AT PARTIES—even his company's own—Jason
Long's usually off to the side, having quiet,
involved discussions with people whose interests
fascinate him the most: travel, family, scotch, and
coffee, of course. Once you know him, his modes-
ty seems almost silly: Jason is one of the global
specialty-coffee industry's most accomplished and
visionary green-coffee importers. In partnership
with Café Imports founder Andrew Miller, Jason
is behind everything the celebrated Minneapolis-
based company does, with both Jason and Andrew
focusing on different parts of the whole. Given
Jason's affability and humility, however, you
wouldn't guess he's one of the most influential and
prominent people our industry has seen in the last
few decades—he's just that easygoing.
Maybe part of it is his Midwestern upbringing
in southern Indiana, where his biggest crimes
were the elaborate doodles he favored over class-
room work. "I think I was just generally a happy
kid with no real idea of what was going on around
me," says Jason via email from a sourcing trip to
Brazil he was on in June. "I do remember when
I was 8 thinking, 'This is pretty great. I am old
enough to do stuff and don't have a lot of things
that I have to do.'"
Jason Long
Innovating Green-Coffee Importing
By Sarah Allen
MASTER
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