A new way to buy coffee in Australia

Jacob Burn ran coffee shops before the Full-time MBA. Today, he’s scaling an online coffee marketplace.

Jacob Burn took a part-time barista job to cover the bills while he studied Aerospace Engineering. Within months, he was convinced he could run a coffee shop better than his boss.

“I looked at my boss and I thought, you're not very good at this. I think I could do a better job than you,” he said.

So he took out a $30,000 loan, teamed up with a good friend and opened a coffee shop.

“The decision to start was that simple and, in hindsight, I didn’t give my boss enough credit,” he said.

That decision in 2018 started years of running small businesses, and later led him to Melbourne Business School, where he became president of the Founders Club.

Having completed the Full-time MBA, Jacob is now scaling two online coffee businesses: Drop, which he founded, and Altdrop, which he acquired.

Learning business the hard way

Jacob ran the coffee shops while completing his Aerospace Engineering degree. Running them gave him a crash course in business.

He set up the ABN, built the brand, negotiated the lease and kept the books. Then there was the broader responsibility of running a business – commercial decisions, managing finances and leading people.

“I always say that a coffee shop is a great business for learning because you have to do everything perfect to not go broke,” he said.

The tight margins of hospitality forced him to become good at designing efficient systems, but by his own admission, people management was his biggest lesson.

“When your culture declines, your systems become worse because people aren't motivated to be there,” he said. “This starts a negative spiral that is hard to stop.”

Harvest Specialty Coffee, where it all began, closed its doors when the lease expired and the building was demolished. Plenty Eatery, his second venture, was sold to new owners.

Closing the gap

In 2023, Jacob enrolled in the Full-time MBA at Melbourne Business School, graduating in 2025. He described the MBA as the “plenary” to his years running small businesses.

“I had the experience. I’d failed a bunch and learnt lot,” he said. “Doing an MBA after that, I was able to fill in those knowledge gaps. I really needed to learn how to manage a team better.”

Choosing a career, not just a job

Jacob started the MBA with the intention to go into consulting, which he saw as the logical next step for his career.

Career Services connected him with firms and helped him prepare. One introduction led to an MBA internship with Westbourne Consulting, a small firm that proved a strong fit. The internship quickly grew into a full role, and Jacob completed five projects with the firm. The MBA helped him apply his previous business experience strategically across different industries.

When he was weighing up his future as a small business operator or remaining a consultant, the Career Services team remained a sounding board.

“It wasn't really about landing a job,” he said. “It was more about building a career. They gave me the skills to do what I wanted to do.”

That direction turned out to be the business he'd already started.

An online marketplace for coffee

Drop was founded in 2021 during the COVID lockdowns to connect coffee drinkers and struggling small roasting businesses. Drop’s core ethos revolves around delivering coffee beans from some of the country’s top roasters straight to your door.

Jacob credits the MBA with sharpening his strategy.

“I didn't understand what the problem was that I was solving,” he said. “Through the MBA, I was able to define it and therefore make the solution better.”

The gap he saw was in the supply chain.

“Coffee at home is growing quite rapidly. But still, it's quite common to buy your coffee direct from the roaster,” he said.

Jacob compares it to the wine industry, where most people buy from a bottle shop rather than a cellar door because the supply chain is more efficient. Jacob didn’t see why coffee should be different. In July 2025, he acquired Altdrop, an online marketplace where customers can buy beans from specialty roasters.

“We are the only kind of marketplace like us in Australia. It's this opportunity that's sitting right there that no one in the industry is taking because they're so focused on either roasting or starting a café,” he said.

Building a network through the Founders Club

Jacob's passion for building businesses found a home in the MBS Founders Club, which he went on to lead as president. In 2024, he helped run the school’s first event on Entrepreneurship Through Acquisition (ETA) there – where entrepreneurs buy and operate existing businesses rather than starting from scratch.

“Since then, ETA has really exploded. It's huge in the US,” he said.

Asked what he'd tell current students looking at starting their own business, Jacob pointed to ETA.

“Being an entrepreneur does not necessarily mean you have to start a startup that's going to be a unicorn and change the world profoundly,” he said. “Right now, there's a huge economic need for operators of small to medium businesses.”

Many founders from the 1980s boom are now at retirement age without a successor.

“Someone with an MBA is perfect for that kind of role,” he said. “You will use every single skill in your MBA.”

He nods to some of his fellow alum as potential future business partners, with whom he's discussing acquiring small businesses.

And his favourite coffee shop in Melbourne?

“Can I give you 2? The first one is Small Batch Coffee Roasters in North Melbourne. The second would be Proud Mary Café in Collingwood.”

And the best coffee in the world?

“I would say 100% Australia has the best coffee in the world, without a doubt.”