Owners Kari & Eric Starkey are salt of the earth Okies. While they love roasting organic, fair trade coffee for a living, their passion is creating art in the world and supporting other local artists through their coffee business. Kari is a producer & director. Eric’s an actor & writer who recently had small parts in the movies Stillwater and Minari.
LEAP is a beautiful extension of Kari & Eric’s hearts & is home to their unique "Artist Series" program, where they collaborate with local artists to create One-Of-A-Kind Coffee Blends that help support the artists creatively & financially.
Kari ran the Yippie Yi Yo Cafe in the early 90's. Of course the coffee was fabulous, but what made the cafe stand out was the people & the community it evolved into. All these years later, that same homegrown magic and intentionality is what sets LEAP Roasters apart from the rest.
Eric wears lots of hats and fills too many roles to count inside our OKC Art Warehouse. His passion for coffee helped him succeed in the corporate jungle by day & kept him awake to write and act by night. These two worlds converged when he decided to use everything he’s learned to build his own business where he didn’t have to separate his love from livelihood. He took a LEAP!
Kari & Eric are truly in awe of the love, care and creativity that radiates from their LEAP Team, family, friends, vendor partners and customers.
