Tower cafe - Our Story

The Tower Cafe Is Built On Family

Ross and Tia Bodenheimer and their three daughters, Lillian, Claire, and Grace started this cafe idea about 3 years ago during a conversation on a shopping trip. Our daughter Lillian, noticed that a building was vacant in the area and asked if we could start a bagel shop. We all liked the idea but, it was always left as just that, an idea.

Sometimes time passes without you knowing and things take a long time to fall into place. In March of 2025 Ross' career went through a bit of a change and his employer moved offices into the Dudley Tower located in downtown Wausau, WI. Ironically, there was a beautiful cafe space without an operator and a demand within the current tenants to have something there. Long story short, ideas turned into action and the Tower Cafe was born. We created our motto, "Tower Cafe, Where You Start Your Day" and the rest is history.

The cafe stresses quality and fresh ingredients. Our food is not complex but, we make it fresh for you at the time of order and take great pride in providing an affordable, quality experience.

Ross and Tia continued their focus on quality when hiring began. We source and hire the best in the business to ensure your service experience is top notch. As owners, we miss the quality customer service experience of yester-year. We needed to bring that back and decided to make sure that our staff is well trained to provide that experience so many people crave.

Tower Cafe provides craft barista drinks made from scratch. No pushing a button on an automatic machine here. We grind the espresso to order and froth the milk right in front of the customer as we build their beverage of choice. We stress quality and use the freshest ingredients we can find.

The dream of a bagel shop was born in July 2025 when we opened our doors. We source our bagels direct from New York and provide the best bagel in town. If you don't believe us, give them a try yourself. These bagels scream freshness not just because we want them to but, because they are flown in without any preservatives directly from the bakery.

So stop in and say hello. We love conversation and talking about our new menu offerings, fresh New York bagels, and our all fruit smoothies. Getting to know our customers is important to us so, let us be part of your day.