Cafe Manager

☕️ WE'RE HIRING: Cafe Manager at Beans & Bloom ☕️

Beans & Bloom is changing. We’re developing a bolder café, a stronger brand, and a clearer ambition: serving genuinely great coffee, run by a commercially successful organisation, and creating meaningful employment opportunities for people with learning disabilities and/or autism.

Zero sob story. Zero lowering the bar. We want to be a spot people choose because the coffee is brilliant, the service is great, and the space has personality.

We are looking for an experienced, hands-on Cafe Manager to lead our site at Whitehall Museum in Cheam in the London Borough of Sutton.

Salary: £35,000–£38,000 (depending on experience)

Contract: Full-time, permanent

Hours: 37.5 hours per week (worked flexibly on a rota basis, including weekends)

Location: Whitehall Museum, 1 Malden Road, Cheam, Sutton SM3 8QD

Who you are:

A coffee lover who genuinely understands espresso extraction, grinder calibration, and milk steaming.

A commercially-minded operator comfortable managing rotas, stock, margins, and food safety.

A patient, emotionally intelligent leader who believes that having a learning disability shouldn't mean having low expectations placed on you.

You don't need to be a learning-disability expert—our partner Nickel Support provides on-site Support Workers. We just need a brilliant manager with the right attitude.

👉 How to apply: Please contact our HR Manager - [email protected] - who will share the job description, personal specification and application form for the role.

Nickel Support - Job Description 

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The Role: Cafe Manager

The Company: Beans & Bloom | Nickel Support

Salary: £35,000–£38,000, depending on experience

Contract: Full-time, permanent

Location: Whitehall Museum, 1 Malden Road, Cheam, Sutton SM3 8QD

Hours of Work: 37.5 hours per week, worked flexibly across Monday to Sunday on a rota basis, including weekends.

Closing Date: 2nd October 2026

Start Date: 11th October 2026

About Us

Nickel Support supports adults with learning disabilities and/or autism to lead more fulfilled and purposeful lives through relationships, health and employment.

We run social enterprises that create real opportunities for people to develop skills, confidence and independence. Beans & Bloom is one of them.

And we're ready to make it bigger, bolder and better.

Great coffee. Small price. Big Impact.

GREAT COFFEE. SMALL PRICE. BIG IMPACT.

Beans & Bloom is changing.

We're developing a bolder cafe,  a stronger brand and a clearer ambition: serving genuinely great coffee, run by a commercially successful organisation, creating meaningful employment opportunities for people with learning disabilities and/or autism.

No sob story. No lowering the bar.

We want Beans & Bloom to be somewhere people choose to visit because the coffee is good, the service is good and the place has personality.

The social impact is part of what makes us different – but it doesn't replace the need to run a brilliant cafe.

We're looking for an experienced Cafe Manager to help us take it there.

The Role

We need someone who knows how to run a coffee shop.

You'll be responsible for the day-to-day operation of Beans & Bloom: the coffee, the team, the customers, the standards and the numbers.

You'll work on the floor, lead from the front and make sure that whether it's 9am on a quiet Tuesday, or we're three deep at the counter, the cafe thrives.

You’ll help us grow and as the business grows, so does our ability to create opportunities for people with learning disabilities.

Coffee

We're looking for somebody who genuinely understands coffee and can maintain high standards every day.

You'll need to be confident with:

• Espresso machines and grinders

• Dialling in and adjusting grinders

• Espresso extraction and recipe consistency

• Milk steaming and drink quality

• Basic machine care, cleaning and troubleshooting

• Maintaining equipment and knowing when specialist servicing is required

• Training others to make consistently good coffee

• Managing workflow during busy service

• Working with our coffee supplier to continually improve standards

You don't necessarily need to be a competition barista.

But if the coffee isn't right, you need to know why – and know how to fix it.

Run the Cafe

You'll take full ownership of the operation.

That means:

• Opening and closing

• Leading service

• Managing the cafe floor

• Creating an efficient counter and barista workflow

• Rotas and staffing

• Stock and ordering

• Waste control

• Cash and EPOS

• Suppliers

• Equipment

• Cleaning standards

• Food safety and allergens

• Health & Safety

• Customer complaints

• Maintaining a 5-star Food Hygiene Rating

• Making sure the cafe is ready for service every day

You'll set the standard and make sure the team understands it.

We don't need someone who spends their day in an office.

We need a manager who's visible, hands-on and knows what's happening in their cafe.

Grow It

Beans & Bloom is a social enterprise – but it still needs to make money.

You'll understand the numbers and help us improve them.

You'll monitor:

• Daily and weekly sales

• Average customer spend

• Labour costs

• Food and drink margins

• Stock

• Waste

• Best and worst-selling products

• Customer patterns

• Profitability

And then you'll do something with that information.

That could mean changing the menu, improving service speed, introducing an offer, building local partnerships, creating catering opportunities or simply getting really good at turning first-time customers into regulars.

We're not looking for a marketing manager.

We're looking for a good cafe manager with commercial instincts.

Build the brand with us

Beans & Bloom is entering a new chapter.

We're moving towards a stronger, more industrial and confident identity.

Think less charity cafe

Think more great independent coffee shop with something important behind it.

Our emerging attitude is:

Great coffee. Small price. Big impact.

Zero sob story.

People with learning disabilities can.

You'll help us bring that attitude to life in the cafe – through the service, team, products, customer experience and the way the space feels.

You won't be responsible for redesigning the brand yourself, but you'll be an important part of making it work in the real world.

We want somebody who gets what we're trying to create and is excited about helping shape it.

People

This bit matters just as much as the coffee.

Beans & Bloom creates opportunities for adults with learning disabilities and/or autism to develop real workplace and hospitality skills.

Your job isn't to do things for people.

It's to help people become good at their jobs.

You'll:

• Teach real cafe and barista skills

• Break tasks down when someone needs additional support

• Adapt training and communication where appropriate

• Create clear routines and systems

• Give people responsibility

• Provide honest, constructive feedback

• Recognise strengths and develop them

• Maintain high expectations

• Work alongside Nickel Support colleagues where additional support is needed

• Create opportunities for progression

You don't need to come to us as a learning-disability expert.

We can support you with that.

What we do need is somebody who is patient, emotionally intelligent and genuinely believes that having a learning disability shouldn't mean having low expectations placed on you.

Nickel Support - Personal Specification

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Essential:

• Strong cafe, coffee shop or hospitality management experience

• Strong barista and coffee knowledge

• Experience managing and developing a team

• Confidence operating and maintaining commercial coffee equipment

• Excellent customer-service skills

• Experience managing stock, ordering and suppliers

• Understanding of sales, margins, labour and waste

• Strong food-safety and Health & Safety knowledge

• Comfortable being hands-on and working on the floor

• Organised, practical and able to solve problems quickly

• Commercially minded

• Able to maintain standards when it's busy

• In the event that a Support Worker is not available on site, you will be responsible for the support and care of the trainee - training will be provided. 

Desirable:

• Experience training baristas

• Specialty or independent coffee-shop experience

• Experience developing menus or food offers

• Experience growing cafe sales

• Experience with catering or events

• Experience supporting people with learning disabilities and/or autism

Beans & Bloom is supported by Nickel Support, and additional support staff will ordinarily be available to support trainees where required. However, as Café Manager, you will be expected to confidently lead, engage and work alongside trainees as part of the day-to-day running of the coffee shop.

While your primary responsibility is to run and manage Beans & Bloom, there may be times when you are required to take a more active role in supporting and leading trainees within the café environment.

If you're a brilliant Café Manager with the right attitude towards people, we'd rather teach you our world than miss out on you. 

If you have any questions, please contact [email protected]

The application form for this role can be found on our website - www.nickel.org.uk - under the Join Us / Work for Us tabs.