Hospitality & Tourism  March 20, 2025

Kava bar slated for summer opening in downtown Loveland 

Customers fill one of the kava bars in Osteen’s growing stable of locations.
Customers fill one of the kava bars in Osteen’s growing stable of locations. Courtesy Roots and Leaves Corp.
By

LOVELAND — An entrepreneur who four years ago opened a space in a Longmont strip mall that served nonalcoholic drinks featuring an exotic root said to promote an elevated mood has built the idea into an 80-employee empire soon to include nine locations, plus a retail shop.

Loveland Kava is expected to open this summer in nearly 7,700 square feet of leased space at 540 N. Garfield Ave., said Tobin Osteen, whose Roots and Leaves Corp. now operates kava bars in Longmont, Fort Collins, Greeley, Westminster and Lakewood, as well as Santa Fe, New Mexico.

Kava, according to his original location’s website, is “a small cultivated plant in the pepper family, native to the South Pacific, with origins that can be traced back at least 3,000 years and is associated with both social and ceremonial functions.”

SPONSORED CONTENT

For the Loveland location, Osteen said, “we are in plan review with the city right now, incorporating the aquaponic component to the greenhouse, so we’re dependent on a construction schedule at this point. I’d love it to open sooner than summer, but I think that’s more realistic.”

Loveland-based Hauser Architects is doing the buildout in the space Osteen said has variously housed “a slew of family businesses” such as a home and garden retailer, an interior design studio, a dog trainer and at one time an Ace Hardware outlet.

Besides the kava bar, the new location will include the greenhouse and a retail shop that Osteen called “Sonder Unlimited, our distribution company. It will sell things like botanical teas, miscellaneous herbal remedies and products from around the world.”

The name Sonder “is a relatively new term that comes out of philosophy,” Osteen said. “The philosophical definition is that we recognize that everyone we meet is experiencing an equally vivid life to ours. It has to do with the parity of human experience and the recognition of others in an equal way.”

According to a news release, “Sonder Unlimited fuels not just our locations but also provides wholesale distribution to like-minded businesses seeking premium kava and botanicals.”

Beginning this year, it said, “we are expanding our distribution by launching a retail website and soon a wholesale section. It’s important that we continue to protect the integrity and medicinal benefits of our products by offering our brand to local businesses and beyond. Our products go through rigorous testing to ensure their safety and quality are met.”

The greenhouse portion of the Loveland location is likely to open later in the year.

“The Loveland Greenhouse is thrilled to join forces with Roots & Leaves Kavas & Teas to transform the greenhouse on the north side of the Loveland Kava building into a thriving aquaponics farm,” founder Jill Frasier said in a prepared statement. “This innovative project aims to supply downtown Loveland restaurants with fresh, organic, locally grown leafy greens. In addition to the farm, the space will host small community events, including pop-up farm-to-table meals and aquaponics growing workshops. We anticipate opening in late 2025.”

A Colorado native, Osteen had been a residential and commercial contractor with Vermilion Construction for more than 20 years. That “pretty rough industry” got him interested in pain relief, and when he happened upon a kava bar in Boulder, “I witnessed the connections people made and continued, and the comfort that seemed to be prevalent in that community.”

Opening a kava bar was attractive to him as a “sober lifestyle alternative” to bars that sell alcohol, and a place that provides “a social outlet that has been uncommon in American society.”

He joined three business partners to open Colorado Mountain Kava at 615-617 Ken Pratt Blvd. in Longmont. He’s still a co-owner there, he said, but said his partners “decided they wanted to keep that a family operation and didn’t want to take on the task of expansion like I did.”

His fledgling chain opened its first two locations on the same day in Fort Collins, with Old Town Kava making its debut at 223 Linden St. 30 minutes before Kavarado Station at 1801 S. College Ave.

When Osteen’s team opened Casa de Kava in Santa Fe in 2022, they finally felt they had a blueprint for what works and launched Mile High Kava in Westminster in March 2023 and Peak Kava in Lakewood in February 2024. Six months later came Stampede Kava at 807 17th St. in Greeley.

Osteen last November launched a sister brand, Roots & Remedies, offering an expanded selection of herbal teas, elixirs, “adaptogen” mocktails and natural remedies that provide “an even deeper connection to the world of ethnobotanical wellness,” according to the release. The venue for that business, which opened in December at 2025 Innosphere St. in Longmont’s “Prospect” new-urbanism development, is located inside Longmont Social, a space that also offers a beer and wine seller, cornhole games and ax throwing and escape rooms.

Also opening this summer will be Tanoan Kava, adjacent to the Indian Pueblo Cultural Center in Albuquerque, New Mexico. But Osteen said he may then put the brakes on expansion for a while.

“We’ve been expanding so rapidly,” he said. “The goal was to saturate the market so we’re within a half hour of big population centers. So now we’re focusing more on advertising and promoting, and expanding our line of elixirs.”

His company also is teaming up with a Berthoud-based operation to add “functional mushrooms into our mocktail menus.”

Osteen said his company also offers its expertise to others looking to start their own kava bar, from concept and design to fully functional operations.

“We’re also marching toward trying to do an employee-owned component,” Osteen said. “Ultimately the goal will be to make that available to our employees.”

An entrepreneur who four years ago opened a space in a Longmont strip mall that served nonalcoholic drinks featuring an exotic root said to promote an elevated mood has built the idea into an 80-employee empire soon to include nine locations, plus a retail shop.

Related Posts

With BizWest since 2012 and in Colorado since 1979, Dallas worked at the Longmont Times-Call, Colorado Springs Gazette, Denver Post and Public News Service. A Missouri native and Mizzou School of Journalism grad, Dallas started as a sports writer and outdoor columnist at the St. Charles (Mo.) Banner-News, then went to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch before fleeing the heat and humidity for the Rockies. He especially loves covering our mountain communities.
Categories: Hospitality & Tourism Longmont Loveland Restaurants Sunday Weekly Today's News Loveland Kava Roots and Leaves Corp.
Sign up for BizWest Daily Alerts
Closing in 8 seconds...

ONE FREE EMAIL CAN MAKE YOU BETTER IN BUSINESS. IT'S AN EASY YES!

×

Stay informed with critical information, news and insights throughout the Boulder Valley and Northern Colorado.