The heavy wooden door groans a little when you open it. It was closed for a long time, the old building of the Deisenhofen station stood empty forever. Lately, however, it smells like coffee here. It is an inviting scent and you will be surprised by the new interior of the almost 125-year-old brick building. Because the result is a mixture of a cozy coffee house and a casual location, with dull herringbone parquet and curved lattice windows on the one hand and second-hand furniture and stylish counters made of wooden pallets on the other – and a hyper-modern portafilter machine. The barista stands behind it and pours the hot coffee into the cups. It’s not just about enjoyment. In the “Bean United Social Café”, the operators Thomas and Philipp Greulich ensure a school meal in Burundi with every espresso, every cup of cappuccino and every glass of latte macchiato.
On the wall next to the large photos of coffee farmers and school children from Africa, the number of paid lunches jumps up one digit with each coffee order. The 42-year-old Greulich twin brothers have set themselves the goal of 20,000 meals a year, which is how many they want to finance with their café through Welthungerhilfe. “After two months we were almost at 4000,” says Thomas Greulich. The people of Oberhaching seem to feel at home in their old train station. The store is running.
The luggage of summer visitors who discovered Oberhaching since the construction of the railway line between Munich and Holzkirchen in the 19th century was once stored here. For a long time, the mayor and municipal council had been thinking of using the quite charming building for gastronomy. That’s how you bought it eight years ago. The plans are still there, but the implementation is dragging on. In two years, the building, which is a listed building, is to be completely gutted. Until then, the Greulichs can serve guests with coffee and small dishes such as banana bread, homemade cakes and focaccia in the approximately 50 square meter room and from March probably also in the outdoor area. The prices are moderate. “The coffee should not cost more than in the bakery,” says Greulich. The experts at a coffee magazine, who awarded their espresso, recently confirmed that the quality of the beans roasted in Garmisch is also right.
Bean United would like to stay in the old train station beyond 2023. “People are already so in love with our café,” says Thomas Greulich, they have regular customers ranging from schoolchildren to 80-year-old seniors. But the deal with the community will initially run for two years, after all. “We’re really happy about that,” says the entrepreneur.
In 2018, together with his brother, he founded the start-up company as “Social Coffee Company” in Oberhaching. The Greulichs grew up here, studied business administration and worked for the beverage manufacturer Red Bull. Thomas has traveled a lot around the world, had jobs in London, Mexico and Mallorca. But at some point it was no longer enough for him to simply market hip drinks. “I wanted to be entrepreneurial and at the same time make a social contribution,” he says. So they founded “Bean United”, which mainly sells coffee to businesses and finances ten meals in Burundi for every kilogram. They have around 100 corporate customers and also supply just as many Dean & David restaurants.
You know the coffee farmers personally
The Greulichs know the five coffee farmers from Burundi, Brazil, Guatemala and India, from whom they get their goods, personally. Marcial, for example, who is already 80 years old and works on a finca in Guatemala. Anyone who has ever held a pack of coffee from Bean United in their hands: it is the man with the hat in the company logo. An essential factor is the appreciation in the form of fair prices for high-quality green coffee. The Oberhaching-based start-up pays an average of just under five euros per kilo. The world market price is around two euros, the fair trade price around 2.80 euros per kilo. “Our coffee beans are traded directly with the coffee fincas and without intermediaries,” promise the Greulich brothers.
In the near future, Thomas Greulich wants to set off again for Rwanda, Ethiopia and Burundi and also visit the project they support. “These are great people, very positive,” he enthuses. “It’s not about saying, these are poor people, we have to help them. We see full potential there to do things on our own, we want to give a boost.” At the local cooperative, parents cook school lunch for the 200 children at four in the morning. A meal costs 25 cents.
In addition to selling the coffee, the brothers have long wanted to test their entry into the catering industry with a pop-up café. “That has so far failed due to the very high fees,” says Thomas Greulich. That’s why last year he asked Oberhaching’s mayor, Stefan Schelle, if it wouldn’t be possible to sell windows in the former ticket office of the station. “The mayor then showed us the luggage compartment and I knew right away: That’s it,” Greulich continued. The only condition of the municipality: the toilets must be open to the public.
Bean United has invested 20,000 euros to re-route the electricity in the old train station and to fix the sanitary facilities. Friends and the artist Nico Lettl helped with the rest of the design, including the colorful public toilet. Much could remain as it was, because this is what gives the building its charm. The brothers’ father also lent a hand and when he wanted to remove a few cobwebs from the corner with his foot, the plaster fell down and the stones came out. Greulich, who is familiar with this type of design from bars in Lisbon and knows that his people from Oberhaching are not as conservative as one might think, says: “That was the perfect look.”