Nestled among the pine trees along a stretch of Big Lake Road sits a tiny blue building. If the signs are out on the roadside, the coffee kiosk is open for business.
Jackson Ripley and his family opened the shop MiigWitches Brew in 2024, fulfilling a dream that began years earlier when the COVID-19 pandemic was in full effect. His spouse, Lyz Jaakola, found the kiosk for sale online in 2020, fully equipped as a coffee shop.
“ We had been doing nothing but drinking coffee, being at home, and I'd slowly start getting into more, different variations of coffee with using a mocha pot, thinking about espresso,” Ripley said. “And so I said, ‘Yeah, let's try it.’”
Ripley, 55, wanted to bring quality coffee to his community on the Fond du Lac Reservation in northeastern Minnesota. He and his family’s business have found success while prioritizing community over profits.
“That was kind of like our business mindset is that we would just serve the community and hopefully we’d make a little bit of money.”
‘Close to family, to friends, to culture’
As vehicles make their way down the drive, Ripley often recognizes the car or work truck and is already making the drink by the time the customer pulls up to the window.
Before the kiosk opened, customers living and working in the reservation community would need to press on a few more miles to the neighboring city of Cloquet.
The flagship coffee shop sits on Ripley’s family property on the reservation, about a mile from the tribal community center. His spouse is a tribal citizen of the Fond du Lac Band of Lake Superior Chippewa. Ripley is from the Mandan, Hidatsa and Arikara Nation in North Dakota.
They’ve raised their family at Fond du Lac. Ripley’s in-laws, who are elders, live with them. His kids work with him at the shop and he can pop out from time to time to address his in-laws' needs.
“I feel like it's important for Native people to give back, or to be there for their families,” he said.
Proximity to family was a motivator in choosing a location for the business. And that’s not rare.
In a survey of 400 Native entrepreneurs, respondents said some of the perceived advantages to opening on tribal lands were financial benefits, familiarity with the location and being “close to family, to friends, to culture,” said Casey Lozar, director of the Center for Indian Country Development at the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis.
‘The heart is always in it’
Miigwech means “thank you” in the Ojibwe language. Ripley credits Jaakola, 57, with the shop's clever name. Combining coffee, language and magic, the name became MiigWitches Brew. The logo is a cauldron with Ojibwe florals.
MiigWitches Brew is expanding. A year and a half after opening the kiosk, the family added another location 10 miles away at the Fond du Lac Tribal and Community College.
Jezlyn Abramowski expertly chats with customers while crafting coffee orders in a space that once served concessions during sporting events.
Abramowski, a Fond du Lac Band member, works as a barista while taking a leave of absence from her university studies. She said she needed time to address her mental health and that MiigWitches Brew is the right place for that.
“I feel like the heart is always in it, and you’re always serving your community, your people,” Abramowski said. “Especially up here on the rez, I feel like it's become a really essential part of our community to have MiigWitches Brew.”
Abramowski finds comfort in working at a business that supports her values and makes space for cultural ceremonies and events.
“Working for an Ojibwe business has been extremely healing for me as an Anishinaabekwe living in the world that we're living in right now.”
Perks that matter
The circle of support also extends to other local small businesses. Ripley sources his coffee beans from a roaster on the North Shore, and he gets his treat supply from a nearby Indigenous baker. For MiigWitches Brew’s signature drink, the maple latte, he gets maple syrup from a local Native farm.
“What we see from our Native entrepreneurs is, really, we prioritize supporting each other over making an outrageous profit,” said Andrea Reese, CEO of the Mni Sota Fund. The Mni Sota Fund is a Native community development financial institution that supports entrepreneurs through business loans and workshops.
“We’re just really rooted in values and culture, so that support of and for our community is really prioritized over anything else.”
Amid the sounds of steaming milk, vehicles pulling up to the kiosk window, and laughter with customers, Ripley has found a rhythm. There are hints that there may be even more opportunities to enjoy MiigWitches Brew in the near future via a mobile coffee shop.
He says he may not be the main breadwinner in his family, but he gets to bring good coffee to his community and he’s present for their kids. And for Ripley, those are the perks that matter.
This story comes from the Upper Midwest Newsroom, a public media collaboration between Wisconsin Public Radio, South Dakota Public Broadcasting, Prairie Public in North Dakota, and Minnesota Public Radio News made possible by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.
