Danny O'Neill

Danny O’Neill, known across Kansas City as “the Bean Baron,” is the founder of The Roasterie, the air-roasted specialty coffee company he started in his Brookside basement in 1993 and grew into one of the Midwest’s signature coffee brands.

Biography

Danny O’Neill was born and raised in Denison, Iowa, the middle of ten children.¹ During his senior year of high school he traveled to Costa Rica as a foreign-exchange student and spent several weeks picking coffee — an experience he credits with igniting a lifelong passion for it.¹ The Roasterie dates that moment precisely: November 22, 1978, when O’Neill picked his first coffee cherries.² He earned a B.A. from Iowa State University with a double major in international studies and political science and a structured minor in economics, and in 1993 an MBA through the Rockhurst University Executive Fellows Program in Kansas City.¹

In 1993, after roughly ten years in sales and marketing positions, O’Neill took the leap and began roasting coffee in the basement of his Brookside home.¹ He had about $17,000 saved, spent most of it on a roaster, and by his own account was “down to nickels and pickles and no income.”³ He built The Roasterie on three premises: find the best coffees in the world, roast them the best way known, and get them to customers as fast as humanly possible.¹³ The company’s own history dates the founding to November 1993; Missouri Business Alert gives November 4, 1993.⁴³ It took 100 days of door-knocking before the first sale.⁵ The operation outgrew the basement within a year, moving to a first factory at 1519 Cherry on July 10, 1994, then to 2601 Madison in 1995.⁶

Over the following decades The Roasterie grew into a regional institution. The Factory moved to its current home at 1204 W. 27th Street, off Southwest Boulevard, in 2006, and in 2012 a Douglas DC-3 — “Betty,” named after O’Neill’s mother — was mounted on its roof, the same year the Factory Café opened.⁶ The aircraft was built in February 1944 and carries the registration NC5931.⁷ O’Neill became one of Kansas City’s best-known food entrepreneurs and a frequent civic and business-community voice: he is past President of the Specialty Coffee Association of America, was awarded “Super Taster” status on the Specialty Coffee Institute Sensory Aptitude Test in 2001, and has served on the Rockhurst University Board of Regents and the boards of the Greater Kansas City Chamber of Commerce and the Missouri Restaurant Association.¹ He reported having visited at least 60 countries in search of coffee.⁴

Legacy

O’Neill helped define modern Midwestern coffee culture, championing specialty coffee in Kansas City well before it was fashionable. The Roasterie remains a homegrown KC brand and a fixture of the city’s café scene.

See also

• the-roasterie

Sources

Two claims removed 2026-09-08 rather than shipped unsourced, per Wiki-Living-Persons-Policy Part 2 rule 1 (no unsourced factual claim about a living subject publishes): (a) that O’Neill lined the Brookside basement “with corrugated tin and blue tarps,” and (b) that his first sale was “a ten-pound bag for a coffee cart at Children’s Mercy Hospital.” Both were previously attributed to a 2017 Startland News article that, on retrieval, contains neither; neither appears on The Roasterie’s own About, 30th-anniversary or Brookside-association pages. The Brookside source instead documents a 100-day gap before the first sale, which is what the page now says. Restore either claim if a first-party source is found.

Footnotes

1. “Startup Grind Kansas City Hosts Danny O’Neill (The Roasterie, Inc.),” Startup Grind — speaker biography: born and raised in Denison, Iowa, middle of ten children; Costa Rica foreign-exchange student during his senior year of high school, several weeks picking coffee; B.A. from Iowa State University, double major international studies and political science with a structured minor in economics; 1993 MBA, Rockhurst University Executive Fellows Program; roughly ten years in sales and marketing before starting to roast in his Brookside basement in 1993; the three founding premises; “Super Taster” status on the Specialty Coffee Institute Sensory Aptitude Test, 2001; past President of the Specialty Coffee Association of America; Rockhurst Board of Regents, Greater Kansas City Chamber of Commerce and Missouri Restaurant Association boards. ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵ ↩⁶

2. “About,” The Roasterie — “On November 22, 1978, Danny O’Neill picked his first coffee cherries as a foreign exchange student in Costa Rica… 15 years later, Danny founded The Roasterie in the basement of his Brookside home in Kansas City.” ↩

3. “As KC’s Roasterie turns 25, founder O’Neill reflects on roots, future,” Missouri Business Alert — founding in the basement of his Brookside home on November 4, 1993; leave of absence from a corporate job; $17,000 in savings, most of it spent on a roaster, ~$1,000 on the basement and $2,500 on the logo; “down to nickels and pickles and no income”; the three founding premises. ↩ ↩² ↩³

4. “By The Numbers: The Roasterie’s Bean Baron Danny O’Neill,” IN Kansas City Magazine — “Number of years The Roasterie has been doing that air-roasting thang? 25 years — November 1993, to be exact”; “Number of countries you’ve visited in search of the perfect coffee bean? At least 60.” (The page serves HTTP 200 to a browser user-agent but 403 to some automated fetchers; verified by direct retrieval 2026-09-08.) ↩ ↩²

5. “Faces of Brookside: The Roasterie,” Brookside Business Association — “It took 100 days for Danny to make his first sale,” and O’Neill on the early period: “It was 18-20 hour days of knocking on doors and roasting small batches day and night.” ↩

6. “30th Anniversary,” The Roasterie — company timeline: 1978 Costa Rica; 1993 first roaster, basement roasting, first sale; 1994 second employee Norm Killmon and the move to the first factory at 1519 Cherry on July 10, 1994; 1995 move to 2601 Madison; 2005 first Roasterie Café opens in Brookside; 2006 the Factory relocates to 1204 W. 27th Street off Southwest Boulevard; 2012 “The DC-3 plane, named Betty after Danny’s mother, is added to the Factory’s roof”; 2012 Factory Café opens; 2016 in-house cold-brew canning line; 2017 Woodside Café. ↩ ↩²

7. “The Roasterie: A Kansas City Coffee Company With A Douglas DC-3 On Its Roof,” Simple Flying — the aircraft was built in February 1944 and delivered to the U.S. Army Air Forces; registration NC5931; placed on the factory roof in 2012 at a ceremony attended by original DC-3 pilots. [Simple Flying describes Betty as named after “the mother of founder Danny O’Neill’s mother”; The Roasterie’s own 30th-anniversary timeline and City Lifestyle both say she is named after O’Neill’s mother, Betty. This page follows the company’s own account.] ↩