On any given day, the cafe at the corner of Douglas and Lischey is lively with conversations over coffee, the whir of an espresso machine and the smell of toasted bagels. The ever-present construction near the intersection doesn’t seem to deter customers from All People Coffee, which has been serving the Cleveland Park community for two years. Patrons have braved worse than blocked roads to get their caffeine fix — shortly after All People’s official opening in 2021 a snowstorm hit Nashville, and patrons still trudged through the wintry landscape for a warm drink from the new neighborhood spot.
“I think that was our jump-start,” says co-owner Corey Alexander, noting that All People was one of the few places open that day.
Two years later and All People is still bringing in Cleveland Park residents (and others) for a matcha drink, Irish latte, nitro cold brew, a draft from their wall of beer taps or an Instagram-able seasonal drink.
Like many neighborhoods in Nashville, Cleveland Park is changing. Development at this particular intersection was the main angle for a 2018 Tennessean story about the wave of development and gentrification hitting the historically Black neighborhood in East Nashville.
All People, in terms of geography, is right in the middle of it all. On top of that, hip cafes are often seen as symptoms, if not causes, of gentrification. The coffee shop is located on the first floor of a modern apartment building full of Airbnb rentals. Construction is happening up Lischey and down Douglas. But stalwart institutions also remain: A barbershop once owned by Vernon Winfrey — a former councilmember and father of Oprah — is just a few blocks away, as is Cleveland Street Baptist Church.
That confluence of new and old communities is what attracted Alexander and co-founder Bradley Bruce to the neighborhood.
All People Coffee
“We’re two brothers who wanted to show that coffee’s for everybody,” says Alexander. “Not just for one group or one community or one type of person.”
The cafe is the duo’s first project together. Bruce, a pharmacist by trade, originally had an idea for a combination cafe and bike shop. He pitched it to Alexander, who has business experience. When the concept for All People came together, they began building out the space on Douglas and Lischey, spending late nights transforming a very unfinished unit (Alexander says the place was just dirt and studs) into a welcoming storefront. The two also introduced themselves to neighbors and made efforts to connect with local Nashville-based vendors, including Morsel for vegan baked goods and Jersey Oven for fresh bagels.
They’ve also been hosting events that pack the coffee shop and its sidewalk, including a writers’ round series and block parties — Bruce says that development was organic thanks to the efforts of creative and artistic baristas.
Two former baristas have become collaborators on several events hosted at the cafe. Soul’d Creative Collective founders Christian Sinclair and Jonathan Wynn were working as baristas at All People when they had the idea to launch a culture night, Sinclair tells the Scene. Alexander and Bruce were on board with the idea. Soul’d was launched soon after in May 2021, while the cafe was still only a few months old.
“As [Alexander and Bruce] were figuring things out with the coffee shop, we were figuring things out with Soul’d,” says Sinclair.
All People Coffee
In addition to block parties, Soul’d has hosted poetry readings, concerts and fundraisers at the cafe. They even won the readers’ poll for Best Writers’ Open Mic Night in the Scene’s most recent Best of Nashville issue.
“It’s always been my dream to get people together and just commune,” says Bruce. “There was so much divisiveness and separation during the pandemic that we wanted to do something that was opposite [of that]. … And we use coffee as a vehicle just to bring people in.”
Alexander and Bruce tease that they have some plans for growth in the “development phase” but decline to share details. For now they just want to reiterate All People’s message that everyone is “created equal.”
“Coffee is not relegated to a certain gender or race,” says Bruce. “If you put your mind to something you can create it — that’s not limited just to a certain class or group of people.”
