Running a small business is no joke.

Case in point, when Easy Luck Coffee & Bodega, which happened to be this year’s Orlando Sentinel Foodie Awards Critic’s Pick for Best Coffee, had its lease unexpectedly terminated after an eight-year run at 2425 E. South St. in Orlando’s Milk District.

It prompted a grueling search for a new place to land, co-owner Tanner Jones tells me.

“We couldn’t really find anything, and then the people at Phat Ash Bakes reached out to tell us they had a space available in their storefront, which we snatched up greedily and hungrily.”

The new space in the Milk Stacks (221 S. Bumby Ave. in Orlando), however, is a pivot from the chill camp-out location on South Street, where relaxed service was the norm and folks mostly lingered, enjoying coffee and perhaps a bite with friends, family — or just laptop, phone or book.

Easy Luck is about to become a grab-and-go.

Best Coffee: 2026 Orlando Sentinel Foodie Awards

“Building things out costs money,” Jones says plainly. “We need that to get things up and going for the pick-up window. The new model is going to force us to be a little more lean, a little faster, while providing the same quality and so we need to put things in place for that.”

That means commissary space for their daily-made breakfast sandwiches (sausage, egg and cheese; egg and cheese; vegan version) and means to heat and store them.

Here’s where the jokes come in, with two comedy shows on Aug. 13 at SAK Comedy Lab (55 W. Church St. in Orlando).

All proceeds from the show (7 and 9 p.m.; tickets are $20) will benefit the Easy Luck transition.

It’s an improv show, Jones says, evolved from some fun these old friends would have during the COVID-19 pandemic while social distancing.

“We’d get on Zoom and do these bracket shows by ourselves, ranking things like bands or theme parks and ultimately deciding which was best,” he says.

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On Aug. 13, comedy duo The Bracket Brothers, Sean and Pat Rice, will do the same thing, but with food.

“It’s March Madness-style, so there will be a lot of categories. One show will be themed for bread, the other for drinks — the two things we do — until the performers and the audience determine the winner.”

Also on hand, U.S. Rep. Maxwell Frost will be among the “expert guests” debating these all-important issues.

“Good people doing good things for the right reasons always makes a community stronger,” says Easy Luck’s future neighbor, Israel Erazo of Phat Ash Bakes.

Tickets are available on the SAK Comedy Lab website at sakcomedylab.com/shows/6382.

Find me on Facebook, TikTok, Twitter or Instagram @amydroo or on the OSFoodie Instagram account @orlando.foodie. Email: amthompson@orlandosentinel.com, For more foodie fun, join the Let’s Eat, Orlando Facebook group.