BROOKINGS Brookings has plenty of places to get a cup of coffee. A trio of them serve up a cup brewed with their own roasted beans: Kool Beans Coffee & Roasterie in downtown Brookings, owned and operated by Kurt Osborne, and Jacob Limmer, owner and operator of Cottonwood Coffee (502 Main Ave.) and Cottonwood Bistro (1710 Sixth St.).
It started out with a challenge of roasting coffee in a popcorn popper, after I read about it, Osborne said. There was enough intrigue to it that it made me kind of want to pursue it. So I bought a small roaster that looks like a microwave.
After that I shared it with some people and went to work; it was interesting, it tasted good, it was fresh, it was fun. Today he continues to pursue roasting on a much larger scale as a professional dealing with a product whose demand is driven via a world market.
He was helped to make it big time by Joy Nelson, a real estate developer and a real go-getter. He got to know her about 15 years ago when he was working for the Foundation of the Evangelical Lutheran Church.
How much money do you need to take it to a production up-scale? she asked. He didnt know; but he did a little research and found a used roaster. Nelson bankrolled his startup in May 2012. Come Christmas 2013 they became 50-50 partners.
In 2017 by which time being in the coffee business had become more than a hobby Osborne opened Kool Beans in the Grunewald Building downtown. In 2020 he moved to a larger space at 225 Main Ave., also downtown in a large building that had housed Trendz, a consignment clothing store. Since the space was larger than he needed, he leased half the space to Mosaic Wine Bar & Small Plates. The two businesses complement each other with java by day and wine and food in the evening.
And Kool Beans, which had five employees, over time increased its staff to 21. Osborne has a fulltime manager and a fulltime assistant manager. But hes still working fulltime: I stay away or Im across the street (in my office), but its still a fulltime deal.
The call of coffee
In the beginning, Osborne bought coffee beans in small batches by the pound from Sweet Marias, which caters largely to home hobby roasters. As the business grew, he began getting coffee from Cathay Imports in Minneapolis.
Its a cool place to see, Osborne said. Its just packed with 150-lb (69-kg) bags of coffee from all over the world. They come 10 bags to a pallet; last year we roasted 17 tons (about 35,000 pounds) of coffee. He added, smiling, We started out just goofing around with a popcorn popper. It just kind of got out of hand.
To give some perspective of what coffee is, beyond being a must-have beverage worldwide, Osborne noted: Coffee is the second most highly-traded commodity in the world, next to oil. Thats how big a business it is. .
Its prices are impacted both to the roaster and ultimately to the customer-consumer by variables that include: country-of-origin, availability, demand, cuts to USAID (United States Agency for International Development ), which had helped bankroll some coffee farms around the world, and shipping.
Shipping has gone up, partly because of the turmoil in the Red Sea area and Gaza, Osborne explained. There are ships that are stuck and cant get through and are bombed.
As to the price of a cup to the customer, he acknowledged that over time prices have gone up; however, he noted: We tried to hold the line as much as we could; but at some point, where youre paying $2 more a pound to get it .
To get the word out about the price of coffee on the world market and how it affects Kool Beans and its Valued customers and friends, Osborne has put out a 2-page letter: Changes ahead in pricing and Why is this happening?
Osbornes missive covers a lot of ground and is penned in easy terms to explain the beans and the beverage they make. One reality he notes upfront: Just since January , we have experienced a 25% increase in our costs. The industry has been holding its breath watching prices climb, and many are wondering whats next. We know that prices put us all in a pinch. These are the harsh realities in the coffee world today.
Theres more interesting info about todays coffee world, so stop by Koolbeans and pick up a copy and maybe read it over a cup.
Not just tariffs
Limmer, a native South Dakotan, admits to sort of stumbling into the world of coffee: I did some small farming, he said. The reason I opened Cottonwood is that I was trying to figure out how to make a living in the winter while farming in the summer. So here we are.
Like Osborne, he also roasts coffee in large amounts and also sells coffee beans by the take-home bag and coffee by the cup. He often orders beans by the full pallet 10 to 12 bags (150 lbs. per bag). He does all the roasting in two roasters at Cottonwood Coffee.
Weve been in this location (Main Avenue) for 19 years, opening in July at the time of the Brookings Summer Arts Festival, he explained of his startup. However, at that time he was not roasting coffee. He worked with a roaster in Minneapolis and later switched to one in Kansas City.
Ironically, the reason we started roasting ourselves was because in 2010, roughly, the price of green coffee was going way up, like it is now, he said. Not because of tariffs but the price kept going up. We couldnt see how we were going to continue to pass that on to our customers. So we started roasting for ourselves at that point.
“Weve been roasting for ourselves back here for about 14 to 15 years.
In addition to selling coffee by the drink and by the bag at both locations, Limmer has a lot of retail outlets and also sells wholesale to other businesses that dont roast themselves, the same way we did when we first started. Add to that e-commerce sales via (his) website.And while tariffs are obviously a major factor in the price coffee, Limmer explained that other factors come into play more: No. 1, tariffs are actually not the biggest impact on coffee prices right now, even though they are having a very significant impact; weather, climate change and consumer demand probably combine to be the bigger factor.
Making Brookings a destination
Continuing, Limmer added: Prior to the tariff conversation, we were paying about double for our green coffee, or raw coffee, than what we were paying a year back. That is certainly significant. And adding the tariff on top of that makes it worse and more volatile. Right now its a guessing game. Tariffs are on, then theyre gone.
In addition to being a coffee roaster, Limmer is also a restaurateur: both Cottonwoods sell prepared food. However, he noted that more than 50 percent of total sales at both places are from coffee.
He also noted that several other products needed in the business of coffee can also be affected by tariffs: There are a lot of associated products that are being tariffed as well: Whether its the bags that were putting the coffee beans in, whether its the effects of transportation, whether its the to-go coffee cups that we use, all the paper products and all the bags that hold something, those are coming from China. Of course its potentially going to be subjected to a very high tariff.
The impacts are just pretty broad, he added, laughing a bit. It just feels like its been one hit after another, not just for coffee.
As for his two java joints that also serve breakfast and lunch, the high cost of eggs has had an impact: Three to five times the average costing us a fortune.
Both Osborne and Limmer are doing their part to make Brookings a destination. The 2025 Visit Brookings brochure (page 40) talks up their Caffeinated Creations. A cup of coffee, a cold brew, a java. No matter what you call it, Brookings has it.
Contact John Kubal at [email protected].
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