+
Volume 126 Issue 110
kansan.com
Monday, April 21, 2014
+
DUNCAN MCHENRY/KANSAN
The Roasterie's factory, located near downtown Kansas City, Mo., features a Douglas DC-3 cargo plane on its roof. The plane and its runway, which allude to the company's signature air-roasting process, both light up after dark.
Danny O'Neill, center, with barista Rebekah Albin and customer service representative Maya Greenwood, from left, at The Roasterie factory cafe. The Roasterie has been a coffee supplier to the University since 1993 and recently donated $22,000 to its college and university partners.
DUNCAN MCHENRY/KANSAN
DUNCAN MCHENRY
news@kansan.com
Anyone who has bought a cup of coffee on campus has seen his name — even if they didn't know it. Danny O'Neill, known as "the Bean Baron," is the president and founder of Kansas City's local air-roasted coffee producer: The Roasterie. The story of how he forged a love for coffee in 1978 by picking beans at a coffee plantation as a study abroad student in Costa Rica is emblazoned on the side of all the University's paper coffee cups.
What many may not know, however, is that O'Neill and The Roasterie, which he started in his basement in the early '90s, have been partnered with the University from the very start. O'Neill's first sales contract in 1993 was with the KU Medical Center, and The Roasterie has been the Lawrence campus's coffee supplier since 1996.
In honor of this partnership, and in recognition of a recent donation of $22,000 to university partners in February — with the University's portion funding the annual Roasterie Retail Student Employee Scholarship — the University Daily Kansan met with O'Neill for an interview at The Roasterie headquarters. He discussed his company's connection with the University and its business practices that have shaped coffee culture in Kansas City and the Midwest.
UDK: The Roasterie recently donated $22,000, which is disbursed between a few of your partner universities — including Kansas. What's your motivation for doing that?
DO: I wouldn't have gone to school without Pell Grants, so we're in a position where it's just very important to me to give back. Not only do we not charge [a franchise fee], but we rebate back 3 percent. So if a café is doing $500,000 a year, that's $15,000 that swing towards scholarships for students. We don't have any strings on it other than that we say, if you ask us, we'd prefer you give it to kids who, but for this [scholarship], wouldn't be able to go to school. We call it the "but for." We've gotten dozens and dozens, if not hundreds, of letters over the years from students who've received those, and then hopefully they'll do the same thing if they're in that position. It's very meaningful to me that we can do that. KU [Medical Center] was the first account for us, so we go back to literally day one. We have folks on the campus every week and I'm out there at least once a quarter if not more often. I love it. We have a great fanbase here in town and a lot of the fanbase is KU.
UDK: Growing up, what are your earliest memories of coffee, and how did your love for coffee begin?
it at that point. But then the first time I drank coffee, that I remember, was at a stock car race and it was really cold, on a Saturday night, so I got coffee. I think I was in third or fourth grade and I did not like it, but you can only imagine how bad it was. It was probably really cheap, nasty, percolated coffee. And then fast forward: I was a freshman in college, going through finals, I was a nervous wreck and I had let things go through the whole semester to the last minute, [so] I drank a whole pot. I loved it.
DO: That's a good question. I
don't get asked that one much. The first one I can think of would be my mom had "coffees" back then. They called them "coffees." It was usually women in the neighborhood where I grew up in a little town in Iowa. Vera Peterson. Mrs. Rules' house — they would rotate and there would be a number of women having coffee and socializing; it was really cool. I remember standing around the table in these different places and I would always smell the coffee. I don't really remember drinking
I couldn't sleep: I couldn't sit still; I couldn't study; but wow, I loved it. And I've been pretty much in that space ever since.
UDK: What was your experience like as a study abroad student in Costa Rica when you first picked coffee beans?
DO: When I went to Costa Rica as a senior in high school I didn't really drink coffee yet then, but I had grown up my whole life working on farms. So when my friends were going coffee picking and they asked
me, I said yeah. I just love farmers — people who have their hands in the dirt are just special people. It was transformative, that whole experience, obviously. At the time I didn't know why and I didn't realize it; I wasn't conscious of it. Of course, later, looking back, there's this idealized memory of that coffee picking in that two to three weeks that I went, and it was just cool being up on top of the sunny mountain with all my high school friends
SEE BARON PAGE 2
CAMPUS
Students share visual and written campus perspective
MORGAN MERRITT/KANSAN
Morgan Merritt, a junior from La Quinta, Calif., snaps a picture of campus from the fifth floor of Fraser and tags it with #exploreKU!
ASHLEY BOOKER
news@kansan.com
When Morgan Merritt looks at her #exploreKU photo of the week she explains it as capturing "one of those moments." The clouds were light and airy, the trees were bare and the brightness of the morning drew her to the window.
"I worked really hard to get here and have to continue to work hard to stay," said Merritt, a junior who works three jobs and is a full-time student from La Quinta, Calif. "Every once in a while I catch myself realizing where I am and how lucky I am to be here. It's like everything I've gone through has been worth it. So capturing one little beautiful part of campus reminds me that I am here for a reason and to keep pushing on."
Merritt is just one of many students who uses the #exploreKU hashtag on social
media created by the Office of Marketing Communications for the school's third social media "triathlon" last August, to encourage students, faculty and staff to share what they love about the University of Kansas.
Marketing Communications. "We added the #exploreKU hashtag as a way to actively engage with students and so they had some sort of enticing reason for them to tag KU in some sort of perpetual way as the year winds on."
For the triathlon, they were encouraged to post on Twitter: a haiku with the additional hashtag #hawKU, a picture posted from Instagram or a video posted from Vine. Prizes included a University sports package, iPad, $200 gift certificates for the KU Bookstore or Tech Shop and a luncheon with Chancellor Bernadette Gray-Little.
"This is our third year doing this triathlon idea beginning in the fall semester. What we decided this year was that we wanted to perpetuate it beyond the two-week time frame," said Justin Henning, associate director of interactive media for the Office of
Now, *exploreKU is mainly used by students, faculty, staff, alumni and prospective students who visit the University. Usual posts include both written 140-character statements and pictures based on moments at the University, favorite hangouts, candid beauty shots or interesting things happening around campus.
"We try to look for, yes, a great photo, but we also like
As a way to promote the hashtag, the Office of Marketing Communications also features one #exploreKU photo of the week, which gets hand picked by their staff and posted on Sundays. Merritt's photo was posted April 13.
people to explain what they're doing," Katie McCurry, digital strategist for the Office of Marketing Communications, said. "The more perspective you can give with your content, the greater other people are to connect with you."
One night, Joey Beeler, who has used the #exploreKU hashtag a couple times was on his way home from the library, snapped a picture of what caught his eye.
"I like the photo because it reminds me of Friday night
football games," said Beeler, a senior from Wichita. "I also thought it was cool that both the memorial Campanile and Memorial Stadium were lit up at night."
Like Beeler, Connor Birzer, a freshman from Ellinwood, has also used the hashtag. Most of his posts have captured the campus foliage in full color.
"I like to see which #exploreKU posts the University reposts," Birzer said. "It's a great way to show how unique and beautiful of a campus we
Next, the Office of Marketing Communications would like to see photos of students' experiences in the classroom.
have."
"There're so many ideas of what a classroom is," McCurry said. "I hope with the further use of the hashtag that we get research students showing their work in the field and in labs."
Edited by Chelsea Mies
Index
GO TO KANSAN.COM FOR A STORIFY OF #EXPLOREKU
CLASSIFIEDS 9
CROSSWORD 5
CRYPTOQUIPS 5
OPINION 4
SPORTS 10
SUDOKU 5
All contents, unless stated otherwise, © 2014 The University Daily Kansan
Don't Forget
Today is the last day to drop a course.
Today's Weather
Scattered thunderstorms. Chance of rain 40 percent.
4