Director of Cafes

About the job

Company Description

Airship Coffee is dedicated to fostering authentic community and creating meaningful coffee experiences. Since 2008, we have been committed to improving the coffee industry by supporting sustainable farming practices and increasing the economic well-being of coffee growers. Our focus extends beyond sourcing and roasting exceptional coffee; we aim to deliver warm and friendly service to our café customers. At Airship, our culture is built on hard work, service, and a passion for what we create, with a steadfast dedication to maintaining our service-oriented values as we grow.

About the Role

We're looking for a seasoned multi-cafe leader to own the performance, culture, and guest experience across all Airship cafe locations. As Director of Cafes, you'll be the connective tissue between our cafe-level teams and company leadership — translating brand vision into daily operations, monitoring and supporting the systems, people, and habits that make every location thrive.

This is a highly visible, high-ownership role. You'll be in cafes regularly, mentoring managers, solving problems, and raising the bar. You'll also spend meaningful time on strategy — workforce planning, financial performance, and new location openings. The role includes competitive compensation, accrued PTO, and bonus potential.

What You'll Own

Operations & Performance

• Oversee day-to-day operations across all cafe locations, ensuring consistent quality, speed of service, and brand standards

• Own P&L performance across all units — monitor labor, COGS, and controllable expenses; drive profitability improvements

• Ensures cash management procedures (drawer counts and deposits) are being followed accurately

• Develop and enforce standard operating procedures, opening/closing checklists, and cafe playbooks

• Compliance: Ensures that Retail Food Permits and Alcohol Permits are up to date and posted according to requirements

• Ensures up-to-date CTL maintenance of alcohol server awareness forms 

• Monitors the cleanliness of cafes through weekly check-ins and holds CTLs accountable to environmental standards

• Communicates facility maintenance needs and facilitates CTL coordination of contractors/service techs. 

• Scheduling annual backflow prevention 

• Coordinates fire suppression system inspection

• Lead new location openings from operational readiness through launch

• Partner with Café Team Leads, Fulfillment, and Marketing teams to maintain product consistency and inventory health

• Ensure CTLs maintain zero out-of-stocks with inventory

• Ensure successful coffee and merch drops at cafes

• Grow merch café sales by evaluating what works at each café and communicating café-specific trends to the marketing team.

People & Culture

• Directly manage, coach, and develop Cafe Team Leads; conduct weekly L10 meetings, performance reviews (rubric evaluations), and career conversations

• Ensure CTLs have required food safety training

• Build internal talent through skills training and structured development programs

• Support CTLs and the Education team in identifying barista training needs

• Train CTLs on Square POS functionality

• Create and implement product upselling initiatives to be executed by CTLs and cafe team members

• Organize and execute inter-café team culture activities in conjunction with CTLs

• Set the tone for a hospitality-first and high-accountability team culture 

• Foster an environment of professionalism through accountability

• Partner with Café Team Leads on hiring, onboarding/offboarding, disciplinary matters, and compensation planning. 

• Forecast labor needs in conjunction with CTLs, initiate call for resumes with Marketing Team, conduct interviews with CTLs, make offers, and support CTLs with onboarding new team members

• Obtain New Hire Docs and deliver to Payroll staff

• Add and remove new/old team members to Square and Slack 

• Ensure new team members are welcomed and introduced to their teams by CTLs 

• Ultimate responsibility for ensuring ample coverage of all cafe schedules. 

• Monitor and approve bi-weekly café schedules, ensuring CTLs have adequate staffing ready. 

• Reduce turnover through strong engagement, clear expectations, and meaningful recognition

Guest Experience & Brand

• Champion exceptional guest experiences — own satisfaction scores, respond to trends in feedback, and drive service standards. No bad customer reviews!

• Ensure all locations reflect the brand's visual identity, hospitality standards, and product quality commitments

• Support event programming by approving the plan, ensuring CTLs are adequately prepared, and communicating content capture needs to the marketing team

• Share monthly update to CTLs on upcoming events in Bentonville and how they affect cafe operations 

• Identify and implement improvements to the guest journey across all touchpoints; café signage, menu updates with the Marketing Team.

Strategy & Growth

• Partner with leadership on market expansion strategy, site selection evaluation, and growth planning

• Analyze sales data, operational metrics, and competitive trends to surface insights and opportunities

• Represent retail operations in cross-functional meetings with marketing, education, finance, and fulfillment teams

WHAT WE'RE LOOKING FOR

Required

• Barista skills, if not will need to learn

• 3-5+ years of multi-unit leadership experience in specialty coffee, fast-casual, or hospitality

• Demonstrated track record of driving financial results across multiple locations

• Strong people leader — experience managing managers, not just frontline teams

• Deep operational fluency: scheduling, inventory, food/beverage cost management, compliance

• Data-driven mindset with comfort analyzing dashboards, sales reports, and labor metrics to make decisions and take action

• Excellent written and verbal communication skills; able to influence at all levels

Preferred

• Experience with specialty coffee or a strong passion for the craft and culture

• Background in scaling from 3–5 to 10+ locations

• Familiarity with POS systems (Square), scheduling tools, and retail analytics platforms

• Experience leading new cafe openings end-to-end