After working with Brunei Darussalam’s civil service for some 30 years, Shaikh Fadilah Shaikh Ahmad decided to embark on a small business. He began his café adventure focusing on delicious bakes and specialty coffee brewing.
Shaikh Fadilah has never attended any baking class or floral decoration. He was inspired by his late mother, Sharifah Hajah Maimunah binti Syed Mohamad, who used to teach domestic science for wives of senior officers for over 10 years (1973-1983). Since at a young age, Shaikh Fadilah was exposed to his mother’s cooking and baking. During fasting months, together with other siblings, afternoons were spent helping the mother baked cakes and cookies for Hari Raya festivities.
In addition, she hosted ‘Mari Memasak’ cooking show on Radio Television Brunei for over a decade, with the programme gaining regional recognition in Singapore and Malaysian Television. Although Shaikh Fadilah never appeared on television with his mother, (while waiting for his O level results), he played a big role behind the scenes, in typing recipes, joining his mother in food tasting and driving her to RTB for television recordings. All these experiences provided an exposure towards food preparation for the Founder.
In 1974, Sharifah Maimunah started her own food business catering: Serikandi based in Kuala Belait.
Sharifah Maimunah has two recipe books published under Dewan Bahasa dan Pustaka, namely: Selera Serikandi 1 and 2.
Shaikh Fadilah was first inspired to pick up Coffee Barista skills while pursuing a Master's Degree in International Affairs at the Australian National University in Canberra in 2007-2008. After finishing his exams, he decided to travel to Sydney to check out the local coffee scene. He came across Sydney Coffee School at Pitts Street. The Coffee School piqued his interest and he decided to attend a two-day course there, which would open up his world of coffee appreciation. He acquired an understanding of the world quality coffee brewing standards that Australia is very proud of. From the course, he understood the importance of using espresso machines, how to texture milk effectively, grinder operation, cleaning and care requirements for a coffee machine.
Another inspiration the Founder picked up from Australia was the Australian baking rustic styles, using fresh ingredients, fruits, chocolate and nuts, to flavour bakes.
Coming back to Brunei Darussalam after the course, it didn’t stir his interest just yet to open a coffee business. Years of travelling and living abroad made him to become more interested in deepening the art of coffee appreciation and knowledge. Holiday times were spent visiting and meeting café owners, roasters, baristas from around the Southeast Asia region, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, UK. Shaikh Fadilah has decided to utilize Specialty Coffee Association (SCA) as his benchmark for coffee brewing. In early 2020, Shaikh Fadilah took SCA intermediate courses on coffee brewing and espresso from DCA in Seri Kembangan, Malaysia, with certification from SCA New York.
It was in 2019 that Shaikh Fadilah decided to focus on his retirement dream, owning a small café serving coffee and bakes. He decided to join various weekends pop-ups organized by social entrepreneurs Big Bwn Project and The Collective Arts, such as Sahur Saturdays, Street Fest, Infinity Con, to introduce himself to the market and opening exposure towards digital payments such as Quick Pay and Progresif Pay. From here, Dil Coffee Trail was born as a business and he started to rent spaces at the Wildflower Café at Peak Performance Recreation Club, on Sundays, to brew filter pour overs to café patrons.
Dil Coffee Trail is also appreciative of assistance in the form of financial advice, fin-tech and market exposure from Bank Islam Brunei Darussalam (BIBD). Dil Coffee Trail was invited to the Bank’s Home Showcase Expo at Taman Mahkota Jubli Emas, from the 23rd to 25th August 2019 as well as part of BIBD’s booth at the 25th Consumer Fair in Bridex on from the 26th to 30th May 2021.
Another milestone for Dil Coffee Trail is the usage of Baiduri Bank’s Merchant Suite, to allow foreign clients to purchase bakes online and delivering to recipients currently living in Brunei Darussalam as well as treating their loved ones, enjoying food and drinks at the Café.
Apart from owning the business, it is the vision of Shaikh Fadilah, to train local budding entrepreneurs about business, customer service and the art of excellence. It is not the intention to employ them throughout their life but to use the Café working experience as a stepping stone to start their own business in the near future, to inculcate the values of working professionally, the tasks that had been layout as well as customer service.
A personal cause that Shaikh Fadilah has advocated for the past two years is mental health awareness. He has been invited by the Psychiatric Unit of RIPAS Hospital to socialize mental health awareness issues during World Mental Health Day celebration and Men’s Health Forum. In the past, Shaikh Fadilah was personally involved in fund raising activities for Brunei Breast Cancer Support Group and Brunei Special Olympics.
Shaikh Fadilah continues to develop his passion for not only coffee but the art of communication. He believes in the diplomacy of coffee – communicating with clients over their love of coffee.
In March 2022, Shaikh Fadilah decided to revamp the business brand to Dil’s Café, as part of his business expansion programme.
On 4th November 2022, a new chapter in Dil’s Cafe with the opening of a commercial café in Batu Bersurat, after 2 years operating from home. This is a significant milestone.
Dil’s Café pledges to remove plastic cups usage by early 2024 as a way to play a role as a responsible business community in contributing towards a sustainable environment, educating our esteemed customers to bring their own tumblers when purchasing take away drinks.
As of March 2023, Dil’s Café has implemented cashless payment as a form of transaction through the use of Pocket App, debit / credit card and online bank transfer.
In November 2022, Shaikh Fadilah was invited to attend the Indonesian Coffee Art Battle at Jakarta, Indonesia as a guest judge. The 5-day event was part of the SIAL InterFOOD 2022 expo. This marks the first time he was invited for an international-level event as a known coffee connoisseur. During this event, Shaikh Fadilah caught the chance to work alongside Indonesia’s best in the coffee industry from roasters, baristas, brewing champions to coffee trainers and educators, as well as coffee business developers.
Shaikh Fadilah was also invited to be a speaker at a Talk show at the Expo theater, hosted by Bayu & Dion to share his coffee experience & business development in Brunei.
Shaikh Fadilah has been recognised by local news portal The Bruneian for two years in a row - 2021 and 2022 - as part of Brunei's 50 Most Inspiring Icons by The Bruneian
Shaikh Fadilah has also worked with numerous businesses such as local fashion designer By Bilang in promoting Kurta design menswear, Indera Motors (B) Sdn Bhd in marketing Jaguar, Takaful Musafir in promoting travel insurance, BILIF (Brunei Institute of Leadership and Islamic Finance) and 3G media in promoting cashless POCKET App.
@ Dil's Café, 2023. No part of this site, Dil's Café, may be reproduced in whole or in part in any manner without the permission of the copyright owner.
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