An essential pillar of Bean United's mission and vision is to pursue innovative ideas we are passionate about. Often, this also includes bringing these new ideas into action. One example of this approach is the opening of a Bean United Social Café, a coffee shop that goes hand in hand with our values and our mission. Learn more about our Social Café, its story, vision and the team behind this project.
How did our Café come into being?
After having established a network of mainly corporate clients since 2018, founders Philipp and Thomas were presented with a further opportunity within the coffee business: The charming old building at Deisenhofen station opened up as a location for a Bean United Café. Born and raised in Oberhaching south of Munich, founders Philipp and Thomas felt that this was an opportunity that couldn't be missed. With the help of family and friends, the venue was cleaned and set up for a coffee shop. Soon, many would come to love the old wooden floors, the beautiful brick walls and the smell of coffee grounds (not to forget the legendary squeaky door!).
Read more about the opening and the first couple of months here: https://www.sueddeutsche.de/muenchen/landkreismuenchen/oberhaching-deisenhofener-bahnhof-bean-united-cafe-burundi-schulmahlzeiten-1.5527128
How is social impact created and made tangible?
Naturally, our mission of creating social impact and providing chances and education should also be translated to Bean United Social Café. This is why each cup of coffee directly enables one school meal in Burundi. When customers pay, they can directly see our impact counter jump to a higher number, making the impact of each drink visible. The impact counter is a real eye-catcher and leads to many conversations about the project in Burundi with customers and friends of all ages.
Also, large and beautiful pictures on the wall show our coffee farmers and friends around the world, for example in Burundi and in Brazil. It is important for Bean United to show the people behind our excellent coffee beans and to tell their stories. It is part of our vision to be able to show the image of coffee cherries and, for example, the harvesting and the washing process.
What do we love about our Café?
Needles to say, our Social Café has become a place of community and positive change. It is like a second living room to friends, customers, families and our team.
Our café is not only a place for coffee lovers of all ages - it is far more, bringing people together for conversation, discussion, yoga classes, barista workshops and book readings. Sadly, we will be closing our doors in December 2023 - the project was planned as a pop-up Café with a duration of two years. In this time, more than 40.000 school meals have been enabled and many gatherings and workshops and countless special moments have occurred here. Bean United has used this place to educate and train a team of Social Baristas who work with us and support our mission. We are enormously grateful for this chapter of Bean United's story and can't wait for what's next.
