Caffeine, Cocktails & Chords

From humble beginnings serving coffee from the back of a pedicab, to now offering one of the most popular establishments in the North Valley to catch live music, Dewey Overholser is the man behind two base area staples: The Coffee Lab and A Bar Above.

Dewey has known Crested Butte and the Gunnison Valley nearly his entire life. “We started coming out here when I was two years old. My family built a cabin out in Gothic in the early ‘70s and my mom was a teacher, so we would spend the whole summer out here,” he says.

When he was 16, Dewey started working for the Rocky Mountain Biological Laboratory (RMBL) in the Gothic townsite. “RMBL drew me here when I was in high school and college. My first job was cleaning outhouses, and when I realized that stunk,” he laughs, “I moved into the kitchen washing dishes. Then I started prepping and cooking and baking.”

In 2016, Dewey recalls RMBL executive director Ian Billick expressing interest in having a coffee shop or espresso machine out at the lab for the scientists. “He asked me to put something together and I created a quick business plan for a coffee shop,” Dewey says. “Ian was a lot of help in getting things started.” And the Coffee Lab was born. “It’s the only business in Gothic that isn’t RMBL,” he says.

That first summer, Dewey remembers making coffee on a cart on the back of a pedicab bike. “The next summer, I moved into the old Gothic Town Hall building, and it’s been there ever since.”

The Gothic location is open every summer, usually from the first week of June when students and scientists arrive until mid-August. Dewey says the Coffee Lab serves many tourists and biologists during the summer. It’s a bustling pit-stop next to the RMBL Visitors Center as hikers make their way to Judd Falls or mountain bikers begin their climb up to the 401 Trail. “We have a lot of regulars who live up there in the summer, it’s a really good spot for having lab meetings and a place to get work done,” he adds. 

Dewey’s mom still comes out every summer and manages the Gothic location, and Dewey says he typically hires one to two full-time staff members, and three to four part-time employees. “We get a lot of students out there looking for extra income,” he says.

In 2017, Dewey started a second full-time Coffee Lab location in Mt. Crested Butte, in Mountaineer Square at the CBMR base area. “It’s one of the few places in the upper end of the valley where you can get First Ascent Coffee,” he notes of the local coffee roaster. The base area location is open almost year-round with the exception of the shoulder seasons in the spring and fall, and sees all types of customer traffic: from skiers on their way to hit the slopes, to visitors catching the wildflowers, to base area employees, to locals working remotely. “People seem to really enjoy it,” he says. “We get a lot of regulars that come in year-round.”

With both Coffee Lab locations running smoothly, in 2022 Dewey had the opportunity for a new business venture at the base area. “Eliot Tilton and I had been talking about doing a project together,” he says of the seasoned local bartender. “Our goal was to have a bar and restaurant that was a nice spot on the mountain for locals to go, but also cater to our tourist community. We wanted to have a place open later on the mountain for people to enjoy,” he says. “We got the opportunity to move into that space next to the bank in Mountaineer Square and we jumped on it.”

That summer, Dewey says he and Eliot began to build out the space, thanks to funding from Region 10 Colorado, which helps small businesses with loans, funding and resources. “We definitely couldn’t have done it without them, they were a huge help,” he says. 

A Bar Above opened on Christmas Eve that year. The restaurant offers cozy mountain ambience with quick bites and elevated cocktails. “Eliot is very into classic cocktails and we both have interest in craft beer,” says Dewey. In the spirit of supporting local peers, A Bar Above serves both Montanya Rum and Anthracite Spirits. Dewey also brought in a couple chef friends from his hometown, Austin, Texas. “They were a good fit and they wanted to get out here.”

From the beginning, Dewey says the plan was to expand the restaurant into the bank space next door, so in the spring of 2023, they knocked out the wall and began the build out and expansion into the current space. They also worked with local musician Bill Dowell to build a stage for performances. 

The new and improved space opened the summer of 2023, just in time to host a Juneteenth poetry reading. Ever since, the establishment has played a vital role in bringing back some vibrancy to the base area that was otherwise lacking in recent years, especially at the height of the pandemic. 

Dewey attributes a lot of this to the staff. “We’ve got an incredible group. We definitely try to put our staff above most everything else and make it a comfortable environment and provide good jobs that are more sustainable to make a living here.”

Another big draw to A Bar Above is the nightly live music. 

“Live music is a big part of what we try to do,” says Dewey. “Having local musicians and filling the hole that the Princess left was a goal of ours from the beginning,” he says, referencing the former wine bar that offered live music seven nights a week. Dewey says the Town of Mt. Crested Butte was a huge help in funding and support for A Bar Above’s live music offerings. “The town’s generous funding allowed us to realize that goal, we couldn’t have done a lot of that without them,” he says.

The live music continues this summer, and Dewey says they plan to have musicians performing every day A Bar Above is open. He also plans to host trivia and poetry readings and has partnered with Montanya to host a larger concert in August for a special Montanya rum release. 

“We’re finding the groove with the bar right now, and I’m just trying not to get tempted into starting another business this next year,” he jokes. 

Aside from running his Gothic and Mt. CB businesses, Dewey spends a lot of his time outside with friends and his husky, Thea. “Skiing, camping, rock climbing, fishing, hiking, the works. These mountains are great and I’ve always loved it here.” But what really motivates him to live in Crested Butte and bring these businesses to the valley is “the connectedness of the community,” he says. “The community of RMBL is what drew me out here in the first place, and it’s hard not to know everyone around you in this small town. I find that comforting and endearing.”

Learn more about The Coffee Lab, hours and locations at www.cbcoffeelab.com. Learn more about A Bar Above, hours and live music schedule at www.abarcb.com.