Edmonton’s Remedy cafe chain close to new ownership

The customer asked for a shot of Baileys in his coffee.

Sohail “Zee” Zaidi didn’t hear the request correctly, and placed a bay leaf in the customer’s cup.

It sounds like the beginnings of a deadpan joke from the late, great Norm Macdonald, but it’s a true story. It was 25 years ago, and Zaidi had just purchased the Remedy coffee shop on 109 Street, near the University of Alberta Campus. But he didn’t know much about the business, or serving coffee in general. Before coming to Edmonton, Zaidi had hopped the globe in search of his fortune. From his native Pakistan he travelled to Thailand, Singapore, Poland, Germany and then the United States. He drove a cab in New York City for more than a decade. But then he met a woman from Edmonton, fell in love, and the globetrotter made his final, permanent move.

The Remedy, across 109 Street from the Garneau Cinema, was a small, quaint spot. A place where University of Alberta students did their homework and Old Strathcona regulars would gather for quiet drinks. He added a number of South Asian touches to the menu, and leaned into the gluten-free movement. Vegan offerings became more than an afterthought. Remedy became a place where you could grab coffee, chai, a muffin or a tandoori chicken.

Then, in 2014, Remedy

added 5,000 square feet of space

. The Movie Studio closed down, a victim of society’s move to streaming. The place where you went to find cool, indie movies to rent became obsolete thanks to Netflix. Remedy expanded into the space that was once inhabited by racks of movies. And that expansion begat another, more aggressive move.

Zaidi built Remedy to a chain with 11 shops throughout the Edmonton area. In 2019, then-prime minister Justin Trudeau visited the Whyte Avenue spot.

But Zaidi has recently closed locations on Jasper Avenue and in Sherwood Park. “Lack of foot traffic,” he said. People just haven’t come back to work, the sidewalks aren’t as busy since the COVID outbreak. He said he also notices a reduction in foot traffic at the University of Alberta, near his flagship location. More and more students are taking classes remotely, there are fewer foreign students coming into the store. He said it was really noticeable at Remedy’s former location in the Savona Centre, where he said the number of passersby was noticeably reduced after COVID restrictions were lifted.

Last year, Zaidi put the chain up for sale — a $7.6-million price tag was placed on Remedy.

Now, he’s close to a sale. The number of locations is down to eight, and there are two local buyers’ groups in the running. Zaidi is currently undergoing the process of vetting each of them. And, no matter which buyer is successful, Zaidi will stay on at least for another couple of years, to help transition the new owners into the business.

“There is no retirement for me,” said Zaidi, as he sat in a plush armchair in the 109 Street location. “Neither of the buyers have a lot of experience in the restaurant business.”

But both potential buyers have a more important ingredient than experience pouring coffee and chai. They are local and are passionate about Remedy. Zaidi said the reason it took more than a year to put a sale together was because he wanted to ensure that Remedy would have a legacy, and have local owners that saw it as a passion, not as simply an investment.

Expansion to Calgary, B.C.

“We had a lot of interest,” he said. “But the thing was that I wanted was to sell to someone local. I didn’t want to sell to someone in Quebec or B.C., who didn’t know what Remedy is.

“I want to pass it on to people who are going to take it to a higher level.”

Zaidi opened up the email app on his phone, and went through dozens of archived requests for franchising information. He said there are more than 120, from Calgary, British Columbia and Saskatchewan. No matter which group buys the chain, there’s a commitment to start expanding Remedy outside of the Edmonton metro area. Calgary is a prime target, as is the desire to open locations in B.C.

This has been a longstanding goal for Zaidi. When the flagship Remedy location expanded in 2014, he talked about branching out into Calgary and Tofino, B.C. Eleven years later, that hasn’t happened yet, but the plan hasn’t been dashed, either.

But running a coffee and fast-service-food business comes with challenges. If you notice the effects of inflation when you roll a cart through the supermarket aisles, imagine the restaurateur, who has to deal with rising prices on everything from cooking oil to bathroom soap.

“You can’t keep raising the prices on the customers.” he said.

But the costs to run the business are consistently putting pressure on the bottom line. Before COVID, a case of chickpeas, vital to his kitchens, cost $21 each. Now, they’re $33 to $34. To-go cups used to cost about 11 cents each. Now, they’re more than 20 cents each. Zaidi said tariffs between China and the United States are sideswiping Canadian businesses, as goods shipped between those countries before they make their way into Canada are going up in price.

Ups and downs of coffee prices

As well, following the global price of coffee is a roller-coaster ride. Currently, coffee is trading globally at more than US$4 per pound. In the summer, it was selling for less than $3 per pound. In February, it was over $4.30 a pound. Following the coffee trade is a lesson in supply-and-demand economics. When supply dwindles, costs go up. And coffee is subject to good and bad crop years. Economic forecasters are predicting that coffee prices should lower in the coming months, as a boom Brazilian bean harvest is expected. But all it takes is one bad year in Colombia, Brazil or Vietnam to send prices shooting back up. If coffee-shop owners wanted to be exact about their margins, the price of your cup would change on a daily basis. Coffee shops would have “market price” on their sales boards, just like fancy restaurants do with lobster.

But despite the pressures, some industry stats offer hope to those in the cafe business.

Milena Stanoeva, spokesperson for Restaurants Canada, said the ending of work-from-home policies at many Canadian offices is boosting the lunch and breakfast market. Full-service breakfast is currently the fastest-growing niche in the Canadian restaurant business.

And, while Edmonton lags a little behind the national average when it comes to coffee-shop loyalty, the numbers are not bad. Still, Starbucks

closed four Edmonton locations

in late September, part of a global restructuring for the Seattle-based coffee giant after two years of zero growth.

“For Edmonton specifically, in October 2025, 57 per cent of consumers went for coffee or a snack at least once, compared to 60 per cent nationally, and 21 per cent went once a week or more, versus 24 per cent nationally,” Stanoeva wrote in an email.

While Zaidi said a lack of foot traffic spurred him to shut down the Sherwood Park operation, the spot at Savona Centre, across from the library, still has the chairs, tables and fixtures inside. The locks were changed by the landlord. A sign on the front entrance, posted by Braden Equities, states “default notice in effect.”

When contacted by Postmedia, Braden Equities stated it could not comment any further on Remedy’s former Sherwood Park site.

Zaidi said he and the landlord have a good relationship, but did not agree on the rental rate. He said the rate didn’t reflect the lack of foot traffic, and lamented that landlords in many of his locations have not offered incentives, despite the knowledge that inflation is hurting the bottom lines of restaurateurs.

Zaidi said he and the Savona Centre landlord have had discussions and he will be able to remove the fixtures.

A search of the realtor.ca site shows one other tea/coffee business up for sale: The Q-Topia bubble tea spot on Parsons Road is listed for $279,900, and has been on the market for more than three months.

Related

• Edmonton’s Remedy Cafes for sale as owner set to retire
• London calling: British chai chain moves into crowded Edmonton fast-food marketplace

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