From Coffee Kiosk To Billion-Dollar Business: How Scooter’s Became One Of America’s Top Franchises

ByChloe Sorvino,

Forbes Staff.

M

ore than a decade into running his Omaha-based coffeeshop chain Scooter’s, founder Don Eckles wrote a letter to Warren Buffett to see if Berkshire Hathaway might be interested in buying his business. The Oracle of his hometown wrote back asking for additional information and they “went back and forth a couple of times.”

Buffett ultimately determined that Scooter’s—which had been bootstrapped with money borrowed from friends and family—was too small “to move the needle for Berkshire.” But Buffett suggested another Nebraska investor, M-One Capital, and that introduction eventually led to a 2018 deal that freed Eckles up to go all-in on expansion.