New owner Dave Fabling is keeping Scope Cafe’s Coffee for a Can tradition alive. Photo / Annabel Reid
New owner Dave Fabling is keeping Scope Cafe’s Coffee for a Can tradition alive. Photo / Annabel Reid
The “new kid on the block” isn’t wasting any time getting involved in the Rotorua community.
Scope Cafe’s new owner, Dave Fabling, starts his first official shift on Tuesday – and on Wednesday, he’ll be handing out coffees at the cafe’s popular annual Coffee for a Can fundraiser.
“Youcould say I’m jumping in the deep end,” Fabling said.
The long-running event is part of the Rotorua Daily Post six-week Christmas Appeal, supported by The Hits Rotorua 97.5FM, which launched on Saturday.
It collects donations of food and funds to help fill the Rotorua Salvation Army foodbank’s shelves, assisting its work through the Christmas period and into next year.
At Scope Cafe’s fundraiser, customers can swap a can or non-perishable item for a coffee of their choice.
Fabling said “straight away” he was “100% on board” with continuing the cafe’s community tradition.
Scope Cafe Rotorua owner-operators at the time, Dana and Steve Greer, filled the stairway during the annual Coffee for a Can fundraiser last year. Photo / Laura Smith
The couple have collected cans for the Salvation Army at Christmas since they opened the cafe on Tutanekai St eight years ago. They will continue to help out this year.
Fabling said it was such a “simple” way to help and it would be “nice to do our bit”.
Originally from Hamilton, Fabling spent the past 35 years living in the Morrinsville-Matamata area, where he managed a sports bar before becoming general manager of the Matamata Golf Club for six years.
Now in a new city, with a “new challenge”, he was looking forward to getting “stuck in”.
Fabling said Rotorua has always been a favourite destination for golf and getaways.
Though he admitted his coffee palate still leaned towards a classic “Kiwi bloke” flat white, Fabling said the Scope Cafe team had been “challenging” him to branch out.
He also had a weakness for the cafe’s “dangerous” caramel squares.
Fabling said he would be “happily dishing out” coffees in exchange for cans on Wednesday – just not making them – he leaves that to the expert Scope staff.
He encouraged locals to think of those doing it tough this Christmas and to give what they could. He said even a simple can of food could make a difference.
Enjoying a coffee in return was a nice way to support others who weren’t as fortunate, Fabling said.
Annabel Reid is a multimedia journalist for the Bay of Plenty Times and Rotorua Daily Post, based in Rotorua. Originally from Hawke’s Bay, she has a Bachelor of Communications from the University of Canterbury.
