Lazy Bear Tea is a socially and environmentally inspired beverage company brewing teas from cascara, the dried coffee fruit. I suspect that, like me, you drink coffee…lots of coffee. But, also like me, you’ve probably never held a coffee fruit in your hand. The coffee bean that we are familiar with is the seed of the coffee fruit. And, just like a plumb, peach, or cherry, coffee fruit has a skin and flesh that surrounds the seed. The coffee fruit is known as cascara, the Spanish word for husk. We know what happens with the coffee bean, but what about the husk? Cascara is commonly a wasted byproduct of coffee production. Lazy Bear Tea purchases cascara to brew into cascara tea, doubling farmer incomes while improving the environment. Cascara is a delicious and nutritious base for beverages traditionally consumed in some coffee-growing countries. Using cascara in beverages not only diverts waste from the ecosystem but also creates additional and meaningful sources of income for coffee farmers. Coffee is one of the most highly traded agricultural commodities globally, yet most coffee farmers live in poverty. These farmers grow millions of hectares of coffee fruit, often selling the bean for low prices due to limited market access. While direct and fair trade have emerged to address issues of access, a vast income gap still exists for most coffee farmers. Coffee production yields millions of tons of wasted cascara that is left behind after the inner beans are collected and sold. With no market for the cascara, the fruit piles up, is dumped into waterways and can pollute local ecosystems. It’s estimated that each hectare of coffee creates 2.25 tons of cascara waste each year. This fruit contributes to 75% of the water pollution associated with coffee production. With over 10 million hectares of coffee globally, there are over 20 million tons of waste each year. When Lazy Bear Tea purchases cascara, coffee farmers harvest once, but profit twice. This means an incredible boost to farmer livelihoods with minor change to their existing farming practices. Lazy Bear’s cascara teas are brewed with natural, simple ingredients to celebrate the exceptional flavor and nutrition of the coffee fruit. These teas are like traditional beverages brewed and consumed at home in places like Yemen and Bolivia for hundreds of years, but until now not commercialized in mass markets in a ready-to-drink (RTD) format. Daniela Uribe’s Early Start to Entrepreneurship Daniela grew up in Pereira, Colombia. “I spent endless days playing in the streets with friends,” she explains. “One of our favorite things to do was come up with ways to make a little money to buy ice cream and other treats after school. We created dozens of businesses out of our parents' kitchens and living rooms, so I guess I've had an entrepreneurial knack for a while!” Daniela spent her childhood weekends with cousins on coffee farms and got to know about coffee production. “Colombia was still suffering from a great deal of violence in my childhood,” she says. “The obvious inequality of our society was evident and painful even to a child. I've been dreaming of ways to be useful in the world since I can remember. As I child I would find small ways to make a difference. It was particularly inspiring for me to see my mom's dedication to our community and her own sense of responsibility to be of use was deeply ingrained in me.” When Daniela was a teenager, she and her mother moved to Washington, D.C. as political asylees. Still Daniela wanted to make a difference. “I tried the academic research route briefly as an undergraduate with ambitions to get a PhD and help make sense of what was happening through research,” she explains. “It simply did not work for me. I wanted to be closer to the ‘real world,’ co-envisioning solutions.” The Drink that Made the Difference Although Daniela grew up in a coffee-growing family in Colombia, she had never had cascara tea. Then a cousin brought her cascara to t