Spencer's Coffee

Spencer's Coffee has been the anchor of downtown Bowling Green's coffee scene since 2001, and its location at 915 College Street — with outdoor seating looking directly onto Fountain Square Park — has made it as much a civic gathering place as a café. On any given morning it's a reliable cross-section of the city: students, remote workers, downtown regulars, and people who have been coming here long enough to have a usual order.

Shelley and Justin Shepherd took over the business in 2005, with Justin leaving a career in journalism to make the jump. In the nearly two decades since, they've grown Spencer's from a single downtown café into a multi-location operation, with a third location set to open this fall. The original College Street location remains the flagship — seating for up to 80 inside plus a courtyard, a full lunch menu, scratch-made pastries, and a rotating selection of craft beer on draft alongside the full espresso program. Both locations serve house-made breakfast pastries and made-to-order breakfast items; the downtown location adds a full lunch menu built around a popular chicken salad and rotating from-scratch soups.

The coffee program is taken seriously — whole-bean offerings from around the world, available to take home alongside whatever equipment you'd need to brew them. But Spencer's has always understood that great coffee needs a great room to be enjoyed in, and the Fountain Square setting delivers that in a way that's difficult to replicate anywhere else in the city.

Learn more: spencerscoffee.com

(Image credit: Spencer's Coffee)