Commuters might not think ``coffee'' when they see the swirling green sign for The Cereal Bowl café that sits tucked away in the Riviera Plaza shopping center at 1560 S. Dixie Hwy.

After all, the three entrepreneurs behind the venture have been working 18-hour days for weeks trying to get the word out that the Bowl carries more than 30 different types of cereal and dozens of toppings for customers to mix and match at their whim.

But in the two months since the Bowl opened its doors, the men behind the venture - twin brothers Josh and Kenneth Rader, 24, and their childhood friend Michael Glassman, 25 - have become increasingly convinced that if they ever hope to fully tap into the river of cars that floats by their shop every morning, they have to promote the joe.

It's not that business is slumping. Volume has been increasing steadily to about about 200 and 250 clients on weekdays and 400 to 450 daily on the weekend. But they would welcome some new faces.

``We are seeing lots of repeat customers,'' said Kenneth, the company's president. ``We are getting the cereal crowd - that's the easy part because it's in our name - but we want to get more of the coffee crowd in. People just don't know to drink coffee at our location.''

The Miami Herald has been chronicling the Bowl's evolution since October, when the trio were wrestling with city permits and contractors to get the venture off the ground. Since opening their doors Feb. 4, they've scrambled to cater to the growing number of children showing up during the day, rather than the college kids they envisioned. Business Monday will continue reporting on the life of the fledgling business through its first year.

SEATTLE'S BEST DEAL

Coffee isn't an afterthought. The entrepreneur's knew java was going to be important from the get-go, and they worked hard to cut a deal with gourmet coffee maker Seattle's Best - although there's no sign outside their shop to promote the brand.

Despite excursions to neighboring office blocks with free samples of the brew, they haven't been seeing the kind of coffee crowd they'd like. (The fact that a Starbucks is just a mile away is certainly a hurdle.)

So they've decided to bring in professional help, in the form of Coral Gables-basedmarketing firm Kaboo Kaboo.

It wasn't an easy decision. From the interior design to the permitting, the trio have preferred doing things themselves. And PR seemed to be one area they had thoroughly covered: Before they opened, they were using Internet chatrooms and cereal-themed blogs to drive traffic to their website, and their press releases have generated a slew of coverage.

``It was a little bit of an issue,'' Kenneth said of the Kaboo Kaboo decision. ``Mike and Josh thought we were doing just fine with the in-house PR, but in the end we all decided we needed fresh ideas . . . Sometimes you have to spend money to make money.''

SURPRISE VISITS

A few hours before his first meeting with the Cereal Bowl trio, Ari Rollnick, founder and president of Kaboo Kaboo, said he was looking forward to talking to the men about their branding strategy and long-term goals. In coming days, members of his team will be scoping out the Bowl unannounced to get a feel for what the average consumer experience is like.

While it was too soon to talk strategy, he said it would ultimately ``combine both traditional and guerrilla marketing tactics.''

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