Mt. Lebanon’s coffee and records store a chic local destination
Needle and Bean offers a relaxing space in which to connect with friends, work from home or create art while music - available for purchase in the vinyl section - wafts softly from the speakers.
Mike Butala loves talking music with Needle and Bean guests. "I get goosebumps, like, twice a day talking to people just about music. That's not hyperbole. It's a good feeling when you can connect with people," he said.
Mike Butala grew up in Hermitage, graduated from Penn State Behrand and served as an engineer out west and in the midwest before returning with his wife Irene to southwestern Pennsylvania, where in August he opened Needle and Bean. The coffee and record shop sits along Castle Shannon Boulevard in Mt. Lebanon.
Mike Butala grew up in Hermitage, graduated from Penn State Behrand and served as an engineer out west and in the midwest before returning with his wife Irene to southwestern Pennsylvania, where in August he opened Needle and Bean. The coffee and record shop sits along Castle Shannon Boulevard in Mt. Lebanon.
Along with vinyl, Needle and Bean offers record players and accessories, a variety of notebooks, a small selection of home decor, and store and indie label apparel and drinkware.
Needle and Bean is a clean, chic atmosphere with a few whimsical decorations, including three portraits, of owner Mike Butula, his wife Irene and their dog, all holding vinyl over their faces (the dog's image was photoshopped, Butula laughed).
"We make our drinks strong," said Mike Butula, who takes pride in crafting quality coffee drinks at Needle and Bean. Currently, Butula serves as the shop's owner-manager-barista, while his mom runs the cash register.
Needle and Bean is down the hill from Mt. Lebanon's main drag and within walking distance of several neighborhoods, making it easily accessible to the community. Owner Mike Butula welcomes folks to work from home inside the minimalist storefront, to meet friends for coffee, pastries and conversation after work, to discover new music in the shop's vinyl section, and to visit often.
"When you put a record on, you're committing to at least 20 minutes of one side of an album, and you don't skip around. If the record's lucky, you flip it over, you play the other side. It's all about the process. You go through your collection. You physically pick out the album. You drop the needle, and then you're almost committed to listening to it versus just putting it on and then working on something. The music has more of a center stage. For me, coffee's no different," said Mike Butala. "A lot of people that come in share that same perspective."
Needle and Bean sells records and coffee, but the Mt. Lebanon shop is more than just a retail store: it's a place owner Mike Butula hopes the community will frequent to work, to tap into their creative sides, to meet friends and family members for good conversations, to enjoy great coffee and to discover new music.
Needle and Bean markets itself as “coffee and records,” but really, it’s a destination: a sleek space that smells like java, sounds like a movie soundtrack and feels like a place in which one could start an ink drawing, finish a novella or write a song.
”I wanted something for the community,” said Mike Butala, who opened Needle and Bean along Castle Shannon Boulevard in August. “We like people to drive here and visit from distances, but the big drive is the community that’s around us. It’s something local for everybody to enjoy.”
Butala grew up in Hermitage and, after graduating with a degree in engineering from Penn State Behrend, moved west. A love for music began with a CD collection in his youth, and an affinity for coffee started over cups with high school friends at the local Eat ‘n Park; both passions were cultivated in California.
”Around 2004, I got a turntable. I lived in San Diego at the time – not the good part – but the good part of that is that there are a lot of consignment stores. My roommate and I, every weekend we, would go to four different consignment shops. We would just get great albums for a dollar. You could really start to explore B sides and deeper cuts from things that you didn’t listen to that much,” Butala said. “During the work week, I would still make Folgers. Then we would just get either Pete’s or Starbucks, my roommate and I, and that would be our treat for the weekend.”
When Butala moved to Chicago, Reckless Records became his go-to spot for all things music, but he had a hard time finding coffee that suited his tastebuds. Finally, he discovered Just Coffee Cooperative in Madison, Wisconsin.
Needle and Bean proudly serves (and sells bags of) Just Coffee. When Butala first conceptualized the coffee and record store, his focus was mainly music.
”I wanted to have a record store that had just drip coffee. I thought that was a great idea because I would charge like a buck for a cup of coffee, and you can just have it while you’re looking at records,” Butala said.
But Butala’s wife Irene said the space needed more than just drip coffee. It needed an espresso machine.
”It started snowballing and getting to be a completely different business idea,” Butala laughed. “That’s kind of how we ended up with what you see here.”
Needle and Bean offers a full menu of drinks coffee shop-goers have come to expect, including flavored lattes crafted with house-made syrup, iced coffee and a selection of teas, pastries and chocolate (yes, there’s drip coffee on the menu, too, a nod to Butala’s original vision).
Folks are invited to grab their beverage and a seat at the street-facing bar or a sleek white table beneath the gold geometric chandelier or browse the more than 1,000 records for sale in the shop’s vinyl section.
”Most of what we focus on is independent labels,” said Butala, who works directly with labels like Dischord Records, Polyvinyl, Sub Pop Records (who produce The Shins and Father John Misty) and Matador Records (who put out boygenius’s EP). “We don’t have any Taylor Swift here. David Bowie’s music is good, unequivocally; you have to have David Bowie. Led Zeppelin, a lot of classic rock, you just can’t avoid. I want to have that as an option because it’s great music, but I’m not necessarily driven to compete against places that carry a lot of pop music.”
Butala said he caters to a niche audience, which sets Needle and Bean apart from other local record stores, all of which have their own flavor and regulars. For Butala, music is personal, and he aims to support independent labels and artists so that they can continue putting out great — though not always mainstream or chart-topping — work.
”The exploitation of some of the artists is kind of sad. It’s just about trying to be good to the artists and trying to keep things as personal as possible,” Butala said.
Being good — to artists, to the community — is what led Butala to open Needle and Bean in the first place. A decades-long engineer who worked on a major project during the COVID-19 pandemic, Butala burned out of the corporate world.
”I wanted to retire. This is all during COVID, when everyone kind of was reevaluating their lives. I was like, well, I can’t retire,” he laughed. “Why not do something I’m more passionate about? Is there something I can do that I wouldn’t mind doing until I can retire?”
At the height of the pandemic, Butala’s personal record collection contained over 2,000 titles. He launched Needle and Bean on social media in 2021 and started selling vinyl online. It took a while to find the perfect space for a brick-and-mortar, but eventually, Butala settled on the current location, which is a quick walk from his home.
”Originally, I wanted to be on Washington because of foot traffic. This place popped up, and I was not super enthusiastic. I had the blinders on. I wanted to be somewhere with more commerce. When I came in here, I saw it. I saw the potential,” he said.
Renovations took longer than expected due to resource and labor scarcity. Butala and Irene wound up doing much of the aesthetic work, including installing the eye-catching black-and-white backsplash behind the coffee bar and constructing the shelving that holds all the records.
”Being patient with that was tough,” Butala said.
The storefront officially opened in August, and while he’s already got a few regulars, Butala is eager to welcome first-time visitors into the clean, chic space and help them discover all that Needle and Bean has to offer.
”We’re doing better and better every day. What I’m most proud about this business is it’s different,” he said. “I want to be accessible as much as possible, to give people what they want all the time. I would love to be open all the time. Always have every single album in the history of music. It sounds grandiose. But you have to stay grounded. I want everyone to feel like they can count on us. I want to be a beacon.”
For store hours and more, visit needle-bean.webflow.io/ or follow Needle and Bean on Instagram at instagram.com/needleandbeancoffeeandrecords/.