Four Barrel Coffee owner accused of sexual assault by ex-employees
Former employees of Four Barrel Coffee, San Francisco’s popular coffee roaster, filed a lawsuit on Friday in San Francisco Superior Court against the company and its founder Jeremy Tooker, alleging he sexually assaulted multiple women, harassed others and created a toxic workplace culture for Four Barrel’s female staff members.
The eight women named in the lawsuit allege incidents where Tooker assaulted a female employee in a hotel room; grabbed another female employee’s neck with enough force to cause soreness; and threatened to fire a staff member for speaking to a former Four Barrel employee.
Overall, the suit depicts a company with rampant sexual misconduct, and an ownership group — led by Tooker, along with partners Jodi Geren and Tal Mor — that chose to address neither the misconduct nor employees’ complaints about it.
The ethos was evident to the public in the brand’s merchandise — mugs adorned with “F— it” and “Suck it,” and secret menu items like the “Dickens Cider,” meant to sound as if the customer said “dick inside her.”
The Chronicle interviewed 14 former employees over two months, 10 of whom spoke on the record regarding the workplace culture at the coffee company. All 10 said both
Geren and Mor were aware of Tooker’s behavior yet did not address complaints in an official capacity.
Neither Tooker, Geren nor Mor responded to Chronicle inquiries regarding the allegations.
Though eight women came forward with allegations in the lawsuit, two — Megan Kepnach and Karley Webb — are listed as plaintiffs, seeking damages from Tooker and Four Barrel.
The accusations against Tooker and Four Barrel are a continuation of a watershed moment in the food world that has seen detailed investigations surrounding high-profile chefs like John Besh in New Orleans, and Johnny Iuzzini and Mario Batali in New York.
In the Bay Area, 17 women accused Oakland chef Charlie Hallowell of sexual harassment. In the wake of The Chronicle investigation, he apologized and stepped down from day-to-day duties, though his future at his restaurants, which include Pizzaiolo, Boot & Shoe Service and Penrose, remains unclear.
Ken Friedman, a co-owner of Tosca Cafe in San Francisco, was accused by 10 female employees of harassment and blacklisting, according to the New York Times; he also apologized while retaining ownership. Michael Chiarello, who owns Coqueta in San Francisco and Bottega in Yountville, has settled two sexual harassment lawsuits in recent years.
As with many of those cases, female workers at Four Barrel have been inspired by the #MeToo movement to come forward and speak out about behavior that many said has been normalized in the restaurant industry.
“Jeremy’s behavior has been an open secret for years. But it’s always been kind of shrugged off,” Umeko Motoyoshi, who worked for Four Barrel from 2013 to 2015, told The Chronicle. “A lot of people were afraid of hurting their careers by saying something.”
Tooker is well known in national coffee circles. In 2008, he made headlines when he left Ritual Coffee Roasters to open Four Barrel on Valencia Street. Five years later, he partnered with Josey Baker to open the Mill on Divisadero, where news of the cafe’s $4 artisan toast went viral. Both businesses have proved incredibly popular in San Francisco, with regular lines out the door. A third Four Barrel outpost opened in Portola in October 2013, and the company’s beans are sold throughout San Francisco.
If Blue Bottle was the highend Bay Area coffee roaster with a clean-cut image, Four Barrel was the coffee outfit embracing San Francisco’s counterculture history.
Molly Haight, a former employee who worked at Four Barrel for more than two years, told The Chronicle Four Barrel’s sexually explicit merchandise and secret menu items were seen as a boon to business by upper management.
“I think these branding tactics and products are a way for Four Barrel to be represented as ‘cool’ and not corporate, and that’s exactly what people in San Francisco want to buy into,” she said.
Another former employee, Erika Schrader, who worked for Four Barrel between 2013 and 2015, described Four Barrel to The Chronicle as an “anti-hipster” empire where
Tooker hired employees with “punk rock” styles.
“I think he watched too many Guns N’ Roses road documentaries. That type of lifestyle just doesn’t happen,” Schrader said. “It was a misunderstanding of the employee-manager dynamic.”
Tayler Mehit, a former employee who worked for Four Barrel between May 2013 and April 2017, said the company’s reputation was common knowledge within the industry. “Other folks within specialty coffee companies certainly know about Jeremy and the general sexist atmosphere at Four Barrel.”
While the lawsuit spans multiple years, it largely focuses on Tooker’s behavior at two company parties in 2015. In court documents, the events are described as alcohol-fueled affairs where the company management mingled closely with lower-level employees.
According to the lawsuit, Tooker made lewd comments during speeches to staff members at these parties, as well as simulated sexual acts with employees and forced attendees to play a game called “kiss or slap,” wherein Tooker would approach employees and force them to either kiss him or slap him.
Cobrina Grieco, an employee of Josey Baker Bread at the Mill, said in the lawsuit that she attended Four Barrel’s “family night music show” anniversary party at Smiley’s Saloon in Bolinas on Oct. 8, 2015.
The lawsuit states that Tooker “forcibly grabbed” Grieco and “kissed her against her will” multiple times throughout the party. In court documents, Tooker’s actions at the Bolinas party are corroborated by fellow employees Britta Leijonflych, Mehit and Kepnach.
According to the lawsuit, the following is alleged to have taken place later that night: In a hotel room reserved for Four Barrel employees, Tooker “forcefully pushed onto the bed and laid on top of ” Grieco, while she repeatedly said no. Tooker “managed to get her pants down to her thighs” and only stopped when several Four Barrel employees entered the room.
Kepnach alleges in the lawsuit that Tooker also attempted to kiss her that night in Bolinas, at one point grabbing the back of her head. One week after telling her manager, Brett Whitman, about the incidents, she was called into Whitman’s office and was told she was fired because she “was not a good fit” for the company, according to the lawsuit.
Webb, a Four Barrel barista from 2014 to 2016, said she too was forcibly kissed by Tooker at the Bolinas party, according to court documents. Webb also said in the lawsuit that she went to the hospital following a different Four Barrel party, out of fear that she’d been given a date rape drug. The lawsuit does not mention if Webb brought the incident to the attention of Four Barrel management, yet the company subsequently fired her for “being difficult,” according to the filing.
For those women who remained with the company after being propositioned or forcibly touched, such parties created uncomfortable workplace dynamics, said Mehit.
“This is the person who basically gives us the money to pay our rent. We work for him. He’s the one who helps us survive in San Francisco,” Mehit told The Chronicle. “It was just an awkward situation.”
Four Barrel had a human resources department, several employees told The Chronicle, but the responses to complaints were often dismissive, they said. The lawsuit describes an instance in which former Four Barrel employee Emily Haddad was overheard by the company’s human resources representative discussing the offensive nature of Four Barrel merchandise, and was told that she was not permitted to speak disparagingly about the company.
“I, as well as others, did not feel like HR was actually there for the safety and comfort of employees,” Haddad told The Chronicle.
Employees said they received similar reactions when bringing concerns about Tooker’s behavior to upper levels of management. According to the suit, partners Geren and Mor responded to complaints about Tooker sexually assaulting multiple women at the Bolinas party by telling the employees not to “create drama.”
“HR was just an extension of the owners. I never felt comfortable saying anything to the HR rep because he was a close friend with the owners,” Motoyoshi said.
According to Mehit, the behavior by Tooker and members of the Four Barrel management team was rarely addressed in an overarching capacity, leaving some employees feeling as though the culture would never change during their tenures with the company.
The Four Barrel workforce was diminutive enough for Tooker to have close relationships with many of the employees, said another former employee, Haight. Tooker often described the company as “a family,” she told The Chronicle.
“It wasn’t like a positive environment.” said Haight. “The dysfunctional family term is one I threw around a lot while I was there.”
Haight described Tooker as the foundation from which the company’s toxicity grew.
“Jeremy wanted to be cool. He wanted to be part of the crowd, I think,” Haight said. “I just don’t think he ever learned to set boundaries.”