baked on-site every day.

While focused on the business community, the café also hopes to become a destination for staff and students.

Abdulrahman said: “Students come to the University of Essex from all over the world. I know from being a student here myself that not having the right food can affect how a student engages with life at university."

Moving forward, a number of awareness-raising events are planned, showcasing different products and discussing what goes into producing each, as well as issues such as climate change and human rights.

Sustainability is also central to the new Mission Café. With a number of local suppliers already onboard, the café will seek to limit its carbon footprint. All packaging will be either compostable or recyclable.

Abdulrahman said: “Our policy is to reduce, reduce, reduce.”

The Mission Café is open from 8.30am - 5.00pm,  Monday – Friday.