Just arriving to Café Imports, Kansas City Missouri native Tim O’Brien came to specialty coffee completely backwards.  Always one to look toward the horizon, easy to do in Kansas, he joined the Peace Corps after college and was sent to Costa Rica for two years to do good things for rural agriculture.  Ready for the beach he was posted to the highest, coldest mountain top in the famous Tarrazu coffee region.  This is where he first discovered a good cup of coffee while in a producer’s shack drinking local back patio dried beans roasted over a wood stove. 

After the Peace Corps, full of optimism and excited to be part of change, he went to Washington DC, and received his masters’ degree from Johns Hopkins in Environmental Science and policy.  He spent eight years there as a K street lobbyist, then a USGS government scientist and environmental restoration specialist, all while searching for a decent cup coffee. Having lost optimism about making change in DC or finding a decent cup of coffee there, Tim took a diplomatic post back in Costa Rica for the Organization of American States to focus on international agricultural development in all of Latin America. This included lots of on-the-ground work in many coffee regions.

While in Costa Rica he built a small micro mill in his old Peace Corps village to try to help his friends improve their low coffee prices.  Not knowing much about quality or international coffee trading, but thinking “How hard could it be?” He initially lost his shirt to unscrupulous traders.  He persisted until his coffee, Cafetin de San Martin, was discovered by direct trade roasters, which changed everything.  Five years later the project has grown to 35 small producers and a business that helped spearhead the micro-mill movement in Costa Rica.  Cafetin was awarded 5th place in COE 2009.

Itching to bring his patient wife and family back to the US after six years abroad and looking to combine his passion for international development and coffee, Tim sought out Café Imports.  He now spends his time drinking coffee and connecting roasters to origin. When he is not out playing with his kids or traveling, he enjoys the outdoors and still produces great coffee on his farm.