Our story

Hi! We’re Travis and Ashley, and we opened Honeylux on October 15, 2021. It has been a WILD ride, to say the least. People always ask me how I got into coffee. My first legit coffee job was at a Restoration Hardware restaurant in West Palm Beach, Florida, where Ashley and I attended college. I learned all the basics there. Once we moved back home to Watsonville, I got a job at Verve on 41st Avenue. Most of my knowledge about opening our own café came from that job. I’m extremely thankful for it. It taught me so much about coffee and how to run a business.

I’ve always been somewhat entrepreneurial. For a long time, I thought I would pursue a career in music, but that wasn’t working out how I’d hoped. My dad mentioned, sort of off the cuff, that I should open my own coffee shop, since I’d been working in coffee for a few years at that point. I shrugged it off. But then I began to think more deeply about the idea, and it became exciting to me.

I figured I was still young enough, at 26, that if I completely failed at this business, I could start over in a new career and tell my kids that I’d started a business long ago, lol. So I decided to go all in. With the help of Ashley and my dad, we built this place together. It took nearly two years from our initial idea to actually opening our doors.

Those first two years were rough. Starting a business is no joke, and it took a big toll on my health. We’d had our first child around the same time we opened our doors. Our regulars always joked that I had two babies: my actual child and the coffee shop. I wasn’t sure if it was going to work out. I was working 12-hour days for nearly two years straight. I was exhausted.

I would have quit if it weren’t for my wife, Ashley. She encouraged me and believed we could keep going and make it work. Thank God I listened to her! In year three, we began to notice a massive difference from the previous two years. People seemed to finally care that we existed, and word was spreading around town! Years four and five have been nothing short of a dream come true.

When we first opened five years ago, I never could have imagined what Honeylux would become. But I’m so thankful every single day for what we have here in Watsonville. If you’ve ever walked through our doors and ordered anything from us, thank you from the bottom of our hearts. We cannot express our gratitude enough.

We will always be here for you. We aren’t ever leaving, and we’re just getting started :)