August 11, 2025. We opened quietly — just for our people, no announcement, no fanfare. A soft open that wasn't really a soft open. More like a first day of something we had been building for a long time without knowing exactly what it would become.
One year later, I'm sitting here trying to find the right words for what this year was. I don't think there are perfect ones. But I want to try.
How it actually started
The first days were small. A few people. Friends, people who knew us, curious neighbors. And already things were breaking. Equipment, processes, people figuring out their roles in real time. We didn't know how to handle what was in front of us — and what was in front of us wasn't even that much yet.
A thousand dollars a day felt like a lot. It felt like it could break us. And in some ways, it did — we just kept putting ourselves back together and going again the next morning.
Then we learned to handle two thousand. Then three. Then the season peaked and we had days at eight thousand dollars in the same hours, with the same team, and we didn't stop. We didn't fall apart. We found something we didn't know we had.
When the season ended and three thousand five hundred dollars a day came back around, it felt like nothing. Like a quiet Tuesday. The same number that had broken us six months earlier felt like a rest day.
That's what a year does to a team. Not the money — the capacity. The ability to absorb what used to be overwhelming and treat it like routine. That doesn't happen by accident. It happens by showing up, every day, and doing the work until the hard things become normal.
What you gave us
More than 500 reviews across three platforms. Each one written by a real person who chose to spend a few minutes saying something about their experience here. That is not a small thing. Reviews are not obligatory. People write them when they feel something — when something was worth saying.
Even more than the reviews: the personal thank-yous. People who stopped at the bar, or found us on Instagram, or sent a message to say something that mattered to them. People who came back — again and again — until coming here became part of their week.
And something we didn't expect: requests. People asking us to open Three Sixteen in their city. Miami. Atlanta. Charlotte. People saying they hadn't found anything like this where they lived. That kind of feedback doesn't come from a good product alone. It comes from something that felt different — and knowing that people felt that difference means everything to us.
What this year meant to me personally
I've built more than twenty companies. This is the most special one.
I say that knowing how it sounds. But it's true, and I want to say it plainly. I've never built anything in retail before. Never in hospitality. Never in a space where the product is made fresh every morning and consumed by the time the day ends. Where the guest is in the room. Where the feedback is immediate and human and right in front of you.
Many people told me not to do this. And they were right — it is extraordinarily hard. The margins are thin, the hours are long, the complexity is constant, and the things that can go wrong in a single day would fill a book. They were right about all of it.
And I would do it again. Without hesitation.
Because what we built here is not just a café. It's a place that people come back to. A place that people missed when we were closed. A place that people want to exist in their city. That is rare. And it happened because of every person on this team who chose to care — really care — about what we were building.
What comes next
When we started, the plan was one location. One café, done well, and see what happens.
The plan has changed. Not because we got carried away with ambition — because we saw something in this first year that told us what's possible. We saw a market that wants what we're building. We saw a team that can grow into something bigger. We saw what happens when you don't compromise.
The plan now is 10 to 20 locations across South Florida over the next five to seven years. We are building Three Sixteen Center in South Naples — a dedicated facility for roasting, baking, training, production, and everything that makes scaling without losing quality actually possible. It is the infrastructure that lets the next ten locations be what this first one is.
Midtown Bonita is next. Then more.
We look at what's ahead with genuine excitement and no illusions. It will be hard. Things will break. There will be days when we wonder what we were thinking. There always are. And we will put ourselves back together and go again the next morning — exactly as we did this year, exactly as we will keep doing.
That's the whole plan. Work. Show up. Don't stop.
To everyone who came through our door this year — thank you.
To everyone who left a review, sent a message, said thank you in person — you gave us something real.
To the team — Alexey, Daniel, David, and everyone who worked a shift, learned something hard, stayed when it was difficult, and cared about what we were making — this year belongs to you as much as it does to me.
To the guests who asked us to open in their city — we heard you. We're working on it.
Year one is done. Let's go build year two.
Vitaliy Rizhkov
Founder, Three Sixteen
