Taking the Weird to New Places: How Weird Brothers Coffee Is Growing With Per Diem

TLDR

Weird Brothers Coffee started with two brothers, a love of fresh roasted coffee, and an idea for a coffee shop that felt different. Today, the veteran-owned Virginia roaster has three operating coffee shops, another location coming to Vienna, and its first franchise locations on the way. As the business grows, Weird Brothers wants to offer the convenience customers expect from larger coffee brands without losing what made people connect with it in the first place. Its partnership with Per Diem is helping the team do exactly that.

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It Started With Two Brothers

Coffee was always part of the family

Long before Weird Brothers Coffee had shops across Northern Virginia, there were Paul and Kenny Olsen.

The brothers grew up with coffee as part of everyday life, from conversations around the family kitchen to time spent in neighborhood coffeehouses. Their father, Daryl, later helped them turn that shared interest into a business.

Paul's path to coffee also took him much farther from home. During his time in the Army, he traveled across the country and around the world. A visit to Harar, Ethiopia, one of the world's historic coffee regions, became an important part of that journey. He returned with an even deeper appreciation for coffee and a desire to share what he had discovered with the people around him.

Eventually, that idea became Weird Brothers Coffee.

Serious coffee, without the serious attitude

The brothers wanted to build a specialty coffee company without the stuffiness they sometimes saw around specialty coffee.

That thinking shaped the name, personality, and experience of Weird Brothers. The coffee could be carefully sourced and roasted while the business itself stayed fun, welcoming and a little unusual.

In 2016, Weird Brothers opened its first coffee bar at its Roasting Factory in Herndon, becoming the city's first coffee roaster.

Not long after the first coffee bar opened, Kenny passed away. Paul and his family continued what the brothers had started, carrying Kenny's personality and spirit into the business as it grew.

That history gives the brand a personal foundation that still matters today. Weird Brothers has grown, but it has never tried to turn itself into a polished, anonymous coffee chain.

A business connected to its community

The same personality extends beyond its shops.

Weird Brothers has used coffee to support causes close to its community. Its Recovery Blend was created with the Chris Atwood Foundation, with 20% of proceeds supporting addiction recovery services.

The company has also worked with Herndon High School to give neurodiverse students practical work experience. Through the school's Brewing Independence program, students learn skills connected to running a coffee business.

These are small details in the larger company story, but they help explain what Weird Brothers wants to preserve as it grows: a business with real roots in the places it serves.

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The Next Chapter Is Already Brewing

New shops are only the beginning

Weird Brothers now serves customers at the Roasting Factory and Worldgate Centre in Herndon, along with Leesburg Village. Its website also lists a new Vienna shop as coming in summer 2026.

The next step takes the business into new territory.

Weird Brothers is moving into franchising. Paul Olsen, Owner and CEO, shared with Per Diem that the company is opening its first franchise locations and hopes to add at least three more locations next year.

For a business that began as a family-run roaster, that is a meaningful shift. Weird Brothers is moving from growing its own shops to creating a model that other operators can carry into new communities.

Growth brings a different customer expectation

Opening new locations also changes what customers expect from the business.

Large coffee chains have made mobile ordering a normal part of buying coffee. Customers can place an order before leaving home, customize it on their phone, pay ahead, and collect it without waiting at the counter.

A growing independent brand has to meet that expectation while still feeling independent.

For Weird Brothers, the answer could not be a generic ordering experience that looked disconnected from its stores. The digital side of the business needed to feel like Weird Brothers too.

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Weird Brothers, Now on Your Phone

Their brand stays front and center

Per Diem gave Weird Brothers a mobile ordering experience built around its own identity and connected with the Square setup already used by the business.

Customers can order ahead and customize their food and drinks from their phones. But when they do, they are still interacting with Weird Brothers rather than entering an ordering experience that puts another company's identity first.

That distinction was important to Paul.

He told Per Diem that the customization around Weird Brothers' branding, together with the Square connection, gives the company the kind of digital presence customers have become familiar with from larger corporate businesses.

“A huge multiplier for our business”

Paul describes the effect in much simpler terms:

“The Per Diem App has been a huge multiplier for our business.”

He says the freedom and flexibility to offer customers mobile ordering is helping Weird Brothers grow faster than the team expected.

For a small veteran-owned business preparing to franchise, that online presence arrives at an important time. Weird Brothers can give customers the ease they already know from national coffee brands while keeping its own name, personality and customer experience at the center.

Now, as the first franchise locations prepare to carry the Weird Brothers name into new communities, that setup has a much bigger job to do.

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Built for What Comes Next at Weird Brothers

A consistent experience, at every location

Franchising changes the job of the systems behind a coffee shop.

When Weird Brothers operated only its own stores, the team had direct control over how customers experienced the business. Franchise growth means that experience now has to carry into locations run by new operators.

That makes consistency important from the start.

A customer ordering from a future Weird Brothers franchise should be able to interact with the same familiar brand they know from Herndon or Leesburg. The ordering journey should not feel different simply because the store is new or operated by a franchisee.

Per Diem gives Weird Brothers a setup that can follow the company into this next stage. Instead of creating a separate ordering experience every time the footprint expands, the brand can bring the same mobile experience into new locations while keeping orders connected with Square.

For a franchise business, that creates a simpler foundation to build on. New shops can join an experience that already exists instead of starting their digital presence from scratch.

The first franchises are already on the way

This is not a distant plan for Weird Brothers.

Paul shared in August 2026 that the company is opening its first franchise locations this month. He also said the team hopes to open at least three additional locations next year.

Per Diem is already part of that transition.

“Weird Brothers Coffee is expanding through Franchising, and Per Diem is helping us through that process,” Paul said.

That distinction is important. The growth comes from the business Paul and his family have spent years building. Per Diem's role is to give the team an online system that is ready to move with them as that business reaches new locations.

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A Partnership That Fits the Business

For Paul, there is also a personal side to the relationship.

“As a small Veteran-owned and operated business, we appreciate the support,” he shared.

It is a simple comment, but it fits the Weird Brothers story. Paul and his family have built the company around their own ideas, personality, and connection with the communities they serve. As the business enters franchising, they are still doing it as Weird Brothers, only on a bigger stage.

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Final Thoughts

Weird Brothers Coffee has come a long way from the idea the owners first built together in Herndon.

The company has added new shops, built deep ties within its local community, and reached the point where other operators can now bring Weird Brothers Coffee into their own markets through franchising. Through all of that change, the character behind the business has remained easy to recognize.

That is also what makes its experience with Per Diem worth sharing.

A growing coffee business does not have to choose between staying independent and giving customers modern ways to order. Weird Brothers has been able to build a stronger digital side of the business while keeping its own identity in front of the customer.

The next chapter will be written in new locations, with new franchise owners and new communities discovering Weird Brothers for the first time.

And if the company's story so far is any indication, things are about to get a little weirder.

Want to give your coffee shop a branded ordering experience built to grow with you? Book a demo with Per Diem.

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