Importers coffee was a Georgian building in the site occupied now by Burger King. It was a beloved shop, which many people remember for the aroma of coffee that drifted down the High Street. At that time, shops that sold coffee beans were unusual, and they were not stocked at the supermarkets (apart from Booths if you lived in Lancashire). There are a number of charming memories about it (see below) and there was a tea shop upstairs.
Previously, in 1940s it served as Army and Navy Board Canteen Tenting Warehouse.
In the 1990s it suffered a fire which inflicted considerable damage to the building. The demolition was opposed as the building was in the (new) town centre Conservation Area, and the replacement is disappointing.
The business traded in the Regents Arcade of The Glades for a while but folded.
Memories of Importers Coffee shop (and link to Francis Frith site):
Neil Moran shared this memory on Bromley Gloss in May 226:
“I remember the lovely aroma of freshly roasted coffee beans from the Coffee Importers in Beckenham High Street in the 1960s when we lived down the road in Penge but I didn’t drink coffee until my adolescence because my parents only drank tea. I suspect they both went to their graves having never tasted coffee.
“I went to the Coffee Importers in Beckenham a few times but much more regularly to the branch in Bromley High Street on Saturday mornings in the early / mid 1970s with my then girlfriend.
“Invariably there was an older gentleman there, a retired school teacher from one of the local grammar schools. I learned this from ear-holing his regular conversations with a newly qualified female teacher who was normally with him. He was apparently acting as a mentor to the neophyte (novice) teacher, sharing tips on maintaining classroom discipline, homework marking & grading, discussing the politics of education etc.
“I had the impression that he was a single man, unrelated to the young woman and there was an air of formality to their relationship. She always left first, leaving him alone with his daily Telegraph and toasted tea cake.
“Of course, that older gentleman has, by now, long since passed and that young teacher herself is, like me, very likely retired too, possibly a mother, grandmother and maybe a mentor to other young teachers today. It seems impossible to me that this took place half a century ago.”
Francis Frith site contains some lovely memories of Bromley in Yesteryear, especially about the beloved Importers Coffee shop. Please see the rest at : https://www.francisfrith.com/uk/bromley/coffee-shop-in-bromley-high-street_memory-485781
Sat Dec 31st 2016, at 9:40 pmtim.b.morrison commented: “I was born in Bromley in 1952, and lived there until 1965.
I knew that coffee shop really well, and can rememember to this day the aroma of coffee outside, watching the grinding going on in the window and the occasional treat of actually going to have a drink inside.
All in the days decades before the coffee culture we have now.
I’m sure it said “Coffee importers” above the shop“
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