Management

ABOUT | OUR COFFEE | OUR TEA | MANAGEMENT

Renée Brown

Renée Brown is a co-founder of Wild Card Roasters and Weaver’s Coffee & Tea, where she leads teams across operations, sales, and marketing while driving the company’s ecommerce, digital, data, and artificial intelligence strategy.

Renée is focused on the intersection of coffee, ecommerce, data, AI, and customer experience, using technology and automation to improve how the company operates, markets, sells, supports customers, and builds the Weaver’s Coffee & Tea brand.

In 2015, Renée led the restructuring of Weaver’s Coffee & Tea, strengthening the company’s direct-to-consumer business and building an integrated ecommerce and digital marketing platform. Her leadership spans ecommerce, sales and marketing, supply chain, logistics, operations, customer experience, and the systems that support the company’s continued growth.

Michael Brown

Michael Brown is a co-founder of Wild Card Roasters and Weaver’s Coffee & Tea, bringing decades of experience in international retail development, franchise operations, technology, licensing, and global business strategy.

Before founding Wild Card Roasters, Michael served as Vice President, International Retail Business Development Worldwide at Warner Bros. Consumer Products. During his tenure, he managed the development and opening of 150 retail stores in 18 countries in eight years, while directing international retail activities across Asia Pacific, Europe, the Middle East, Africa, and Latin America.

Michael spent more than a decade living and working in Hong Kong and Japan, where he developed and implemented international retail and franchise business models for global brands. His experience spans franchise development, retail operations, consumer products licensing, sourcing and manufacturing, technology, and international business development.

Throughout his career, Michael has worked at the intersection of retail, franchise systems, technology, and operations, developing the business models, systems, and infrastructure needed to deliver consistent brand and customer experiences across international markets.

At Wild Card Roasters, Michael applies that experience to business development, retail and franchise strategy, technology, operations, and the continued development of Weaver’s Coffee & Tea.

John Weaver

John Weaver is a co-founder of Wild Card Roasters and Weaver’s Coffee & Tea and serves as Master Coffee Roaster, bringing more than four decades of hands-on coffee roasting experience to the company.

John began his coffee career at Peet’s Coffee in 1980. From 1980 through 1984, he worked side by side with Alfred Peet and Sal Bonavita, learning the craft of hand-roasting coffee and hand-blending tea directly from two pioneers of specialty coffee and tea. John continued his career at Peet’s as Master Coffee Roaster, remaining with the company through 2007—a 27-year career devoted to developing his expertise in green coffee selection, roasting, blending, cupping, and tea tasting.

In 2007, John left Peet’s Coffee to co-found Wild Card Roasters and Weaver’s Coffee & Tea in San Rafael, California.

Over the course of his career, John has evaluated thousands of green coffee samples and developed extensive knowledge of how origin, processing, green coffee quality, roast development, and blending influence flavor in the cup. His experience extends to tea, with decades of tasting and evaluating teas from major tea-producing regions around the world.

Today, John leads the coffee roasting and quality standards behind Weaver’s Coffee & Tea. His approach combines experience, sensory evaluation, and hands-on roasting to develop coffees with distinctive flavor, aroma, body, balance, and consistency.

More than four decades after he first began roasting coffee, John remains directly involved in the craft selecting, roasting, blending, and tasting the coffees that define Weaver’s Coffee & Tea.

Bryce Inouye

Bryce Inouye is a co-founder of Wild Card Roasters and Weaver’s Coffee & Tea, bringing more than three decades of experience in international business, brand development, licensing, retail operations, and the Asia-Pacific market.

Before co-founding Wild Card Roasters, Bryce spent more than a decade at Warner Bros. Consumer Products in Asia, working alongside Michael Brown and holding leadership roles across international retail operations, franchise operations, consumer products licensing, brand marketing, and retail business development.

His experience also spans sourcing and manufacturing, advertising, public relations, business affairs, new media, and the management of creative and marketing teams. This broad background has given Bryce extensive experience developing brands and bringing products to market across different countries, cultures, and distribution channels.

Based in Tokyo, Japan, Bryce maintains longstanding relationships throughout the Asia-Pacific region, including connections with international entertainment companies, intellectual property owners, manufacturers, and sourcing partners.

At Wild Card Roasters, Bryce brings an international perspective to brand development, licensing, sourcing, strategic partnerships, and business development, supporting the continued growth of Wild Card Roasters and Weaver’s Coffee & Tea.