By: Mia Kelley

Sunlight trickles through the leaves of the tree growing in the center of the new location of Dodo Coffee Company, a tree that grows out of the perfect hole in the ceiling. Students share laptops while working on homework, an older woman is reading in the corner, and a couple stumbles through their conversation, on what might be their first date. On every table sits little clear cups filled with coffee: cups all stamped with a Dodo bird.

Dodo Coffee first opened its doors in a little drive-through shop on Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard in 2024 and has since evolved in the way they deliver coffee to Fayetteville. Their humble, ground-up approach to selling coffee out of that tiny, white-bricked home is part of what attracted University of Arkansas students, through its low prices and personable employees.

Throughout the years, the shop has lived in that tiny home, then a trailer, and now in a full brick and mortar established location on West McMillan Drive, and the company continues to catch students’ eyes.

Junior Macy Penick said Dodo was a constant in her daily routine as a freshman, especially after comparing it to all the other coffee shops that she and her roommate had scouted out on their Fayetteville coffee bucket list.

“We very quickly figured out that it was our favorite, and we stuck with it as our go-to for the rest of the year,” she said.

Just like many college students, the company has had to quickly adapt to new styles of business operations in very short spans of time, each exhibiting a new authentic space for students to connect with others.

“So many of my friendships have formed [at Dodo], because in college I feel like people were always asking to get coffee and catch up, or ‘let’s go get coffee and I want to get to know you more,’’’ Penick said.

As more people started to frequent the location, Penick said she regularly saw the same people and became friends with them, too.

Dodo employee and sophomore Delaney Neal recalls a specific morning with a similar experience: she had a prolonged wait for her drink at the trailer, and while she waited, more and more of her friends both close and new, kept showing up.

“That’s what’s so fun…every time you go, you have a chance of seeing somebody you know,” she said.

Dodo’s new location that opened on Aug. 24 of this year is the first to have an indoor-outdoor space with seating areas for customers to enjoy their drinks in. Now, students can bring their books, schoolwork and other hobbies with them to work while sipping their coffee.

“[The new location] has made it so fun for people to come and make it an outing,” Neal said. 
“I see people sit to do homework or do Bible studies here now all the time.”

Another employee at Dodo, senior Kenna Wallace, said the work environment is incredibly positive, from the conversations she had when interviewing to the connections she’s made with regular customers.

“When I went in for my interview, the owners were so nice, and they talked about how they want to spread light to the community …for Dodo to be a place that brings people together,” she said.

Additionally, she said that Dodo is accommodating students’ school schedules, which motivates more U of A students to work there.

“They’re super good about working with your schedule, and they never want to schedule you too much if like you have a heavy course load,” Wallace said.

The company also attempts to be as organic in their coffee as they are in their mannerism towards customers. With ethically sourced mold-free beans and naturally sweetened syrups, the company strives to serve naturally based beverages in every order.

After undergoing training and education sessions about the beans and syrups, Wallace said she places even more trust in the company and in the fact that “they only want to serve high-quality coffee to their customers.”

Even more than the coffee or the polished modern seating and architectural flair it adds to Fayetteville, Dodo attracts communities through their culture. Here, employees are urged to make an effort to create meaningful conversations with customers, rather than simple, surface-level ones, with the intent to make someone’s day a little more bright.

“Our number one rule is to make everybody’s experience there a good one, because that could be the only good moment they have in their day,” Neal said.

Just like the tree at the center of their new location, Dodo continues to be a place where students and Fayetteville alike can put down roots of connections and make their communities a little bit stronger.