In the Milk District, the New Morning Spots Are Moving In With Their Neighbors

"Now here we are, our first official coffee counter. Not coffee shop!" Ryan Plaza told Bungalower in September. "That will come."

Plaza's counter sits inside Bad As's, the sandwich shop at 207 N. Primrose Drive. That arrangement is how the Milk District has gained places to get coffee and breakfast this year. The new names are moving into rooms that already have a sign out front. The closures over the same months are leaving standalone storefronts empty. If your mornings run between Bumby Avenue and Primrose Drive, you have more options than you did in spring, at fewer addresses.

One Kitchen on Primrose, Three Businesses

Chef John Collazo has run Bad As's from its Primrose Drive home since 2017, after starting with a food truck, Bungalower reported. He had wanted to serve breakfast almost from the start. This fall he finally does, and he didn't build anything new to do it.

Two partners make it work. NEWRICH Coffee Co. began online in 2024, selling whole and ground coffee. Plaza says the brand has sold more than 2,000 pounds since then. Its flagship is José Blend, named for Plaza's grandfather and made with beans Plaza sources himself from a mountain farm in Puerto Rico. The counter at Bad As's grew out of about a year of Thursday coffee meetings between Plaza and Collazo, according to Bungalower.

The second partner is L'Encanto Bakery, a Puerto Rican-inspired microbakery that makes pastries, cakes and breads. It started with Saturday-morning pop-ups at Bad As's, and the pop-ups grew into a full partnership. Expect a rotating mix of sweet and savory pastries and croissants, plus mallorca, the soft Puerto Rican sweet bread Collazo named as one of his personal favorites.

"I love investing in talent," Collazo told Bungalower.

Bad As's now opens at 7 a.m. Tuesday through Friday and 9 a.m. on Saturday. Bungalower describes the three businesses as essentially sharing one home.

The building already had more under its roof before breakfast arrived. Earlier this year, Collazo closed Bad As's Burgers on Curry Ford Road and moved the burgers back into the Primrose restaurant. So one address now covers burgers, sandwiches, a coffee brand and a bakery that a year ago were spread across a separate shop, a website and a weekend pop-up.

Easy Luck Landed Four Blocks Over, Inside Phat Ash

Easy Luck Coffee and Bodega went through a similar move, but it had to happen faster. In May, Easy Luck announced it would leave its longtime home at 2425 E. South Street in August. It said the change came sooner than expected and warned customers there might be a gap in service while it looked for a new space, Bungalower reported.

Phat Ash Bakes closed that gap. It invited Easy Luck into its flagship shop at MilkStacks, 221 S. Bumby Avenue, with specialty coffee and breakfast service announced to begin August 10. That kept Easy Luck in the neighborhood it has called home for years. Easy Luck's own site lists its hours simply as "7AM - CLOSE," so a quick check of its social accounts before a weekday visit is a good idea.

That makes two moves into existing shops in one summer. Each time, a business that would otherwise have had to find, lease and build out its own space landed behind someone else's counter.

The Addresses, Side by Side

The pattern is easiest to see address by address.

The two rows that gained something are both shops that were already open. The rows that lost something are each a single business in its own space, and no new tenant has been announced for any of them.

Running a Standalone Space Got Harder

Twelve Talons owner Travis Smith explained the math plainly. He told Bungalower that no single thing led to the brewery's closing after service on Aug. 30. It was a combination of rising operating costs, high rent and softer sales. Even when sales held steady or improved, he said, the cost of doing business made the numbers hard to work. There were no plans to continue the brewery somewhere else.

Gringos Locos closed all four of its locations at the start of August, ClickOrlando reported. That included the Milk District restaurant at 2406 E. Robinson Street.

The next closing is Saturday, Oct. 31. The Nook on Robinson opened in March 2018 in the former Sandwich Bar space at 2432 E. Robinson Street. It became known for Florida craft beer, local art, vinyl nights and live music. Owners Matt Duke and Mary McGinn have not given a reason for closing. In a February 2025 interview with Orlando Weekly, Duke talked about the neighborhood's growth: "I love the growth of the neighborhood and the changing of Orlando. But it's making it harder and harder for us to exist."

Orlando Weekly reported that McGinn said the bar would hold a funeral for itself on closing night, Halloween. The paper credited the Nook's recurring nights, Circuit Church, Please Understand, Movie Trash and the weekly bring-your-own-vinyl night, with giving local beatmakers and synthesists a place to play when bigger venues had no room for them. Nothing has been shared about what will move into the space.

Dates for the Rest of the Year

The neighborhood calendar shows the same pattern. The district's biggest days depend on businesses that host events in spaces they already have.

1. Saturday, Oct. 31: The Funeral for The Nook, the bar's announced final night at 2432 E. Robinson Street.
2. Sunday, Nov. 15: The third annual Florida Coffee Festival at Festival Park, 2911 E. Robinson Street. VIP entry starts at 10 a.m. and general admission runs 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. Tickets on Eventbrite start at $19.01, and Florida Coffee Culture is the listed organizer.
3. Sunday, Dec. 20: Holiday Milk Mart, noon to 6 p.m., with about 300 local artists, food trucks and live music around Robinson and Bumby, plus an appearance by Santa Cow.

Milk Mart turned 10 this year. It started in 2016 and is a quarterly market that spreads across The Nook, Etoile Boutique, Sportstown, Sideward Brewing, Milkhouse, Whiskey Lou's and Otto's High Dive, with vendors in the parking lots and on the sidewalks. Bungalower noted that the Oct. 4 Spooky Soirée was The Nook's last Milk Mart after years as one of the event's anchors. That makes the December market the first one held without it. The Milk Mart team also helps produce the Florida Coffee Festival, so the same people are behind both of the district's remaining big dates this year.

The One Corner Being Rebuilt

The only big physical change coming to the district is at its most visible corner. The former Hoods Up auto repair shop at 2400 E. Robinson Street, at Robinson and Bumby, sat empty for years. Demolition started this summer. Ustler Group, which is tied to the property's ownership, told Bungalower that much of the original structure was failing. The plan now is to rebuild it in about the same footprint and keep a similar look and scale. City records show a 3,519-square-foot restaurant project.

Good Salt Restaurant Group will run the restaurant. It's the team behind Seito Sushi, The Osprey, Reyes Mezcaleria, The Monroe, Sparrow and Osteria Ester. The name Paper Kites has shown up in city paperwork, but no name, menu, cuisine or design is final. Ustler called the mid-2027 completion estimate a "best guess."

Until it opens, the closest thing to a new place for breakfast in the Milk District is a counter, a bakery case or a coffee bar inside a shop you have probably walked past for years: Bad As's at 7 a.m. on a weekday, or Phat Ash at MilkStacks on Bumby.

Eileen Winfrey keeps track of which Milk District storefronts are turning over, along with the rebuild at Robinson and Bumby that's expected around mid-2027. If you own near the Milk District and want a straight read on how these changes affect your plans, call or schedule a free consultation.