A Table for Everyone: How Global Café’s Sabine Langer is Building Community Through Business

By ICIC | July 13, 2026

Walk into Global Café in Memphis and you’ll notice something unusual.

At the center of the dining room sits a large community table. On any given day, strangers sit together, share stories, and discover foods from places they may never have visited.

For founder Sabine Langer, that table represents everything she hoped to build.

As an immigrant herself, she understood what it feels like to search for belonging in a new place. She also knew that many refugees and immigrants arrive with incredible talents but limited opportunities.

So she created one.

“I wanted to find a way to help my fellow immigrants.”
– Sabine Langer, Founder, Owner, and CEO, Global Café

The result was Global Café, a restaurant that employs immigrant and refugee chefs and celebrates the rich culinary traditions they bring with them.

Today, the business serves dishes from countries across the globe while creating economic opportunity and community connection in Memphis. This year, those efforts are being recognized with the 2025 Dorothy A. Terrell Community Impact Award. 

Presented through the IC100 Awards, which recognize the fastest-growing businesses in under-resourced communities across the United States, the Dorothy A. Terrell Community Impact Award honors the company that demonstrates exceptional community impact through quality job creation and civic engagement.

Building a Business Around People

Global Café operates differently than most restaurants. The company is a for-profit business, but its success is measured by more than sales and growth. Through a profit-sharing system, earnings are reinvested in employees and their well-being. 

Team members have received free English lessons, access to healthcare resources, YMCA memberships, and other support designed to help them build stable lives.

“We constantly have conversations about, ‘What do you, employee, need from us to support you in your life?’” Sabine says. 

Those conversations have led to extraordinary milestones. One employee paid off her home. Another bought her first car. Another became a first-time homeowner.

“Seeing direct impact in our little community is what drives me every day,” Sabine says. 

The restaurant’s impact stretches far beyond its kitchen.

During ice storms and community emergencies, Global Café’s chefs arrive before sunrise to prepare hundreds of meals for shelters and organizations serving people experiencing homelessness. The business also supports local families through scholarships, school supplies, and free meals.

For Sabine, community impact isn’t a program or an initiative. It’s simply the way business should work.

A Gathering Place in Memphis

Global Café sits inside Memphis’ Crosstown Concourse, a former Sears distribution center that has been reimagined as a community hub filled with housing, healthcare, arts, education, and local businesses. The setting feels fitting.

The restaurant itself is a gathering place where strangers often become friends. The menu changes regularly and reflects the many countries represented by the staff, including Bhutan, Burundi, Mexico, Syria, Somalia, Jamaica, Venezuela, and many others.

As one supporter of the café put it, “It feels like home.” That sense of belonging is exactly what Sabine hoped to create.

Growing With Purpose

As Global Café expanded, Sabine knew she needed to think beyond the day-to-day demands of running a restaurant.

She participated in the FedEx sponsored Memphis cohort of the ICCC program, ICIC’s executive education program for small businesses focused on capital readiness and capacity building. Through comprehensive executive education, one-on-one coaching, and connections to capital providers, the program helps entrepreneurs build stronger, more sustainable companies.

“The ICCC program was incredibly helpful and helped me understand where the company is and where we should be and what we should think about in the long term.”
– Sabine Langer

The experience helped strengthen the business while preserving the mission at its core. Since completing the program, Global Café has earned a spot on the IC100 Awards list for three consecutive years, demonstrating that businesses centered on community impact can also achieve remarkable growth.

For entrepreneurs, it offers an important reminder: purpose and profitability do not have to compete with one another.

A Table With Room for Everyone

ICIC’s Year of Changemakers celebrates business owners who create opportunity, strengthen communities, and show that business can be a force for good.

Sabine Langer has done all three. She built a restaurant that feels like home for employees, customers, and an entire community. She showed that lasting economic prosperity begins with investing in people.

Her story invites every entrepreneur to ask a simple but powerful question: If your business succeeds, who else succeeds with it?

If you’re ready to grow your company and deepen your impact, learn more about the ICCC program and discover how executive education, coaching, and strategic connections can help you build a stronger business, create new opportunities, and strengthen your community.

About the IC100 Awards

Since 1999, ICIC has identified and honored some of fastest-growing businesses located in under-resourced communities through the prestigious IC100 Awards. Throughout this period, ICIC has had the privilege of learning about and highlighting more than 1,000 remarkable business leaders and companies from across the United States. These firms have proven to be catalysts for job growth and promoters of a thriving, inclusive economy, even amidst challenging circumstances. Furthermore, they have actively contributed to the enhancement of their communities by generously donating their time and resources to local organizations and charitable causes.

About ICCC

Inner City Capital Connections (ICCC) is a national business accelerator designed for growth-stage entrepreneurs ready to strengthen their companies and scale to the next level. ICCC combines executive education, peer learning, coaching, and capital readiness support to help business owners build stronger operations, make smarter decisions, and unlock new opportunities. Participation is fully funded for qualifying businesses, thanks to the generosity of ICIC’s national network of funding partners.

To learn more and apply, visit icic.org/iccc.