
(From left) Zach Archibald, founder of Surrounding Counties, with two of its new owners, Vance Dunn and Jeff Rock (Photo by Eileen Mellon)
After announcing its closure (for now) in November, Surrounding Counties — the suburban specialty coffee shop known for its Texas-sized European pastries and a record player that spins everything from Taylor Swift to The Clash — is making a return with a new set of owners.
In mid-March, Surrounding Counties will reopen as a grab-and-go cafe at 7019 Three Chopt Road in Henrico’s Village Shopping Center.
The coffee shop was originally founded by Zach Archibald, also a co-founder of Lamplighter Coffee Roasters, in October 2020. After a four-year-run, he says, “Surrounding Counties was doing well, but I had definitely racked up a lot of debt, and in order to make it work, it was going to kill me.”
After considering different ways to rescue the venture (transitioning to a virtual restaurant, relocating to the former North End Juice Co. space in Union Hill), Archibald eventually settled on a solution: selling the business.
“I create great things, I create great spaces, I create great community, but I need support. I needed help. I need help with the workload and the development,” he says.
In a fortuitous series of events, he not only bailed out the business, he also found a trusted team of familiar faces to take over.
One of Surrounding Counties’ new owners is Jeff Rock, CEO of software development company Mobelux, which is responsible for creating Tumblr's first mobile platform. His wife, Emily Rock, negotiated the lease and operations details. The couple were regulars at the old Surrounding Counties location, and Archibald says of their son, “He was one of our first super fan kids.”
Another new owner is Vance Dunn. His child, Tony, previously worked for Surrounding Counties, and Dunn began clocking in, too, when it got busier. Dunn also worked at Chewy’s Bagels and was on the opening team at Baltik’s Bagels.
A more silent third partner — someone who was tangentially involved in the Richmond coffee community, responsible for the mint fudge brownies sold at Lamplighter back in the day, and the artist whose hands crafted the pottery for sale at Surrounding Counties — is Archibald’s mother, Joan Lewis.
The freshly refocused project, a mere 2 miles from the former cafe, is built on a foundation of business and personal connections. Explaining the financial strategy of not having any financial stake in Surrounding Counties to ensure its success, Archibald says, “In order to give the new company its opportunity to really achieve, … I own zero equity of the new company.
“That was my creative solution that ensures that my family is getting to go forward and benefit and be a part of it,” he adds. “My goodwill gets me very far in the community, but it doesn’t get me very far [at] the bank. The customers and employees believed in it so much that they were willing to put their name on a lease and give it the opportunity.”
Dunn says, “We’re ready to go and excited for this opportunity and a new location.”
The 500-square-foot reintroduced shop will operate as a quick-service, takeout-out only venture. The cafe is located at the end of an open-air corridor with plenty of parking out back and outdoor seating. Archibald says the food menu will be “about 85% the same” with four core kolaches (European filled pastries) always available, in addition to rotating weekly specials. To offer a sneak peek, Surrounding Counties has secured a February breakfast residency at Brave Captain, opened last month by the crew behind Cobra Cabana and Hot for Pizza.
For customers used to spotting Archibald (and his flashy custom T-shirts emblazoned with pizza and tacos) behind the counter, he is still in the picture. “When you walk into Surrounding Counties 2.0 on day one, you’ll see me and Vance working in there,” he says. “And then if you could pull up the hood, you would see Jeff running the business operations from [a] satellite [location]. My dream was to be able to kind of get out of the way of the company while still being its dynamo engine.”
He says the vision is to return to a full-service coffee house that can be a third space for people to come together, but for now, the goal is honing this forthcoming edition of the business.
“We’re already scanning the area around Richmond for other similar postage stamp-size places where we can insert ourselves into neighborhoods and communities,” Archibald says. “Once we’ve proven the concept and we’ve hit our initial benchmark for this first one, that should be the green light to play and explore similar spaces.”
Surrounding Counties will be open daily from 7 a.m. to 2 p.m.