by Christian MurrayFrank Raffaele, the CEO and founder of the Long Island City-based coffee chain Coffeed, is a familiar face in the neighborhood, often serving drinks or clearing tables at his Hunters Point South Park café location, LIC Landing.He's typically wearing a short-sleeve shirt-even in winter- a red apron and dons an old baseball hat that reads "Yale." He can be seen darting from table to table, conversing with visitors.Raffaele, 42, despite his modesty and low-key demure, is on the cusp of converting a small Long Island City-based coffee chain into a significant player in the New York City food and beverage arena.He's in the process of adding several new cafes -and will soon be opening a large centralized commissary kitchen in Long Island City where the company's food will be prepared and then distributed to his growing network of cafes and kiosks.He plans on raising between $6 million and $10 million in capital for expansion and aims to double his revenue from $5 million in 2015 to $10 million this year."I'm really excited right now," said Raffaele, who currently has 12 cafes/kiosks throughout New York. "We are at a big tipping point as we grow. It is going to be interesting and challenging to scale our model."(Visit the LIC Post to read the article in its entirety.)
