The Favored Farmhouse
Derek and Daphne Martinez in front of their business, The Favored Farmhouse, which serves coffee drinks, mixed soda drinks, vintage furniture and clothing, and homemade goods like candles and soap.
CHARLES H. FEATHERSTONE/COLUMBIA BASIN HERALD
A wooden crate full of old cookbooks, complete with bookmarks and notes left over from the original owners, for sale at The Favored Farmhouse.
Giant Scrabble letters spell out “Hello” in a display in one of the upper floor rooms at The Favored Farmhouse.
The outline of Moses Lake, a knick-knack on display at the shop. The owners carry a variety of items created by local crafters alongside their own items - and, of course, coffee and baked goods.
Daphne Martinez, co-owner of The Favored Farmhouse with her husband, Derek, in Moses Lake.
Derek Martinez is co-owner of The Favored Farmhouse in Moses Lake - the dream of his wife Daphne, whom he met while he was in school at the age of 14.
Candles and knick-knacks for sale at The Favored Farmhouse. The boutique offers a wide variety of items for customers to enjoy, including books to read while drinking a cup of coffee and eating baked goods at the boutique’s coffee shop, a place Daphne and Derek Martinez hope feels like home to their patrons.
MOSES LAKE — Daphne Martinez has a rather odd confession to make for a coffee shop owner.
“So, I’m not a coffee drinker,” Martinez said as she sat with her husband Derek in front of the Favored Farmhouse’s espresso machine. “I grew up on Folgers. My mom, my grandparents, all drank Folgers drip coffee.”
“So, I like black coffee with sugar. I’m not a fancy coffee drinker,” she added.
While you can get fancy coffee drinks at The Favored Farmhouse, the menu at the coffee bar betrays another of Daphne’s loves — mixed non-alcoholic drinks made with soda pop. From the Summer Kiss (Sprite, raspberry puree, pineapple and cream) to the Gone Wild (Coke or Diet Coke, fresh lime, coconut, cream), the menu is full of soda drinks Daphne Martinez created and named herself.
“I am obsessed with Coca-Cola, and Cherry Cokes have been my thing forever. And my boys, they love to add vanilla to their Dr. Pepper. And so it was kind of let’s play with the idea,” she said.
A trip to Texas a few years ago and the discovery of a shop that sold flavored soda — a big thing in the South — finally prompted the Martinezes to launch the soda bar.
However, Daphne and Derek didn’t start The Favored Farmhouse in a century-old building — likely one of the few remaining from the town’s settlement more than 100 years ago — at 415 S. Alder St. to sell coffee or soda drinks. They started it because Daphne wanted a place to expand her home business of buying and refurbishing old furniture.
“We met when we were 14, in the hallway of Frontier Middle School,” said Derek, now 41. “We started dating soon after, and we’ve been together ever since.”
The Martinezes had their first child when they were both 16 — not something Derek said he’d recommend anyone else do.
“But it’s been a blessing to us, though. Four boys to date,” he said.
Daphne said to be a stay-at-home mom, she ran a daycare and flipped furniture on the side, working in the family garage.
“I would find old vintage pieces, refurbish them, paint them, and sell them on Buy, Sell, Trade or wherever. I did that for nine years out of my garage,” she said. “I always wanted a shop. When I walked into this, it was a tanning salon with a couple of attic shops upstairs, and I was like, ‘I need this house.’”
That was four years ago. Now, The Favored Farmhouse is something of a small business incubator of its own, selling things like essential oils, soap, candles, jewelry and old clothes made or refurbished by other part-time business people looking for a way to market their goods.
“Her whole vision for the retail was to do what she loved doing but also to give the opportunity to other local moms that had visions of having their own business or selling some type of product to help support their family,” Derek said.
Derek said they have been expanding their business slowly — they will be celebrating the one-year anniversary of opening the coffee shop and soda bar with a Hawaiian-themed luau on Sept. 10, and they have applied to the city for the permits to install a drive-through coffee window, something Derek told city council members at a recent meeting a lot of customers have asked for.
“We actually bought a food truck too, because we want to venture out into serving some kind of food,” Daphne said.
Currently, The Favored Farmhouse serves baked goods from The Cow Path Bakery in Othello.
Each room in the old house is dedicated to something a little different, though the same sense of decor — a mix of old and new — is everywhere.
“I feel that the old stuff has more character. I find it more unique. I prefer old over new. But then, I love my candles and I love shoes and things like that. So it’s a little eclectic,” Daphne said.
Whatever room you find yourself in, however, there are always books.
“We have books everywhere. Books everywhere. Because you can’t really put a price on books, you know, they don’t go out of date. They just get better,” she said. “I love to see people sit in the shop and read and have their coffee and take a break. Just slow down.”
Charles H. Featherstone can be reached at cfeatherstone@columbiabasinherald.com. See more of Charles’s work at www.columbiabasinherald.com.
The Favored Farmhouse
415 S. Adler St.,
Moses Lake
509-771-0685
Coffee shop hours:
Mon.-Fri.: 8:30 a.m. - 5 p.m.
Sat.: 8:30 a.m. - 5 p.m.
Other departments: 12-6 p.m.
Closed Sundays
