Keurig Dr. Pepper won’t reopen café, says it lays off fewer than 50 in Vt.

January 28, 2021 | By Lisa Scagliotti

The historic Waterbury train station was home to the Green Mountain Coffee Roasters Café since October 2006. Photo by Lisa Scagliotti

Closed since March 2020 due to COVID-19, the Green Mountain Coffee Roasters café at the Waterbury train station will not reopen and its staff has been officially laid off, a spokeswoman at Keurig Dr. Pepper said Thursday.

“The café has remained closed, though all café employees have remained employed and paid,” said Katie Gilroy, director of corporate communications for Keurig in Boston. “Consumer preferences have changed as travel and restaurant operations remain restricted and people enjoy beverages at home. With this, we have made the difficult decision to close the café operation permanently.”

The layoff affects roughly a half dozen full- and part-time employees who have remained on the payroll since the café closed last March. 

But the decision to shed the handful of jobs in Waterbury was part of a larger reduction in Keurig Dr. Pepper’s workforce that was announced to employees companywide on Wednesday, Gilroy said. 

“We announced organizational moves that align teams with the Executive Leadership Team changes announced this past October and focuses resources against our highest priorities,” Gilroy said, referring to multiple shifts in senior management at the company that started in Waitsfield and now runs its corporate bases in Burlington, Mass., and Plano, Texas.

“These organizational changes resulted in a headcount reduction that impacted less than 1% of Keurig Dr. Pepper’s total workforce across the U.S.,” she said, noting that the company employs some 26,000 people in multiple states. 

Gilroy said the company was not releasing numbers of employees impacted by the reorganizational moves either nationwide or in Vermont. The cuts in Vermont, however, did involve employees beyond the Waterbury café staff,  she said.

“We continue to maintain a solid employee base in Waterbury across multiple functions, as well as manufacturing operations in Williston and Essex. In fact, we are currently recruiting for nearly 30 open roles for our Essex and Williston plant operations,” she added. 

The company which produces its trademark K-cup coffee pods has manufacturing facilities in Essex and Williston. Gilroy said Keurig still has employees working out of offices in Waterbury and in Chittenden County. 

Keurig no longer has a manufacturing presence in Waterbury as the commercial space it once filled has both new owners and new occupants, primarily the Darn Tough sock company from Northfield which is expanding into the former coffee roasting and packaging facility. Other new tenants include Central Vermont Gymnastics and Northern Reliability power storage.  

Gilroy said any layoffs in Vermont were fewer than the threshold that requires an employer to report the cuts to the state. Any employer that’s closing or laying off 50 or more workers within a 90-day period must report that activity to the Vermont Secretary of Commerce and Community Development and the Commissioner of Labor 45 days prior.  

Waterbury’s ‘pride and joy’

The permanent closure of the Coffee Roasters’ café now raises the question of the future of an anchor of activity in the heart of downtown Waterbury.  

The café occupies most of the interior of the historic train station with a section devoted to the Amtrak service that also halted last spring due to the pandemic. Resuming that service as part of all of Amtrak’s service to Vermont awaits decision-making by state government. 

Checks with Amtrak and the Vermont Agency of Transportation turned up no plans yet for the return of interstate passenger rail activity. VTrans spokeswoman Amy Tatko said the pandemic factors into this decision. “There is no Amtrak update at this time. The resumption of passenger train service is dependent on the COVID infection rate decreasing in the region,” she said.

Prior to the coronavirus pandemic, Waterbury’s train station has been a bustling hub for tourists, townspeople as well as scores of workers in nearby offices including the Vermont State Office Complex. 

With a large covered porch and electric vehicle charging station, the train station sits at the head of Rusty Parker Memorial Park. The entire block forms a gathering place fueled by traffic in and out of the cafe spilling into the park with its well-used picnic tables, gazebo, and small playground. Morning commuters would jockey the parking spaces and in summer the farmers market and summer concerts fill the green. 

The café drew an estimated 200,000 people a year through doors of the restored 1875 Victorian Italianate landmark. That’s a figure shared by Karen Nevin, executive director at Revitalizing Waterbury, the nonprofit economic development organization that owns the train station. 

Revitalizing Waterbury purchased the property and shepherded it through a 10-year process to refurbish and reopen it in October 2006 with then-Green Mountain Coffee Roasters as its key tenant operating the café and visitor center. 

The interior decor and exhibits together tell both the story of Waterbury and the story of the coffee company that made Waterbury its home base as it expanded to a national brand, eventually evolving into its present-day Keurig Dr. Pepper. 

Gilroy acknowledged the connection between Keurig and the key piece of real estate it has occupied for 14 years. “We are open to discussing options to support the Revitalizing Waterbury organization as they evaluate the appropriate future purpose for café space,” she said. 

Ironically, however, Nevin late Thursday said she had not had any direct communication from Keurig Dr. Pepper about the company’s decision to close the café permanently. Nevin said she couldn’t comment yet on the exact next steps. In 2016, Nevin said the café marked the 10th year of its 20-year lease. 

Whatever happens next, Nevin said Revitalizing Waterbury is acutely aware of the train station’s importance to the downtown and the community. “It’s the pride and joy of our organization and the town,” she said. “We’ve been waiting for it to reopen. We will do right by it and bring something special back into that space.” 

Having the café closed and rail service stopped for nearly 10 months has had an impact on the community, Nevin said, adding though that she’s confident a new tenant won’t be too hard to find. 

“Ever since it closed, people have expressed interest in the space,” she said.