Boku Adds Healthy New Dimension with Café
Like most origin stories, BōKU Café’s is steeped in love and discovery—the love of a mother and discovery in the journey to wellness.
When her son was diagnosed with attention deficit disorder (ADD) 26 years ago, BōKU CEO Lynn Rollé wanted to find an alternative to putting her 5-year-old on Ritalin. At a time when natural-food stores were not very prevalent in the Florida area where she lived, she considers herself quite fortunate to have randomly met a pediatrician in the one store she found. He had attended a conference in California, and recommended a “superfood” product he had heard of there.
“We didn’t have internet much back then, so somehow I found it and ordered it,” says Lynn. “It was very green and tasted like licking the bottom of my lawn mower.”
Reno Rollé Jr., now 31 with a degree in plant-based nutrition and a brewing certification, adds, “It looked like fish flakes. Oh my God, it was terrible. The only thing we had to mix it with was apple or orange juice, so it was citrusy and green.”
But it worked, Lynn tells me. So much so that Reno Jr.’s teacher thought that he had been taking the drug. “I thought, ‘Wow! I’ve got something here.’ So I started doing research and coming up with all these ingredients.” She learned about foods from all over the world that contained high levels of nutrients, many of which had been eaten by our ancestors in some form for health and longevity.
Some years later, the family moved to Ojai for her husband, Reno Sr.’s, work. With the kids in middle school, Lynn found she had some extra time and decided to really focus on the superfoods she had been feeding her family. She began working with naturopathic doctor BJ Adrezin to formulate certified organic, biodynamic, kosher and vegan powders and snacks. In 2007, BōKU started selling direct-to-consumer to offset the exorbitant costs of consuming and using these products.
Lynn quickly met many challenges common to running a small business in a large-business industry and solved some by opening her own blending facility in Ventura. She expanded and outgrew the space several times and in 2017, found the facility on Ojai Avenue just north of the Ojai Valley Inn within biking distance of home. It took a while to build out the location to fit all of their needs, but Lynn says there was always a plan to have some sort of café and store there, just not run by her.
“We really beat the doors down to find someone to lease the space,” she says. “We had a lovely couple interested and even got the café application in their name. Then COVID hit and it just kind of derailed everyone.”
Left with few other options, Lynn did what she had done with the superfood company: She buckled down to learn everything she needed to open BōKU Café.
Looking to the future of driving, they set up the BōKU parking lot with EV charging stations from Tesla and Electrify America. “It’s really exciting, what we are doing,” says Reno Sr. “With the café opening, you can charge your car and charge your body. We are offering clean energy for both—earth-friendly and human-friendly!”
Indeed, earth-friendly and human-friendly appears to be a deeply embedded philosophy of the Rollé family. “For me it’s a passion,” he says. “It is estimated that 70% of food grown in North America is wasted. But we take everything. Even the ugly ones they won’t sell because of a damage or bruising. Our process of harvesting, drying and powdering captures peak nutrition and essentially removes perishability from the equation.”
The café’s plant-based menu was designed in collaboration with chef Todd English and Jasmine Jacobson (who developed the beverage menu for Café Gratitude). It features superfood smoothies, bread from Ojai Rotîe, Revel Kombucha on tap, SunOven gluten free baked goods, local produce from Ojai Roots and a coffee bar brewing freshly roasted Bonito coffee. All water used for the recipes is hyper-oxygenated, restructured, from Ophora in Santa Barbara and the “milks” and creamers are all proprietary plant-based seed butters developed by Reno Jr.
With its prime location right on the bike path, the café is bike-and dog-friendly and even features a “Bark Bar” to nourish its four-legged patrons.
987 W. Ojai Ave. For more information, visit BokuSuperfood.com.
