St. Pete Running Company Opens Second Location With Coffee Bar

St. Pete Running Company will throw a grand opening celebration for its second shop on Sunday, Jan. 11 at 2601 Dr. MLK, Jr. St. N. The 1,300-square-foot store began welcoming customers in December. It has a coffee bar inside.

Cody and Janna Angell launched their first store in the Tyrone area back in 2014. "We wanted a presence on the East side of town too because a lot of our customers were coming from there," Cody said, per the St. Pete Catalyst.

The new shop stocks running shoes and accessories. Group runs start here.

"People have come to our first store just to hang out. So, it quickly transcended a normal retail environment and became like a club," Cody said. "So, with the second store, we thought 'why not give them a reason to hang out.'"

The couple spent time in Australia, where coffee thrives. They'd go for runs and then sip coffee together after. While traveling, they stopped at cafes and jotted down ideas for what they wanted to build.

This "sculpted the ethos of" what the couple created, Cody added. The business works with a roaster from Orlando that sources beans from a single farm in Guatemala. The Angells have teamed up with St. Petersburg-based More Living Ceramics to craft mugs for guests.

The shop owners hit several roadblocks before the soft opening. They chose to rebuild the space, which meant new plumbing and electrical work. Permits took six or seven months to secure.

"This felt like the cool neighbor feel where you can see the same people every week and become integrated into the flow of that community," Cody said.

The grand opening will kick off with an 8 a.m. run split into two groups. People can try out running shoes from one of the company's partners. A ribbon cutting ceremony starts at 9:30 a.m.

"Walking and running are really simple solutions to a lot of complicated problems in the world," Cody said.