Life & Work with German Sierra of Dallas

Today we’d like to introduce you to German Sierra

Alright, so thank you so much for sharing your story and insight with our readers. To kick things off, can you tell us a bit about how you got started?
My story with coffee started as a passion hobby. My business travels from my corporate life sent me to the Pacific Northwest often, specifically Portland, OR. That is where my true exposure to specialty coffee began. It started with trying to hit as many local coffee shops/roasters and bring as many different coffees to brew back home, to eventually wanting me to dig deeper and see how I can replicate those same coffee recipes or profiles on my own. That led me to eventually roasting my own coffee. I started learning how to roast by reading books, consulting with professionals in the industry, and trial and error of course. Eventually, I was able to purchase a larger coffee roaster that opened the doors to considering this as a side-business more seriously. Within about a year, I was able to get a couple wholesale accounts from local coffee shops in Dallas. I still kept my corporate job while doing this on the side, and in October 2020 a casual drive through a small hidden commercial district in the middle of a residential neighborhood showed a “for sale” sign at one of the properties. It was a corner lot originally built as a residential home, though zoned commercial by the City. The property was dilapidated as the home remained vacant and unattended for several years. We found out about this opportunity the very last day they were taking offers. Being very familiar with this neighborhood (we live only 5 mins away), and the potential for the future state of it, we knew it was a diamond in the rough. We made an offer and to our surprise, we got it. We immediately started working on the physical renovation of the property, and it was a full gut job top to bottom. New roof, plumbing, dry-wall, windows, siding, electrical, paint, etc. That project alone took us a full year to complete. The second part of this story starts with the obstacle we faced with the city of Dallas to allow us to use it for what we intended to. The main issue revolved around the parking requirements with code and the given land use. There is an entire article that was published by D Magazine that provides more insight into that debacle, but fast forward another year in dealing with red-tape with the City of Dallas, we finally were able to figure out a way to get our permits. The time it took us, and the resiliency we inevitably had to show is what inspired the shop name of Slow and Steady. A nod to the Aesop fable of the tortoise and the hare which teaches a lesson on patience, courage, resiliency and perseverance. There were plenty days we felt like giving up and throwing our hands up in the air, but I’ve always been a fighter and a hustler, so I would muster what little courage I had left to keep going. It finally paid off when we were able to publicly announce a soft opening for our shop in Sept of 2023, and an official grand opening a few months later in November. We’re in our first year and couldn’t be happier that we were able to make it happen for the neighborhood that we’re in. To get to know our neighbors and see their support means everything, and we’ve been able to establish more than just a customer transaction or exchange, we’ve come to see and value them as friends. We are within days of celebrating our first year in business and plan to celebrate it with the community that have supported us along the way since day one.

We all face challenges, but looking back would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
The physical renovation was definitely one of them, but it was a more tangible one. I’d try and accomplish as many renovation projects as I could on my own in order to save money, but also finding reliable contractors to do the more professional jobs was no easy task either. Thankfully, we have several friends and a great network that made that much easier for us. The biggest struggle was dealing with the city of Dallas and their reluctance to work with us to figure out a way to make this happen. We are also a BIPOC Latino small business and it was very discouraging to see how much more unnecessary money the City made us spend to drag on the process as long as it took.

As you know, we’re big fans of you and your work. For our readers who might not be as familiar what can you tell them about what you do?
I’ve always worked in the corporate world soon after high school and post college classes (though I never finished college). I’d like to say I’m known for being a perfectionist (both a blessing and a curse). I have very high expectations for myself in everything that I do, whether that’s presenting or speaking in front of people, or cleaning the kitchen. I don’t do anything half way, and I struggle to see eye to eye with people that like to take short-cuts. Very detail-oriented and a bit OCD about a lot of things. I’m quite competitive by nature. I also am a strong believer of valuing relationships, and paying it forward when it’s within my means to do so. This work ethic has served me well throughout my entire life, both personally and professionally speaking.

If we knew you growing up, how would we have described you?
Very similar to what I previously described, I tend to take myself too serious for everything at times. And some days that can work against me, but my parents say that people would always say I acted much older than I was as a child. As a child, I’d speak in a very professional and courteous way with adults. And throughout my entire school and professional life, I maintained that. I believe it’s what set me apart from the rest. I always connected with the right people that saw my motivation and eagerness to do the best work I’m capable of, and its served me well. There’s an anecdote my mother speaks about me that almost foreshadowed the type of personality I would display throughout my life. She says we were vacationing with family in the summer (I was still a child), and while in a swimming pool, I would inch towards the deep-end of the pool without even knowing how to swim, to the point I would actually struggle to keep afloat. My mother says I was so persistent even after her attempts to bring me back to the shallow side, yet my father would tell her to let me be. His way to teach me a lesson about knowing and respecting my limits I guess. For better or worse, I don’t think I’ve changed much in terms of my “sink or swim” approach on life.

Three years later, what started out as Graph Coffee has now finally opened as Slow and Steady, a reference to his years-long battle with Dallas’ restrictive parking mandates and a guiding philosophy for a business that had to battle so much just to serve a cup of (really good) coffee.

Missed the story the first time around? Read “Death By Parking.”

“Suddenly, you get the green light. You finally get everything that you’ve been fighting for so long,” Sierra explained. “And in no time, you have to do everything that you didn’t have the time or energy, you know, to do before.”

When Sierra first tried to open his coffee shop, a decades-old Dallas code mandating one parking spot for every 100 square feet stood in his way. Providing the requisite number of parking spaces would necessitate demolishing part of his own recently renovated property or the one next door. Neither of these were options as far as he was concerned and so began a lengthy and expensive process to procure a variance from the Board of Adjustments.

When asked to provide community support, he collected dozens of letters from locals. When asked to provide a traffic study, he paid city traffic engineers thousands of dollars to perform several. Yet, no matter what Sierra was able to prove, the Board of Adjustments refused to budge. He had the support of three on the board of five, a majority, but not enough in a city which requires at least 75% of the board to be in agreement. Three out of five votes amounts to only 60%.

As this stalemate waged on, Sierra wasn’t just losing out on revenue his future coffee shop would generate. He couldn’t even begin preparing for inspections, certifications, and all the hurdles a small business owner can expect ahead of a launch. In fact, by the time he was able to invite inspectors over, he laughed at how relatively painless it was compared to what he’d endured with the Board of Adjustments.

“Once I passed [the final inspection], the inspector asked me, ‘So, when are you planning to open?’” Sierra recalled. “Tomorrow!” he replied, in disbelief that he finally had the green light to do so. Months behind schedule, he wanted to begin recouping his losses immediately. He also needed to learn the ropes. He wasn’t able to focus on operations, the daily needs of running a coffee shop, when every day for nearly two years was defined by uncertainty over whether his coffee shop would even exist.

At the tail end of August 2023, all the paperwork, permitting, inspections, and certifications were completed. Days later in September, he quietly opened his doors, effectively soft launching the newly rebranded Slow and Steady Coffee. Sierra spent the next two months adjusting to life as a coffee shop owner and preparing Slow and Steady for a grand opening, which ultimately took place on November 11, 2023.

A Bittersweet Relief

Slow and Steady didn’t ultimately triumph over Dallas’ arcane parking mandates. Despite bottomless community support—“they really came out to bat for me since the very beginning”—and all the evidence Sierra could muster disproving the demand for parking, those final two members of the Board of Adjustments could not be convinced. Sierra was not granted a variance.

Opening Slow and Steady took demolishing his garage, nearly half of the square footage of the one-story structure.

Naturally, Sierra tried whatever he could to preserve the garage. It was a matter of practicality: running a coffee shop demands storage for equipment, inventory, and assorted coffee shop paraphernalia. The garage was envisioned as a closet, not a space for potential car-driving customers. But that didn’t matter to the Board of Adjustments. What mattered for the parking calculus was the total square footage of the space, and according to the board, he had “too much.”

Sacrificing storage wasn’t enough. “Restaurants have some of the strictest parking requirements,” he explained, “whereas splitting the space into something between an office and a to-go eatery awarded me some leniency when it came to parking.”

In the end, Sierra not only had to slice his property in half, he had to reapply under two different uses. At least this time, he was guaranteed the green light. It also meant he was only liable to provide four parking spaces, something he could easily accommodate, compared to over a dozen in the earlier mandate.

It wasn’t an easy choice, but he couldn’t afford to delay the opening any longer, nor the expenses associated with petitioning for a variance with no end in sight.

Now, three months into business since the official launch of Slow and Steady, Sierra appreciates how many patrons come to caffeinate by foot or bicycle. “I just love seeing how many people use the bike rack I put out there,” he told me. He even offers 10% off on Saturdays for customers who walk.
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It’s been especially heartwarming to welcome customers cognizant of all the hassles Sierra weathered in the last two years. “Remember the inspector who asked when I’m going to open?” Sierra recalled. “The next time I saw him, he was a customer. That was such a cool moment.”

When You Make Space for Parking, What Do You Lose?

If—or perhaps, when—Dallas follows suit with dozens of cities across the country scrapping costly parking mandates, Sierra can entertain restoring the garage. These rules, often dating back to the 1960s, not only restrict how business owners and homeowners can improve upon their own property, they confine cities to a future of auto-centric design.

With the average parking spot measuring nearly 350 square feet, more space must be ceded for asphalt than the actual people whom the business plans to serve or the home is designed to house. When a place is designed to prioritize the geometry of cars, rather than the experience of people, the latter suffers. Learn more about how parking mandates and subsidies affect your city here.