The New Deal Cafe is a restaurant, music venue and community

coffee house A coffeehouse, coffee shop, or café is an establishment that primarily serves coffee of various types, notably espresso, latte, and cappuccino. Some coffeehouses may serve cold drinks, such as iced coffee and iced tea, as well as other non- ...

in the historic Roosevelt Center of

Greenbelt, Maryland Greenbelt is a city in Prince George's County, Maryland, United States, and a suburb of Washington, D.C. At the 2020 census, the population was 24,921. Greenbelt is the first and the largest of the three experimental and controversial New D ...

. It is a rare example of a restaurant operated as a

consumers' cooperative A consumers' co-operative is an enterprise owned by consumers and managed democratically and that aims at fulfilling the needs and aspirations of its members. Such co-operatives operate within the market system, independently of the state, as a f ...

, as it is owned by over 200 member patrons. The cafe, which has a small beer/wine bar in the back room, features nightly and some daytime performances by regional musicians, and sponsors several outdoor music festivals each year, including the Crazy Quilt Festival and the Greenbelt Blues Festival. The cafe walls are decorated with art by local artists, which is changed bi-monthly. The arts and entertainment activities are supported by the Friends of New Deal Café Arts (FONDCA), a separate tax-exempt

501(c)(3) A 501(c)(3) organization is a United States corporation, trust, unincorporated association or other type of organization exempt from federal income tax under section 501(c)(3) of Title 26 of the United States Code. It is one of the 29 types of 50 ...

organization. The New Deal Cafe won WTOP's Top-10 2012 best music venue in the DC region. The cafe's menu offers breakfast, lunch, and, dinner options as well as a variety of smoothies and coffee beverages. New Deal Cafe is currently under management by the Greenbelt Consumers Co-op grocery store. There is beer on tap and a selection of wines and bottled beer. The cafe is commonly referred to by customers as "Greenbelt's community living room" or "third place", part of the third place movement. Its name comes from

Franklin Delano Roosevelt Franklin Delano Roosevelt (; ; January 30, 1882April 12, 1945), often referred to by his initials FDR, was an American politician and attorney who served as the 32nd president of the United States from 1933 until his death in 1945. As the ...

New Deal The New Deal was a series of programs, public work projects, financial reforms, and regulations enacted by President Franklin D. Roosevelt in the United States between 1933 and 1939. Major federal programs agencies included the Civilian Cons ...

, which was responsible for the founding of Greenbelt.

History

The New Deal Cafe was founded by a group of Greenbelt residents in 1995. In November 2004, over 600 people attended an open house to support the project. From 1995 to 2000, the cafe operated as a part-time coffeehouse in the Greenbelt Community Center. In April 2000, the cafe obtained a lease and opened its current full-time retail space, which was doubled in size in 2005 with expansion into an adjacent space. For several years, it struggled without a kitchen on the premises, and its debt increased. However, in June 2008, the cafe built a kitchen as part of a four-month renovation using volunteer and professional contract labor, and contracted the restaurant operations with chef Karim Kmaiha and his wife, Maria Almeida, to operate the restaurant. On November 30, 2016, the cafe ended the restaurant operations contract with Chef Kmaiha. In the summer of 2018, the cafe contracted with Michael and Leah Moon to manage the restaurant operations, their partnership ended in 2021. It is currently being managed by the Greenbelt Consumers Co-op Grocery Store manager.

References

External links

New Deal Cafe website
{{Coord, 39, 0, 10.12, N, 76, 52, 35.51, W, type:_region:US-MD_type:city, display=inline,title Consumers' cooperatives in the United States Restaurants in Maryland Greenbelt, Maryland Buildings and structures in Prince George's County, Maryland Restaurants established in 1994 1994 establishments in Maryland