The Adobe Flash Player is required to view this multimedia interactive. Get it here.

Grand opening for Miamisburg cafe today

Springfield resident realizing lifelong dream with business opening

McGinn: What this city needs is a wrestling commissioner
2/3/12
Gospel music, punk making news locally
2/3/12
Your chance to see St. Valentine’s massacre guns
1/27/12
Clark County teen on album with Hank Jr.
1/27/12
McGinn: Does Bigfoot live here or is he just passing through?
1/25/12
> More headlines

By Kristin McAllister, Staff Writer Updated 2:38 AM Saturday, September 19, 2009

MIAMISBURG — It’s been the dream of a lifetime for Springfield resident Jim Leep to open his own business.

And come this morning, Sept. 19, Leep’s dream will come true with the grand opening of his JW’s Star City Cafe in historic, downtown Miamisburg.

“I’ve been in the car business for 26 years, and this is just something I’ve always wanted to do,” Leep said.

JW’s in the Rost Building at 8 W. Central Ave. in Market Square, formerly Dale’s Donut House.

Leep said it was while talking with Dale Qualls, one of the former owners of the donut house, that Leep took an interest in opening his own business at that same location.

“He was singing the praises of Miamisburg, and it just seemed like a good fit,” he said.

After familiarizing himself with the city and talking with local business owners, police and fire, Leep said, “I just fell in love with it. It’s a great town.”

About $25,000 and a few months later, JW’s was born, but with a whole new look from the donut house, said Wendy Leep, who works in the administrative offices for the grocery store, Aldi’s.

“It’s what I call a Friends style,” she said, referring to the cafe’s similarity in look to the popular 1990s sitcom set in part in a New York City coffee house.

“It’s where you can come in and read the newspaper and have a cup of coffee or have lunch with friends, watch TV, just a completely different atmosphere,” she said. “It’s more upscale.”

Menu items range in price from about 89 cents to $6.45 and include everything from coffee and tea and hot and cold drinks, to sweet baked goods, bagel or pulled pork sandwiches, pretzel rolls and flat breads.

She said the niche’ product, however, is something unique.

“It’s an 8 inch steamed hoagie,” she said. “It’s a very popular thing in the south. You don’t see it anywhere around here, and it’s so good.”

And of course, there are the oversized, gourmet doughnuts, Leep said, which are supplied fresh daily by retail and wholesaler Donut Haus Bakery in Springboro. Bakery owner Mike Hemmert said he services 23 customers in five area counties within 120 miles.

“I’m just so very proud of him,” said Wendy Leep, of her husband. “That he had the desire to do something like this in this day and age and with the economy the way it is. It’s a struggle to make that kind of a decision ... But he’s got such a good outlook in life, and we both felt that if he doesn’t do it now, it would never be the right time to take that step again.”

For Leep, it was family support that gave him the strength to pursue his dream.

“I owe so much to my wife and family,” he said. “She had to do twice as much as what I did. She had to help me and still maintain her job.”

Contact this reporter at (937) 225-9338 or kmcallister@DaytonDailyNews.com.