Danny O'Neill is the "Bean Baron" of The Roasterie, inc., a specialty coffee roasting company which services espresso bars and coffee houses, fine restaurants, high-end grocers, offices and retail accounts. Danny started The Roasterie in the basement of his Brookside home in November 1993.

It all began during his last year of high school when Danny spent the year in Costa Rica as an exchange student. While visiting, he spent several weeks picking coffee, and it was at this time that his passion for coffee ignited. Since then, Danny has made hundreds of trips to origin, touring different segments of the coffee industry and locating premier coffee bean estates.

Since The Roasterie's inception, Danny has become a sought-after expert in the ever growing coffee industry. He has judged cupping and barista competitions all around the world since 1995. In April 2001, he was awarded "Super Taster" status on the Specialty Coffee Institute Sensory Aptitude Test. In 2005, he authored a DVD, Cupping 101, which is sold around the world.

Danny's business experience includes ten years in varied sales and marketing positions, spending the last seven of those years with a large multinational corporation. In his final position, Danny was responsible for an entire industry segment, with sales in excesses of $80 million. Danny serves on a number of advisory boards for various local companies and associations, and is currently on the Board of Trustees at Park University, Board of Regents at Rockhurst University, Board of Directors for FastTrac, and past President of the Specialty Coffee Association of America.

Danny was born and raised in Denison, Iowa, and is the middle of ten children. Receiving a B.A. from Iowa State University in 1983, Danny graduated with a double major in International Studies and Political Science and a structured minor in Economics. In 1993, Danny received an M.B.A. from the Rockhurst University Executive Fellows Program in Kansas City.