BTTR Ventures

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BTTR Ventures (pronounced "Better") is a Berkeley, CA, based company that stands for "back to the roots". BTTR Ventures collects over 6000 lbs of coffee grounds weekly from Peet's Coffee & Tea to use as the substrate for growing gourmet oyster mushrooms. BTTR produces (a) oyster mushrooms for sale, (b) the BTTR Gourmet Garden grow-it-at-home mushroom kit and (c) compost that is enriched by the growth of mushrooms.

Origins

BTTR was formed by graduates of UC Berkeley, Alex Velez and Nikhil Arora. While studying at the University of California, Berkeley's Haas School of Business, they heard in a Business Ethics course taught by Professor Alan Ross the fact coffee grounds could serve as growing medium for gourmet mushrooms.Inspired by the concept and using a social innovation grant from UC Berkeley's Bear Breaking Boundaries competition, the duo founded BTTR in 2009, partnering with Peet's Coffee & Tea(PEET) as a source of coffee grounds and Whole Foods Market (WFMI), which now purchases the company's mushrooms and mushroom kits for its 28 Bay Area stores.

Awards

Runner-up, BBC / Newsweek World Challenge 2009
Winner, UC Berkeley Bears Breaking Boundaries Social Innovation Business Plan Competition
Named a Top 25 Sustainable Company by the UCLA Opportunity Green Conference
Founders Nikhil Arora and Alex Velez Named Top 25 Entrepreneurs Under 25 by Businessweek

Process

BTTR relies on a local model to collect waste from Peet's Coffee & Tea throughout the Bay Area in Northern California coffee stores. These grounds are used to grow mushrooms and mushroom kits (BTTR Gourmet Garden) at the local Emeryville warehouse. These products are sold back to local consumers at Whole Foods, farmers' markets, local restaurants, and the Berkeley Co-op system. The compost that results from growing mushrooms is then both donated back to local urban farms such as the Richmond High School garden, and sold to various nurseries. By doing so, the company aims to add three life cycles to products previously considered waste, setting standards for resource management in local communities.