Wild Joe*s to close its doors after 25 years

Wild Joe*s Coffee Spot, a fixture of downtown Bozeman for 25 years, will close its Main Street location on Dec. 5 after its lease was not renewed. The staff and the owners say they hope to reopen somewhere else.

The coffee shop announced the closure in a post on its website on Sept. 28, which said its lease would be "involuntarily terminated" and that another tenant was already lined up for the space. Wild Joe*s sits at 18 West Main Street, across from the Ellen Theatre, in a century-old space that once housed Montana Motor Supply.

The shop has occupied the ground floor of the Lovelace Building since 2001, which was owned by one family for generations before being sold in 2020, according to the Bozeman Real Estate Group. After the sale, the upstairs apartments became luxury residences and office space, leaving the coffee shop as the last piece of the old building left unchanged.

The shop will close after the annual Christmas Stroll on Dec. 5 and plans to display a memory window in December where customers can share favorite memories.

For Meredith Christensen, who has been a barista at Wild Joe*s for a year and a half, the job has been about more than a paycheck.

"First of all, it supports me as a student. It's how I make my money. It's how I am able to go to school here," Christensen said. "But more importantly, I feel like Joe*s has always been like a family. It's a place that I can go that's not school, that's not my friends at home."

Randee Tormondsen, who has worked at the shop for a little over a year, said the job was her sense of community. 

"Sometimes we wake up and we just feel dread because there's so much going on in the world," Tormondsen said. "Then coming to Wild Joe*s and being able to work here and interact with the community, it feels so tangible to make a difference."

Tormondsen said that seeing the different waves of people coming into the shop, just to interact over a cup of coffee, is what made Wild Joe*s a “beautiful third space.”

"We're going to miss this place where we all feel welcome, no matter who we are," she said.

Christensen said that since the announcement, customers have told staff about their experiences at the shop: from going on first dates at to stopping in while touring MSU. Many regulars, she said, have promised to follow the shop to a new location, even if it means walking farther.

"I don't even think it's the fact that it's on Main Street," she said. "I think it's just the community."

Wild Joe*s joins several longtime Bozeman businesses that have closed or announced closures this year. The Wantulok family decided to sell Joe's Parkway Market after running it for 57 years, and Pita Pit closed after 22 years on Main Street. Open Range and Nova Cafe have also closed within the past year, representing a worrying trend of small business closure. 

"I think it's devastating," Christensen said. "I think it shows a trend in Bozeman of small businesses being priced out and taken over by larger businesses. For MSU and for our community, it's just another space that we're losing." 

Seanna Farrow, a barista at Cafe M, another Bozeman coffee shop, said Wild Joe*4s has been around for all 10 years she has lived in town, and she called the news "pretty disheartening." She said she hopes the shop finds a new space just as welcoming, but she sees the closure as part of a bigger shift. "I think in general, Bozeman's moving in a different direction, catering to a different kind of culture than we're used to," Farrow said.

However, this closure may not be the end for Wild Joe*s. In a Sept. 28 announcement, Wild Joe*s owner Erica Brubaker wrote, "Wild Joe*s has never belonged to me. It has always been ours," and invited anyone interested in carrying on the shop in a new location to reach out. 

"If anyone knows of a space or an opportunity that we can move — please reach out to us," she said. "No ideas are bad ideas. We want to stay open. We want to keep this space open." 

Tormondsen had one message for the Bozeman and MSU community: "Cherish your small businesses," she said. "Cherish what we have that makes Bozeman so special before it is gone."

Brubaker is seeking recommendations for a new space. To contact Brubaker, email erica@wildjoescoffee.com