Merely six years old at the time, Charli Johnson expressed to her father her desire to start a coffee business. Accepting the challenge, her father, T.Shane Johnson, told her if she came up with a name and a logo, they would work together to make it happen. Sure enough, she created the brand idea of Big Guns Coffee that same day.

The inspiration behind Charli's dream stemmed from her father's strength. A military veteran, he achieved world records for pushups and participated in runs across America. Charlie wanted people to feel empowered, just as her father did during those intense workouts, and she believed coffee could be the conduit.

Having written multiple books, including Done by 2:30 focusing on work-life balance and the importance of fathers’ relationships with their children, T.Shane Johnson and his daughter opened the Big Guns Coffee shop. Once they were in business, they realized that despite coffee being the second most consumed beverage in the United States, its origins remain widely unknown by drinkers. This realization prompted the father-daughter team to embark on a mission to educate people about the journey from bean to cup.

At a visit to Frontline to Farm, a program for disabled veterans by Appalachian State University, Johnson met another veteran who worked with hydroponics. After extensively “picking his brain” as well as doing his own research, Johnson and his daughter took an entrepreneurial gamble and developed a hydroponic system for growing coffee.

“I took every bit of savings I had and dumped it into the project,” T.Shane Johnson said. “We failed a lot and learned a lot. It may not have been the best way to go about it, but we did it, and now we are growing coffee indoors.”

Their coffee shop serves as an educational platform to showcase the hydroponic system they developed, explaining the trees, cherries, and growing process to visitors. Their vision is to occupy empty warehouses to produce high-quality indoor coffee.

“We hope to create some kind of economic development opportunity out of this system,” T.Shane Johnson said. “Farmers deal with a lot of challenges. This type of farming can lead to more jobs right here, and we’re not going to turn them into tech geeks overnight because that’s not the aspect of farming they love, but it’s possible to attract a new generation of farmers who can allow people to combine technology to create easier work and potentially better-paying jobs."

Leveraging an opportunity with Isothermal Community College’s business incubator program has allowed the Johnsons to subsidize upfront costs including space, utilities, and lighting. Their research and development department is testing different coffee varieties, and in the meantime, they are expecting about 100 pounds of coffee from their initial harvest.

“We should be able to create and control the environment to trick the trees and push another harvest out of them right after that,” T.Shane Johnson said. “The trees don’t have to go through a four-year cycle like it does in the traditional climate. We can create the climate for them again and encourage them to produce again right away.”

While Big Guns already sells coffee across the country, they also sell candles and soaps from recycled grinds. They are working toward placing their products into grocery stores, but unlike other coffee brands, Big Guns’ goal is to put trees in the produce section for people to understand the association. They also act as a nursery, selling coffee trees as house plants. The bigger vision involves selling and consulting on the concept and the process. 

“The idea is to come to farmers who want to continue farming, but for whatever reason, cannot continue with their original product,” T.Shane Johnson said. “They can transition into hydroponically-grown coffee, allowing them to continue growing their business and farming tradition. We want to maintain the integrity of small town America by helping farmers generate enough revenue to have a decent quality of life in today’s society.

“It’s also about maintaining the integrity of dreaming big right now,” T.Shane Johnson said. “It shows how far we are willing to go, not only to educate people about coffee and farming, but more importantly about the relationship with a young girl who decides to dream. If we can support and get behind this as a priority as parents and listen more as students than teachers, it can create a paradigm shift in the world.”

Owned by nine-year-old Charli Johnson and her father T.Shane Johnson, Big Guns Coffee in Tryon operates a coffee shop and North Carolina’s first hydroponically-grown coffee farm. Learn more at BigGunsCoffee.com.