New Owner Plans To Re-Open

Bethel’s Second Cup Café

By Chris Costanzo

Rhonda Ketner, who lived in Bethel for all but two years of her life, is doing what comes naturally to her. Born in Randolph, she moved to Bethel as a child, graduated from Whitcomb High School, and has been working in the restaurant business since she was 11 years old. Now she is acquiring the Second Cup Café on Bethel’s Main Street from the original owner Jennifer Ankner-Edelstein.

It’s welcome news for Bethel. Residents have long lamented the absence of a breakfast and lunch establishment in the village, as documented in the planning commission’s survey of town attitudes conducted early this year. So, when the Second Cup Café opened in March, it quickly became a popular hang out, but the scheduling and service model that Ankner-Edelstein had established for the cafe still wasn’t generating enough customers to meet the café’s financial requirements, so she closed the establishment in August.

The exact form, appearance and hours of the Second Cup Café, under its new ownership, is not yet certain. Ketner told The Herald that she is tentatively planning to open the café’s doors Tuesday, Oct. 17. She intends to sign a lease with the building’s owners this week, and is purchasing all the café’s equipment and furnishings, as well as its name, from Ankner-Edelstein.

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