Godspeed Coffee
Coffee as a Cocktail: How Godspeed is Rewriting the Brew Rules in Columbia's Five Points
Finding a great coffee shop is easy. Finding one that leaves you speechless is rare, and that's exactly what Godspeed Coffee did to me.
Tucked into a storefront in Columbia, SC's Five Points neighborhood, Godspeed treats coffee like a craft cocktail program. Owners Roger Caughman and Kailey Cunningham build beautifully layered signature drinks from espresso, teas, and syrups that read more like a cocktail list than a coffee menu. "We've always seen parallels between being a barista and being a bartender," Cunningham says, "and we've always had fun watching the workflow whenever we go out for drinks and seeing the similarities and differences."
It started as a pop-up based on the belief that coffee could be more interesting than it usually is, before landing a permanent home in a former Starbucks at 747 Saluda Ave. There's something ironic about that: a chain that standardized coffee, replaced by two baristas out to prove it never had to be standard in the first place.
Midcentury Modern Meets Desert Cool
In Columbia, SC, there's only one other place I've seen people lining up before opening: City Limits BBQ. Godspeed is the second. I mistakenly thought they opened at 8:00 a.m. on a Sunday and arrived at 8:30 a.m., thirty minutes early. It turned out to be a lucky mistake: by the time the clock hit 9:00 a.m., there was a line of 40-plus people waiting behind me to get in. Step inside, and it's easy to see why they keep coming back: effortlessly chic, midcentury modern meets desert cool. Broken clay tile, cut to mimic stone, runs underfoot, giving the whole room the loose, warm texture of terrazzo. Walnut wood clads the walls and the coffee bar, while the bar itself is topped in stone, and wooden tables and wire metal barstools line the counter. Green plants are scattered throughout, and huge windows flood the space with natural light.
It feels like Palm Springs, or maybe LA. Not the Carolinas, which is exactly why it stands out here.
More Than a Pretty Room
While it's an aesthetically pleasing space, the drinks are what really draw the crowd. Even the classics get the same care: cortados, cappuccinos, lattes, chai lattes, and matcha lattes, all done well, if familiar is what you're after. But it's the creative signature drinks that show real ambition.
Two stood out above the rest. The Magpie, one of their permanent signature drinks, is what an Old Fashioned would taste like if it were coffee: delicately bitter, balanced by slightly sweet, caramelized molasses notes from brown sugar. It's served over ice in a rocks glass, dark espresso settling beneath a thick white foam cap dusted with orange zest. The other was a seasonal special called Movin' to the Country. It's sweet, earthy, and fruity, mixing ceremonial-grade matcha with Sprite, lime juice, and peach nectar into something fizzy and completely crushable. It was like a sunset caught in a glass, and I'm hoping it will make a comeback.
The Nectar, made with saffron and rose, is stunning: a pale gold latte finished with a swirl of rose-pink and saffron-orange dust across the top. I highly recommend ordering it hot, since the saffron milk balances beautifully against the coffee and the rose dust on top adds a genuinely nice floral quality, though it's available iced too, if that's more your speed. The PB&J is served cold as well, poured into a tall glass, pale and creamy throughout. It tastes exactly like you'd expect: creamy, nutty, and sweetened by the berry jam, but it still tastes unmistakably like coffee underneath, remarkably balanced with no single flavor pulling ahead of the rest.
The Neapolitan plays a clever trick on the palate: coffee leads the first sip, then gives way entirely to the unmistakable taste of Neapolitan ice cream by the finish. Served over ice in a tall glass, it leans sweet but stays balanced rather than turning into a sugar bomb, layering espresso, chocolate, strawberry milk, and a vanilla bean cream top, finished with a triangular shard of waffle cone perched on the rim. The Neapolitan plays a clever trick on the palate: coffee leads the first sip, then gives way entirely to the unmistakable taste of Neapolitan ice cream by the finish. Served over ice in a tall glass, it leans sweet but stays balanced rather than turning into a straight sugar bomb, layering espresso, chocolate, strawberry milk, and a vanilla bean cream top, finished with a triangular shard of waffle cone perched on the rim. Most recently, I tried a mango lassi matcha special that mirrors the same layered look as Movin' to the Country: a golden-yellow top fading into vivid green at the base, finished with a sprig of mint and a light dusting of red spice. Somehow, it's refreshing and thick and dessert-like all at once.
I haven't had a chance to try the Jam Jar (shaken cold brew concentrate, Sakhar strawberry habanero jam, sparkling water, and bitters) or the BBL (a mix of matcha, blackberry, lavender, and lemonade), mostly because any more caffeine per visit would have sent me into a full panic attack. But based on the ones I have tried, I have no doubt they're just as spectacular.
Something to Eat While You Wait
A small pastry case rounds things out; it’s worth a look if you want something to eat with your drink. I tried two. The Brown Butter Chocolate Chip Cookie leans into bitter dark chocolate with a pop of salt. The brown butter adds a nutty depth, while the cookie itself has a more firm, almost crumbly texture. In contrast, Lemon Blueberry Muffin is more restrained: a light lemon flavor with blueberries throughout, it’s soft and moist with a crackle of sugar across the top.
Final Verdict
Godspeed changes what a coffee shop can be, not just for Columbia, SC, but for a lot of cities that think they've already seen it all. By bringing craft cocktail complexity to caffeine and pairing it with a gorgeous midcentury space, Roger Caughman and Kailey Cunningham have built something genuinely rare. If you want to experience your morning coffee in an entirely new way, this is the spot. Just set an alarm to get there early, or be prepared to wait, and let them send you off into your day exactly the way the name promises.