United By Coffee

A simple mistake as a new barista sparked a passion for learning everything about coffee—and helped propel her all the way to becoming a Q Instructor just a few years later. Join U3 co-founder Kristi Ross and her co-host, Greg Hess, as they sit down with Candice Madison—a coffee-industry leader, coffee consultant, roaster, barista, and coffee educator who is preparing to launch her own coffee comp...

What happens when an aspiring winemaker wants to leave behind the late-night hours? Join U3 co-founder Kristi Ross and her co-host, Greg Hess, in a conversation with Patrick O’Malley, an award-winning coffee educator, serial entrepreneur, and thirty-year veteran of the coffee industry. Patrick shares how a simple request to create a more palatable schedule wound up changing the trajectory of his c...

How does a chemical engineer become a leading voice in the coffee industry? Join U3 co-founder Kristi Ross and her co-host Greg Hess as they sit down with Scott Stouffer, a chemical engineer by training and a 30-year coffee veteran. His remarkable journey started with a chance role as a process engineer for a “little expanding startup company”—Starbucks—and today he’s the Chief Sales Officer at PR...

Join U3 co-founder Kristi Ross and her co-host Greg Hess in an enlightening conversation with Lucas Venturim, a fifth-generation Brazilian coffee producer and commercial director of Café Fazenda Venturim, which specializes in fine Robusta coffees. He’s on a mission to change the narrative around Robusta by educating coffee roasters, baristas, and coffee lovers about its unique flavor profile. He s...

Join U3 co-founder Kristi Ross and her co-host Greg Hess in an enlightening and inspiring conversation with Dehab Mesfin, the founder and general manager of Diamond Enterprise and Dahab Specialty Farm, a woman-owned coffee business that’s focused on sustainability and women’s empowerment. Dehab’s specialty coffee farm—Dahab Specialty Farm—is nestled within the buffer zone of Ethiopia’s Kafa Biosph...

Join U3 co-founder Kristi Ross and her co-host Greg Hess in an inspiring conversation with Francisco Lacayo, general manager of L53 Family Estates, a multifaceted family-run operation that includes two Rainforest Alliance Certified farms, co-ownership of a dry mill, and an export company. Francisco’s father first entered the coffee industry in 1994, when Francisco was seven years old. Twenty years...

Join U3 co-founder Kristi Ross and her co-host Greg Hess in an inspiring conversation with Jake Elster and Ben Heins, co-owners of Crop to Cup Coffee Importers, a green-coffee importing company that’s committed to a people-first approach to coffee. Hear all about how their paths collided in a serendipitous meeting at the University of Chicago. Ben, a trailblazer in the ready-to-drink coffee game,...

Join U3 co-founder Kristi Ross and her co-host Greg Hess as they chat with Bill Ristenpart, professor of chemical engineering and founding director of the UC Davis Coffee Center, a groundbreaking multidisciplinary academic center focused on research to support and improve the coffee industry. What started in 2013 as 18 engineering students in a freshman engineering seminar has now served more than...

Join U3 co-founder Kristi Ross and her co-host Greg Hess in a conversation with Michael Shultz, founder of Fairgrounds Craft Coffee & Tea, a café experience founded on the principles of diversity, choice, and community. After two decades working in the restaurant industry, and with his first child on the way, Michael started to think about the legacy he wanted to leave behind. He wanted to fin...

Join U3 co-founder Kristi Ross and her co-host Greg Hess in an inspiring conversation with Tim Coonan, co-founder of Big Shoulders Coffee, a hospitality-driven company that prioritizes their customers, their team, and their producers. When Tim and his wife Patricia, both accomplished leaders in the restaurant industry, were starting to think about their own coffee business fourteen years ago, ther...

Join U3 co-founder Kristi Ross and her co-host Greg Hess as they sit down with Connie Blumhardt, the founder and publisher of the award-winning Roast Magazine , one of the coffee industry’s best-loved and most well-respected publications. Discover how a job in ad sales helped her fall in love with the coffee roasting community and why their passion for coffee inspired her to create a publication f...

Join U3 co-founder Kristi Ross and her co-host Greg Hess as they sit down with Ana Velloso, a third-generation Brazilian coffee producer and a champion for the unique flavors and high-quality beans Brazilian coffee offers the world. Find out why Ana never envisioned a career in coffee—and what led her back to her family’s coffee business after 10 years working as an architect. Today, Ana runs the...

Join U3 Coffee co-founder Kristi Ross as she chats with Laura Sommers, a thirty-year veteran of the coffee industry and the designer behind the innovative SimplyGoodCoffee brewer. Discover the story behind Laura’s incredibly successful first coffee business—Espresso Supply, Inc—and how she preserved when people told her she was wasting her time, because there was no way coffeeshops in the States w...

Join U3 Coffee co-founder Kristi Ross as she sits down with Yannis Apostolopoulos, beverage-industry veteran and CEO of the Specialty Coffee Association. As CEO of the SCA, Yannis leads a team that’s taking a global approach to supporting and promoting specialty coffee through in-depth research into all things coffee, education initiatives that serve coffee entrepreneurs across the value chain, an...

Join U3 Coffee co-founder Kristi Ross as she digs in with Jeremy Hardy, executive director of Vigilant Hope Inc, a nonprofit working to end poverty in Wilmington, NC that’s roasting incredible coffee to fund their important programs. Today, Vigilant Hope Roasting not only helps finance their work, it’s also a way for the organization to connect with their community and share their story. Learn abo...

Join U3 Coffee co-founder Kristi Ross as she uncovers the story behind Nanelle and Andy Newbom, two coffee industry veterans who consider themselves to be “coffee lifers.” They share how coffee became a shared passion (and why Andy originally considered coffee “disgusting”) and why they believe the essence of great coffee is the people who produce it. After almost 25 years wearing almost every hat...

Join U3 Coffee co-founder Kristi Ross in a conversation with Jen Apodaca, one of the world’s most celebrated women coffee roasters. After fourteen years roasting for some of coffee’s biggest brands—including Intelligentsia, Blue Bottle, Royal Coffee—Jen is now the founder, owner, and head coffee roaster of her own company, Mother Tongue Coffee. Learn about Jen’s mission to build her brand on a fou...

Join U3 Coffee co-founder Kristi Ross in conversation with Carmen and Rafael Silva, their family runs the award-winning Sicafe, which includes six family-owned farms in El Salvador, a mill, and exporting company, all focused on specialty coffee. The Silva family’s coffee legacy started in 1870s; today they own some of the most renowned coffee farms in the world and are nine-time winners of the Cup...

Join U3 Coffee co-founder Kristi Ross as she chats with Julia Stamberger, CEO and co-founder of The Planting Hope Company , a Chicago startup working to create plant-based food options that are sustainable, scalable, and simple to use. After twenty successful years in the food industry, Julia Stamberger noticed an important trend: While consumers wanted better-for-you options, many of the products...

Listen in as U3 Coffee co-founder Kristi Ross chats with Brian Franklin, a coffee connoisseur and a self-described “coffee purist” who is on a mission to educate coffee drinkers on the true potential of coffee. Discover Brian’s journey as founder, owner, and roaster of DoubleShot Coffee Company, and find out why he’s proud that their menu has only gotten smaller over time. Learn why Brian went hea...

Join U3 Coffee co-founder Kristi Ross as she chats with Nadine Rasch, founder and director of Primavera Green Coffee and La Central de Café, about sustainability and equity across the coffee value chain. Growing up on her family’s coffee farm in Guatemala, Nadine was convinced she would never want to work in coffee. After pursuing a career in finance, she recognized that the people who shaped the...

Listen in as U3 Coffee co-founder Kristi Ross sits down with Firaol Ahmed—founder, owner, and roaster of Moii Coffee. Learn all about Firaol’s journey, from his childhood growing up in a family of coffee farmers in Ethiopia to his current college career as a D1 student-athlete at Saint Louis University. Find out how a sports industry inspired him to make the leap into roasting and why it didn’t oc...

Join U3 Coffee co-founder Kristi Ross as she dives deep with Bill Murray about his decade-long tenure as the CEO of the National Coffee Association—and organization focused on advocating for “the business of coffee.” Find out about his work leading a team that helps coffee companies—big and small—by championing the coffee industry and offering tools to help coffee entrepreneurs thrive. From their...

Join U3 Coffee co-founder Kristi Ross as she chats with Keri Elliott, founder, owner, and head roaster of Roasted by Mom Coffee, where she’s building a brand that embraces the “passion, love, and care” that only a mother can bring to each cup. Learn how Keri’s experience as a Starbucks barista helped shape her coffee journey, why she dove into home-roasting after the birth of her son (and why she...

Join U3 Coffee co-founder Kristi Ross as she uncovers the story and mission behind Stephanie & Bryce Wein’s Pinup Coffee Co., a veteran-owned business on a mission to make specialty coffee more accessible and welcoming. Learn all about how Stephanie’s ambition to own a coffee business stayed with her through her six years serving in the US Navy and how the military and veteran communities prov...