• Lost Stag Brew Box Tickner's winter focus

Lost Stag Brew Box Tickner's winter focus

With summer well and truly gone, professional cricket is placed on the back burner by Hawke's Bay's former Black Cap Blair Tickner.

Running the 13th Stag Cafe, Lost Stag Brew Box and 13th Stag Hanging Loose coffee trailer with fiance Sarah Reid (pictured above with Tickner) is Tickner's winter focus. 

These two with the help of their amazing Front Of House and Back Of House team run both locations together during the off season. Reid is in charge in the summer while Tickner is representing the Central Districts Stags cricket team and working hard to reach higher honours.  

The container coffee cart (Lost Stag Brew Box) was initially moved around the Mitre 10 Sports Park in Hastings for sporting events (including netball, hockey, football, athletics and canoe polo), but the pair were given the opportunity by Alice and Kevin Bayley at the HB Fruit Shop on Pakowhai Road to have the box there for the summer to align with their busy summer selling fruit and veggies to the Bay. With the HB Fruit Shop being a sought after location in Hawke's Bay as well as creating a very recognizable and “cool” brand it was a no brainer to align with Alice and Kevin, Ticker said.

"With a lot of traffic heading down Pakowhai Road, we realized it was a huge opportunity to provide a coffee shop for workers in a hurry heading from Napier to Hastings or Hastings to Napier and therefore decided to keep it open. We want it to be a destination (especially in the summer) where people can sit and enjoy their coffees with their loved ones," Tickner said. 

Lost stag brew box will be changing hours and starting an hour earlier every morning. Plus being open Mondays for people on the way to work to get their morning fix. (Monday to Friday / 6am to 1pm and Saturday 7am to 1pm). 

"We purchased a mobile coffee trailer in addition to the Lost Stag Brew Box 13th Stag Café, to make sure we can provide good coffee to participants, parents and other supporters for all sporting events around the park. This is called 13th Stag Hanging Loose, and will be parked up on the netball courts every Saturday, but we hope to see it floating around the Bay at other events," Tickner said.

The 13th Stag Café had not even been open for a year before the pandemic hit NZ and we had to close our doors. We worked hard on the business during lockdown to ensure we were delivering the best coffee and food the Bay has to offer. We have had a lot of support from locals and have been overwhelmed with customers coming in once we were able to open our doors again," Tickner explained.

"Being based at the Sports Park we look forward to the 50m pool and learning to swim pool opening as we believe this will be a great addition to Hawke's Bay and become a great hub for all sports stars around NZ.  It’s so inspiring seeing the likes of Valerie Adams, Tom Walsh, Eliza McCartney, the Central Districts Stags, Black Caps and other sports stars in the Café and seeing how much effort they put into their training and fitness," Tickner added.