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two scrambled eggs, cheddar cheese, pesto, tomato and onion, all put together on a biscuit made in house, served with potatoes, salad or fruit.

  What makes this great is how something so simple as a biscuit with eggs on it, (which one could find at whatever breakfast-serving fast food restaurant or diner they might frequent in their morning rush) is taken and given a more gourmet touch to it. It is refreshing to have such care taken into a meal that is frequently neglected or completely skipped.

  The atmosphere could be equated to that of your own living room or dining room with a large open space filled with wooden tables and couches. According to the director of the Camp House, Matt Busby, this is kind of atmosphere is completely intentional. Upon talking to him, one quickly will realize that there is far more to the Camp House than just food and drink, and when discussing the Camp House, while the food and drink are something to behold, I couldn’t write about the restaurant without addressing the other goings-on in the space.

   To backtrack, Busby’s position is different from that of a restaurant general manager. As the director of the Camp House, he is responsible for coordinating events and promoting culture in Chattanooga. This position is directly connected to The Mission Chattanooga, the Christian church that meets there. Also, because of this connection between busy and church, a lot of the ideas and motivation behind what Busby and the rest of the Camp House staff do are directly correlated to their religion.

  On Busby’s online profile it states that he is passionate about learning about the threshold between faith and culture. When learning about the goals of the Camp House staff outside of simply serving food, the idea of culture is impossible to ignore. Touching on the religious aspect of the Camp House, Busby believes in returning to the “living room atmosphere”.  Busby pointed out that, while first and foremost, the Camp House is a coffee shop and a restaurant, they do not function as a typical restaurant. “It’s not about turning over tables” he states.

  One of his visions for the space is that it will be a space for conversation. Students often study there. People in the business sector meet there. Politicians and people of prominence meet there as well. He noted a theoretical example of one day, a conservative politician will have a meeting at a table in the restaurant, and then a couple hours later a liberal activist group will hold a meeting at the very same table. He describes the building as a “gathering space”.

The goal of being a gathering space and a place for conversation lead Busby to begin recording a weekly podcast to discuss issues and culture around Chattanooga. He explained that the idea of the podcast was to take the different kind of conversations going on within the walls of the Camp House and expose them to the broader population of Chattanooga. Since its recent inception, the podcast has featured prominent Chattanoogans such as Stephanie Hays of the Lamp Post investment group, Abby Garrison, the executive director of Causeway in Chattanooga, and Chattanooga Police Chief Fred Fletcher.

            Lastly, another interesting aspect of the Camp House is how Busby addressed competition. He discussed how, in business, competition is something bred into how you think. However, because of the connection to the church, non-profit organization ownership, and the focus on culture, the Camp House is not competitive the way that other businesses might be.

  One goal he addressed was being able to lift up the MLK neighborhood of Chattanooga. He would prefer to see the boulevard flourish than to have the Camp House pull all business from the area. He used the phrase “a rising tide raises all boats,” to explain the desire to make the MLK area a walkable destination so that consumers from the downtown area will want to frequent other businesses in the area, and not just the Camp House.