Two Denver-area real estate agents have spent the last few years quietly building a small hospitality district out of a single stretch of Lakewood real estate, opening a coffee shop, a full-service Mediterranean restaurant and bar, and a Pilates studio, all funded without outside investors. Stacie Staub, 51, and Madie Linder, 39, run the operations alongside their brokerage, West + Main Homes, on Youngfield Street in the Applewood neighborhood.
According to The Denver Post, Staub and Linder opened West + Main Homes in 2017 after meeting while working at a previous brokerage. The company now generates more than $1 billion in annual sales volume, and Staub has said that real estate profits finance the partners' other businesses, according to the same report.
Real estate is still what pays the bills. West + Main was ranked No. 1 among midsize companies in Colorado on The Denver Post's Top Workplaces list in 2024, after placing second and third in prior years, and by late 2023 the network had grown to roughly 500 agents and closed more than $1.4 billion across over 2,500 transactions, per Mile High CRE. That same year, Canadian developer Amacon selected the brokerage to manage sales for a 461-unit, two-tower condo project at 18th and Glenarm Streets in downtown Denver, billed as the city's largest condo development since 2009.
From Storefront Office to Neighborhood Hangout
The founders' storefront strategy predates their restaurant launch. West + Main's real estate offices already function as walk-in spaces for clients, and the company opened an office in Oklahoma City's Paseo Arts District in 2023, built with an open coffee shop aesthetic meant to host community events, according to the brokerage's own account. Staub said the partners wanted every vacant storefront on their stretch of Youngfield Street, and they later moved a West Way lending branch to a nearby standalone building to make room.
Staub told the Denver Post the neighborhood was missing a Mediterranean restaurant, which helped spur the opening of Blue Nest Bar & Bistro in July 2026 as a full-service restaurant and bar. Linder said the partners chose to open a full restaurant rather than simply expand the coffee shop, even though restaurants initially frightened her. Staub, who also teaches Pilates classes and works shifts at Blue Nest as a server, said the pair loves creating what she calls third spaces for the community.
Coffee Shop and Pilates Studio Already Profitable
Staub and Linder opened Blue Nest Coffee in 2022, and the shop reached profitability in its second year of operation, according to the Denver Post. The partners' Pilates studios followed the same trajectory, turning a profit in their second year as well, and the founders anticipate the new restaurant will hit profitability on a similar timeline. Blue Nest Coffee and Bistro's storefront sits at 2050 Youngfield Street, serving regional items like Bonfire Burritos and sourdough focaccia sandwiches alongside daily coffee service, according to Blue Nest Coffee.
Linder said operating restaurants provides jobs and creates a third place for the community, echoing Staub's framing of the businesses as neighborhood gathering spots rather than pure side ventures. Staub said she wishes the partners owned their building outright. Both are Colorado natives: Staub grew up in Arvada and attended Pomona High School before earning a master's degree from the University of Colorado Denver, while Linder is from Gunnison and graduated from the University of Colorado Boulder.
A Cooling Housing Market in the Background
The diversification comes as Denver's housing market has cooled in stretches. The 11-county metro area recorded just 1,919 home sales in January 2026, one of the lowest single-month totals since 2011, according to data from Anthony Rael. More recently, the Denver Metro Association of Realtors reported that the market entering late summer 2026 featured expanded inventory and property-specific negotiation, with single-family detached homes dominating luxury sales above $1 million.
West + Main has kept expanding even through that sideways market. In October 2025, NextHome Front Range merged into the brokerage as the Front Range Collective team, adding 28 agents who had generated more than $100 million in sales over the prior year and extending West + Main's reach into Fort Collins and Colorado Springs. The company also partnered with contractor Curbio in June 2025 to launch Refresh by West, a program offering home sellers fixed-price, pay-at-closing repairs and staging. Beyond Colorado, the brokerage now operates in Oklahoma, Oregon, North Carolina and Minnesota.
Whether real estate profits will keep subsidizing the hospitality side until the restaurant matures on its own, and how much daily attention two real estate entrepreneurs can spread across a coffee shop, a restaurant and a Pilates studio, remain open questions the founders have not fully addressed publicly. For now, the model has held together one Lakewood storefront at a time.
