Tinker Gemini: The Weekly Wave #07
Welcome to The Weekly Wave, a weekly newsletter highlighting the amazing local coffee shops in Indianapolis. This week, we're talking about...a coffee cart?
Meet Tinker Gemini
Welcome back to The Weekly Wave by the Indianapolis Coffee Guide! After a brief hiatus (what actually happened to May and June?), we’re back with your regularly scheduled programming, and we’re re-kicking off by introducing you to our friends at Tinker Gemini!
Tinker Gemini?!
No, Gemini is not the name of their new café on Market Street.
Tinker Gemini is the catering arm of Tinker Coffee, and by “arm” I mean “the sweet Tinker coffee carts” you see at events.
Obviously, we love visiting our favorite local coffee shops around Indianapolis, but did you know some of our favorite local coffee shops can visit you? That’s what Tinker does with Tinker Gemini. 👩🚀
So how does it work?
Have you ever ordered catering for a meeting? Or been to an event with food? That’s what Tinker Gemini does but with their incredible coffees.
You call up Tinker or submit a form online to tell them when your next event is, how many people you’d like to serve, and a few other details. Then on the day of your event, Tinker Gemini’s talented coffee professionals show up with enough coffee to fuel a rocket ship (this is a great joke that you’ll get in a minute).
The coffee cart(s) comes equipped to serve up incredible espresso, lattes, chai lattes, and hot chocolates. They also come slingin’ their house-made syrups: honey vanilla (a classic), maple miso (my favorite), brown sugar cinnamon (so good), and chocolate (because obviously), all served with a smile courtesy of Tinker’s baristas.
You know what to expect when walking into a Tinker café, but no two days look the same to Tinker Gemini.
You can find them pouring great coffees for teacher appreciation days, realtor open houses, weddings (right?!?), luncheons, concerts, sporting events, magazine launch parties (👀), and even C-level executives during the Indy 500.
BONUS: They’ve also recently introduced custom branding (see below) so the coffee cart can seamlessly integrate into your event.
Why is it called ‘Gemini’?
Great question! I’m glad you asked.
Tinker Gemini was named after NASA’s Gemini missions which preceded their Apollo missions. The Gemini missions aimed to run all kinds of tests & orbits before the main Apollo mission of landing on the moon (for the official record: the Indianapolis Coffee Guide is vehemently pro-moon landing).
Before Tinker opened any of their cafés, they used Gemini to showcase their incredible coffees and impeccable service to Indianapolis to give us a literal taste of what to expect when we’d eventually step foot into their storefront cafés (their Apollo mission).
PRETTY COOL, RIGHT?!
Everything we love about Tinker, wherever you are
The Tinker crew approaches everything with a sense of adventure, but they also approach everything intentionally. I loved learning all of this about Gemini because it shows their thoughtfulness and creativity.
This is demonstrated in how they approach Gemini as a solid and thoughtful part of their business and not just as an add-on or marketing gimmick. Gimini has been around for 5 years, and they’ve got plans to keep it around and growing. It’s been awesome to see how far they’ve come, and I’m excited to see where they grow next.
This all shows us, once again, how they make great local coffee approachable and accessible in creative and sustainable ways.
Prepare for your next moon landing
Maybe you’re planning your next space launch or maybe you’re just planning an office event (which tbh can sometimes feel like equivalent stakes), Tinker Gemini is a pretty cool way to treat your guests (and yourself) to some of Indy’s best locally roasted coffee wherever you are.
Because Tinker loves us and you, they’d like to give readers of The Weekly Wave a 25% discount. Head to tinkercoffee.com/catering for more info, and when you’re planning your event with Alec (hey, Alec!), make sure to let him know you heard about Tinker Gemini here in The Weekly Wave. 👋
This isn’t an ad or sponsored content. I don’t get any kickbacks. I just love Tinker, and they love us. Homies help homies, ya know?
Indianapolis Coffee Cart Guide?
I don’t talk a lot about coffee carts on the Indianapolis Coffee Guide for a handful of reasons—they’re constantly on the move, it’s a different business model, etc., etc., etc. However, some really great carts have popped up over the last few years, so you can expect to hear more about them on a regular basis.
All photos courtesy of Tinker Gemini. Then I put them over some NASA photos from Unsplash. :)
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Indianapolis Public Library's Adult Summer Reading Program: NOW - July 29
Y'ALL ALREADY KNOW HOW MUCH WE LOVE THE LIBRARY, which is just one reason why I am so stoked to talk about their summer reading program FOR ADULTS. THAT'S US.
Unlike in elementary school, you can read ANYTHING this summer—you know, like Batch or this newsletter! The more you read, the more tickets you get to enter to win huge prizes at the end of the program. We're talking huge coffee prizes, stays at Bottleworks, and a ton of other stuff.
I love the library so much 😭 Head to the link above to learn more and to sign up on the Beanstack app. It took me all of 2 minutes.
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