Dutch Bros Puts Its CEO and Executives Behind the Counter
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Christine Barone runs a coffee chain valued at $7.5 billion, and she can also work its shop counter. The Dutch Bros CEO completed the two-week "broista" bootcamp that every other top leader at the company goes through.
Six shifts and a test
The course includes six shifts of hands-on shop training. Leaders practise hospitality, perfect drink orders and learn the values the company puts first: speed, quality and service. One goal is that a drink such as the popular Golden Eagle coffee tastes the same on Monday as on Wednesday.
At the end comes a "Flow" test. Questions cover recipes, company history, shop operations and culture. Anyone who fails retakes it.
Barone says her team knew she was the CEO and still pointed out her mistakes. She counts that as a sign of a strong culture, because it shows the crew cares about the customer.
Headquarters goes through it too
The training is part of what the company calls a "growth from within" model. Store owners and senior managers have taken it for years, and the chain has 25,000 broistas. As the course reached more of headquarters, Barone says the company made sure marketing staff took part, especially those who help design drinks. Her reasoning was that anyone shaping programs or beverages should know what the shop floor feels like.
She says a large number of headquarters workers started as broistas. In her view that lets senior people decide "through the right lenses". Operators, who run a store or a market, also begin on the coffee line before they move up and into new markets.
From a pushcart to 1,273 shops
The company began in 1992 as a pushcart with 100 pounds of coffee beans in Grants Pass, Oregon. Brothers Travis Boersma and the late Dane Boersma started it after their family dairy business struggled. A drive-thru stand followed in 1994, six locations by 1996, and the first franchise in 2000.
By 2018 there were 300 locations and 9,000 employees, and TSG Consumer Partners bought a minority stake. Dutch Bros reported revenue of $1.64 billion in 2025, up 27.9%. It now has 37,000 systemwide employees and 1,273 locations in 27 states, and it hopes to reach 2,029 stores in 2029.
Fortune notes that keeping a home-grown culture gets harder as headcount grows and outside investors arrive. Barone describes hospitality as thinking through how someone else will experience something, more than how you do. She says empathy is a skill that serves people whether they stay at Dutch Bros or leave.
Source: Fortune