Discover the story of Adriel. A former banker from Banco do Brasil, currently changing the world one coffee at a time.
Meet Xolopreneur Ariel Oliveira who's innovative coffee alternative made from mushrooms aims to combat climate change by reducing deforestation and the environmental impact of traditional coffee farming. Read on for an inspirational story on a corporate banker turned digital nomad and climate activist with an eco-friendly beverage that not only offers health benefits but also represents a step towards sustainable consumption.
Adriel, please introduce yourself.
“Adriel Oliveira––35 years old, autistic, father, Brazilian, e-resident since 2018––and I’ve been living in Portugal and Spain since 2019, a developer since age 14, started my bachelor in languages at UnB (Spanish and Portuguese) at age 16, former banker from Banco do Brasil.
Today I work as a business consultant and mycologist.
Fun fact! In 2020 I discovered a way to produce electricity using mushrooms, afterwards I won the prize ‘the biggest potential project after covid-19 crises’ from Startup Estonia. I like to play bass, drive go-karts, and travel with my wife and kid. I’m an author, climate activist and anarchist theory philosopher.”
Tell us about your company Mushspresso?
“Mushspresso started as a spin-off from Shimejito: my first project in the impact industry when we were challenged by Super Bock (the biggest brewery in Portugal) to show a holistic solution for their waste.
I realized that if we want to make the benefits of mushrooms go to the masses we need to make it more accessible. Let’s make mushrooms cheaper by adding them to one of the most globally-consumed commodities on the planet: Coffee!
We began developing a service around this new functional product with the question “Why not drink your mushrooms every day?”
We developed a peer-to-peer logistic system to that idea and discovered that regular coffee produces 15 kilograms of carbon per kilogram sold in a supermarket. We also discovered that 1 Billion people are suffering from mental health issues, according to the World Health Organization.
Our logic was simple:
✔️ Mushrooms are great mental health tools.
✔️ Modern coffee supply chains pollute, and pay small producers very little money.
✔️ Humans love coffee.
✔️ Add functional mushrooms to coffee.
Combining these ideas and changing the supply chain, we created the service Mushspresso. Locally-produced mushrooms decrease coffee’s carbon footprint with Mushspresso. Our customers get 450 milligrams per day, and reap the benefits of lion’s mane, shiitake and pleurotus while protecting their stomachs from coffee’s acidity.
Mushspresso gets the order, we find the closest member from our community to prepare the mix, and deliver to people that want to drink it. We offer this service at two supermarkets in Portugal and we have a decentralized coffee shop where people are able to set up our machines in offices, shops, houses and sell the coffee with us throughout Europe and Brazil.”
Action for climate change seems to be something you care deeply about. Why is this so important to you and how is Mushspresso relevant in this regard?
"Imagine you live with 100 people in a building.
Then one person suddenly is allowed to enter every apartment, break everything, make noise, change your heater, hurt your dog, make a mess and laugh at you while saying that it will happen again because it makes them happy and rich. What would the other ninety-nine apartment owners do?
I would do everything I can to kick that intruder out and organize the other tenants.
We humans are the owners of our house called Earth. This is the same house that the oil and gas industries invade, the private banks use to enable 1% of people to get 80% of all resources, money, jobs, communication and weapons. This 1% pollutes 50% of our global emissions.
Climate change is important because it's evidence that capitalism can’t work when only 1% have so much power. It destroys life in the name of profit.
We have the tools to take this power in our hands and make the world better. Mushspresso is trying to make a change in the coffee industry, a small room in this building of ours, but I’m calling on everyone to reflect and imagine how they can fix the other rooms.
Any entrepreneur that’s not putting climate action on their agenda is risking to die in the hands of the 1%, so that’s why climate action is so important for me. We are on the same planet and what happens in Brazil, Uganda, China and Europe are connected."
Today you're traveling around the world promoting Mushpresso and action on climate change. What did you do before starting Mushpresso? And how does your life look different now?
"I’m a former banker from the biggest bank in Brazil, a public one. I used to work with SMEs, credit for startups, FX, trading, insurance, loans, designing banking products and selling it. All of this from 2010 to 2018.
After that I developed a way to use IoT to accelerate mushroom production organically, this company is shimejito.com and it became a victim of the system after we suffered a scam.
The main difference in my current life is that I’m incredibly happy and engaged with my inner peace. I was afraid to die when I was working in the bank. I was afraid to take risks. What I got was only a nice salary, a nice car and an average middle class life, but neglected to dream bigger, was blocked by a wage, waiting for the bills until death arrives.
Now I can live in anarchy. I’ve written 2 books: Biolitical: an economy model for the post-covid and Proudhon: anarchy applied to the XXI Century (available in Portuguese). The first is free and for all ages. The second is 10 USD and it’s for inspiring other revolutionaries."
How did you discover Xolo and what role does it play in running your business today.
“After I moved from Brazil to Portugal I realized that Portuguese bureaucracy and banking is awful. Since I was an e-resident already, I started to look for services that could maximize my e-resident benefits and get support to develop my ideas and sell services to my customers. I think it was an instagram ad, or an ad on Linkedin. I started to be a Xolo member in 2021.
Xolo is the main invoicing and talent management tool I use because it’s the best in the world. I even wrote a small ebook, available on my consultancy website, to teach how e-residence + solopreneurship can change your life. I mention Xolo services and recommend it as the best service provider for the e-residency program.
I would love to help to develop Xolo for the Portuguese-speaking market (Brazil, Angola, Moçambique, Cabo Verde, Portugal). We are 600 Million strong and waiting for this kind of alternative.”
What one thing would you want to leave the reader with?
"All of us will pass away one day, what can you do until then? Why not pursue your own dreams, instead of the dreams of the 1%?"
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