In the midst of the city of London there is an artisan café, named Iris &June, they are not just known for their mind-blowing menu and addicting coffee, but what made them stand out is a classic tabloid they printed out as a thank you note for their customers. They undertook this publication to mark the café turning one. The owners considered it to be a special way to appreciate the local crowd and acquaintances who has always been extremely supportive. The Café also symbolises the celebration of living, culture and art.

They opened in April 2014 with a mouth-watering menu, addictive coffee and excellent customer service, and the owners want the café to stand out as a symbol of culture in years to come. They also see the publication as a medium to express their stand on various issues, and what makes them stand out from a normal coffee shop. They also have some of their suppliers featured in the magazine talking about the market and the difficulties in survival amidst all the competition without any compromise on the quality of service.

The restaurant, which is named after two of owner’s grandmother’s also feature special delicacies made on closely guarded family recipes. The owners say how they have regular customers who come there only to savour those and sometimes it becomes really difficult to manage the rush during peek hours and also during the holiday season. They distributed the copies of tabloids at the London Coffee festival and also at St James and Victoria stations. They are also hoping to extend the distribution to offices nearby and the neighbouring homes.

This is the unique story of a daughter, Olivia Micheal who wanted to give something special and creative for her dad on Father’s day. From the beginning she was sure that she did not want to give him a store bought gift like mugs or jumpers and instead she wanted something that he would cherish for its personalised feel. That is how she got the idea of having a personalised tabloid newspaper printed out with memories. Luckily, she had a full box of photographic slides from her grandfather which had a lot of pictures of her dad with his siblings, which also covered everything from his babyhood to boyhood to adolescence.

Though she had it all scanned and stored on her hard drive, it was no use to her technically challenged father. So she went ahead with her decision knowing that it would be the perfect gift for making his day special. She used Arthur, which is a free online layout tool for the designing part, and says that it helped her get exactly what she wanted. It also helped that she already had an exact idea of how she wanted the tabloid in terms of its appearance and contents. She found that tool to be extremely helpful and was completely satisfied with the results.

She also says that the only part, where she had to struggle was in the shortlisting of images for printing, as she did not want to cut out. After a lot o debating, she shortlisted it to a 12 paged tabloid which she proudly gifted her dad. She still feels the glee that she experienced when her family saw it and how they have kept it in their family room to cherish it.