Photography by Kelsey Shoemaker
Natalie Huscheck opened Well Grounded Coffee Community in late 2020 with the mission of hiring women recently released from prison. She partnered with Exodus Ministries, a Christian nonprofit that provides counseling and support to local mothers in need, to connect with mothers who were previously incarcerated.
Through Exodus, she met Hannah Dorsey, a single mother of two coming out of a three year prison sentence. Huscheck hired her to be a barista at the flagship location in 2021.
The shop recently opened a second location in Bishop Arts with Dorsey at the helm. In only a few short years out of prison, she’s gone from unemployed single mother to the general manager of her own coffee shop.
Going on four years for WGCC, Huscheck realized her dream of helping women rebuild their lives after prison. Over the past year, she sat down and interviewed nine of her baristas for a book commemorating their mission. The result is But God… A 30 Day Journey of Hope. The book oscillates between narrative and devotional, with each barista’s story broken up into past, present and future segments with a faith-based message at the core.
“When we got a copy of the first book, it became real for everyone,” Huscheck says. “They almost had buyer’s remorse. They all had moments of being absolutely vulnerable.”
The book pulls no punches about the severity of some of the women’s lives prior to rehabilitation efforts from organizations like Exodus and WGCC. Now that the book is published, their vulnerability is helping women with similar life experiences.
“When I hire, I do tell them that this is a completely unique situation where people will know that you’ve been in prison,” she says. “That’s just our mission, it’ll be out there.”
Huscheck has gifted copies of the book to various rehab organizations with the hopes of inspiring those who may just be starting their recovery process. Eventually, Huscheck wants to get the book in women’s prisons to show that there’s a pathway out of their current situation.
“They go from prison, no rights at all, everyone’s telling them what to do. Then they get out and the reaction is, I don’t want anyone ever telling me what to do,” she says. “It’s real life. People will always be over you. It’s managing that well and choosing healthy accountability.”
