Meet Jaren Mendel, the UGA sophomore behind Karma Coffee

Do a good deed, get a cup of coffee – no money required

Some of the best things about walking around UGA’s campus in the fall are that you can smell the crisp air, see the colorful leaves and finally wear those sweatshirts you’ve been dying to wear all semester. Another fall staple that is extremely popular among college students is drinking a warm cup of coffee on a chilly fall day.

Whether it’s a seasonal pumpkin spice latte, an always-trendy mocha, or a boosting espresso shot, most students rely on the occasional comfort of a simple cup of coffee. This is the basis of UGA student Jaren Mendel’s new initiative called Karma Coffee.

Karma Coffee has found a way to not only warm people’s bodies with a steaming cup of joe, but also to warm people’s hearts by inspiring students to perform acts of kindness. The Tab UGA sat down for a Q&A with Jaren about Karma Coffee.

Karma Coffee table outside the Miller Learning Center

Tell us a little bit about yourself.

My name is Jaren Mendel, and I am a sophomore accounting major. I have been doing karate for 14 years now and love any chance to do extreme sports. I love meeting people and of course, I love Karma Coffee.

What is Karma Coffee?

Karma Coffee is a coffee service, you could say, where you pay for your cup of coffee with an act of kindness rather than with money. It’s more or less free coffee, but once you do your good deed you’ve essentially paid for the coffee.

What inspired you to start this organization?

The original inspiration was being a scared little freshman at UGA, and walking around and seeing the opportunity to connect people to each other. Like, you see people walking around with their phones and not making eye contact with each other or people like those who work at the dining hall or the front desks at Creswell, for example. So that was the original inspiration: to find a way to break down the personal spheres and bubbles that separate people.

Do you have a story about someone’s act of kindness that stands out the most?

Yeah. I always go back to this one. This guy wrote me a very long message. He initially told me: “Let’s be honest, I came for the coffee and was kind of bummed when I found out that I had to do an act of kindness.” However, his act of kindness was greeting the custodial staff. That’s one of the acts of kindness that is very foundational to Karma Coffee – saying a simple “hi” to custodial staff, or even the people making your eggs in the morning.

He had experienced the previous divide that we all experience with custodial staff. You know, when you keep your eyes straight ahead and don’t really say anything. However, the simple act of greeting a custodian had a profound impact on him. So that’s always been my favorite story – because that is the essence of what we try to inspire.

Do you have any future goals with the organization?

In the near future, we are trying to serve 2,000 cups (this year). So we currently have about 1,500 more to go. That’s one of the goals. I really want to make the “Big 3” – Miracle, HEROS and Relay – the “Big 4” by adding Karma Coffee into that mix. Eventually, I want to be able to put up a sign and people already know about our organization, where we don’t need to have four or five people who have to explain the initiative. I hope that people will just know that Karma Coffee is a movement to brighten the community, to make the community warm, to connect people with doing acts of kindness and to keep the thought of doing acts of kindness in the back of people’s minds.

If you’re out and about on campus and pass Karma Coffee, stop by and celebrate the win-win situation of getting to treat yourself to a cup of coffee and pay it forward by doing a random act of kindness for a member of this great community we call home.

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