“We’re excited you’re here!” Such is the welcome extended to visitors of Highland Popcorn through text decals on the glass of its entrance doors.
Beyond those doors and a vibrant retail and production space with the shop’s tagline, “Popcorn with personality,” on its wall is a team living out a mission to connect people with intellectual and developmental disabilities to meaningful employment.
The nonprofit, whose shop is located within the Highland Village Center in St. Paul’s Highland Park neighborhood, was founded by father-and-son duo Shamus and Conor O’Meara. The idea for the shop developed out of a challenge in finding employment for Conor.
“As a parent, first and foremost, of a young man with autism and developmental disabilities, you want to be able to help him find employment and try to find meaningful connections within the community,” said Shamus, Highland Popcorn’s president and a full-time lawyer. “And so, after some frustration in trying to locate employment, we talked about building our own business and we gravitated toward popcorn because our family loves popcorn, everyone loves popcorn. And we thought it would be a nice, fun business to start.”
The O’Mearas spent about five years before officially opening planning the business and working with food scientists to help develop some of the popcorn ingredients they planned to use. Next, they talked with the general manager of Lunds and Byerlys Highland Bridge in St. Paul who connected them with Lunds and Byerlys leadership and helped organize their lease for their current retail shop, which is near the O’Meara’s family home, also in Highland Park, as well as the parish to which the family belongs, Lumen Christi.
The nonprofit opened its retail shop “with a tremendous groundswell of community support” in 2024, “on Super Bowl Sunday” Feb. 11, said Shamus. Father Daniel Haugan, pastor of Lumen Christi, blessed the shop and since then, its employees have been popping corn — its roughly five staple flavors plus seasonal and specialty flavors — for its own retail sales as well as for wholesale distribution.
Shamus said that he and Conor are primarily involved in Highland Popcorn’s operations but that other members of the O’Meara family — Shamus’ wife, Erin Delaney, and sons, Patrick O’Meara and Rory O’Meara — also participate.
“(B)eing Catholic as a family, we like to think we have a faith-based approach to life,” Shamus said, which factored into developing Highland Popcorn’s mission of providing meaningful employment to those with intellectual and developmental disabilities.
“About 55 people have experienced employment opportunities here, either through the workforce (partner), or direct hiring, or through our internship program,” Shamus said.
Highland Popcorn’s workforce partner is St. Paul-based nonprofit MSS (previously known as Midwest Special Services), which Shamus described as “a day training and habilitative provider”; two days a week, MSS provides a team of four employees with intellectual and developmental disabilities, along with a job coach, to help Highland Popcorn produce and package their products. Meanwhile, the shop also has direct hires, like Conor and James Marrinan.
“I would say we’re probably consistently 25 to 30, but up to 50” employees, said Craig Applebaum, who has been the general manager of Highland Popcorn since the shop opened. Applebaum, whose background is in grocery retail, connected with the O’Meara family when Applebaum’s brother and Conor started hosting a sports and lifestyle podcast called “Conor’s Corner.”
“(T)he goal wasn’t just to hire people with disabilities, but it was to give them long-term, meaningful employment,” Applebaum said. “And we’re proud to say that out of the number I just gave you, I bet 90-plus percent of those people opened the store with us. That’s really what we’re proud of.”
“I like working here because I want to be independent and make friends,” Conor said as the January sun shone outside the shop windows.
Conor fields questions in his role as communications director of Highland Popcorn. “(If) people have a question, I’m the one to answer,” he said. “And I greet people when they come into the store.” He also works at the various production stations, popping corn, adding ingredients like caramel, and filling partnership orders.
“It’s great to work with other friends,” Conor said. “I want to help them” with the various job responsibilities that come with working in the shop, he said.
“A lot of people in the community know Conor and love him,” Shamus said. “They come in and they’re disappointed if he’s not here. There’s a lot of people (who) gravitate toward Conor — he’s our communications director for a reason. He loves to talk to people and greet them and talk about their day and make them feel good.”
The appreciation for Highland Popcorn’s employees is apparent as Shamus recalled Marrinan’s hiring.
“He came in with his mother while we were doing the build-out even before we opened,” Shamus said. While his mother waited in the shop’s vestibule, “James came in sheepishly and with his head down and not looking at me. We were sitting at a construction table, and he asked, under his breath, if he could have a job here and I had to turn him down. We weren’t open and we didn’t have anything going on.”
But the shop’s soft opening soon arrived, then its grand opening “and we had lines of people down the street,” Shamus said. “And we had asked James if he wanted to volunteer because we needed some help and we remembered his courage to come in and ask for that job. He came in and he worked seven hours on his feet until we ran out of popcorn.”
Shamus said a couple days later, he called Marrinan back to the shop. “He came in with his father … I said, ‘James, you did a great job. I would love to offer you a job at Highland Popcorn.’ And his father started to cry. And then I started to cry,” Shamus said, voice breaking. Marrinan, meanwhile, had “the greatest beaming smile I’ve ever seen. And I remember, I mean, it’s like yesterday. That was two years ago.”
“And he works really hard now for us,” Shamus said.
Shamus said he had stopped counting months ago but that at last count, “we had 4,500 discrete requests for employment at this location — either from an individual with autism or other developmental disability (who) had the courage to walk in here and ask for a job, or their family or loved ones that came in with them, or emails or phone calls. And it’s been hundreds more since then. Every week, we get dozens and dozens of requests like that.”
Filling such a need has led to Highland Popcorn receiving “really good reactions from the community,” Conor said, a fact underscored by the interest the shop has garnered in the nearly two years it has been open.
“We have people coming from all over the upper Midwest because they heard about it (Highland Popcorn),” Shamus said. “We have people wanting to order the product from all over the world.”
From Hastings to Red Wing, across the border to River Falls, Wisconsin, and soon to Duluth, Highland Popcorn has partnered with local, regional and statewide businesses, organizations and teams — including the Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis, Eagan-based automotive parts chain Factory Motor Parts, the University of Minnesota Golden Gophers football team and Delta Air Lines — for events and custom-designed products like bags and tins of popcorn and personalized cards.
In 2025, Highland Popcorn participated as a newly invited vendor at the Minnesota State Fair. “I don’t think we could have said after one year that we would have ever been close to the fair,” Applebaum said.
The initial partnership with Lunds and Byerlys has provided Highland Popcorn with consistent orders and helped maximize the nonprofit’s exposure in the broader community, Shamus said.
“We’re now in all of their 30 stores,” Shamus said. Having a grocery retailer like Lunds and Byerlys on board, “that has a great customer base and also people (who) really care about the community, we found that to be just amazing,” he said. Shamus said Highland Popcorn has newly entered Hy-Vee stores and will soon be in a new Coborn’s store opening in Maple Grove.
Next up, “we’ll be initiating our e-commerce platform by Mother’s Day,” Shamus said, “where we’ll do order fulfillment for people all over the country.”
“It’s exciting,” Applebaum said about the ways Highland Popcorn is growing. “I’m very optimistic, assuming that this was going to happen or like it’s going to continue to happen. … it’s been unbelievable.”
“When we have a chance to slow down and enjoy it, we do,” he said.
As regular volunteers at Highland Popcorn, John and Margaret Blissenbach, both members of Lumen Christi, attest to the nonprofit’s mission as it aims to fill a need.
“It’s truly become a community asset,” John said. “I mean, the growth that’s occurred — I was a businessman, I’m awed by how fast it’s grown and the connections they’ve made in the community over the years and how receptive people have been and the generosity (from the community).”
The Blissenbachs connected with the O’Meara family through their children. When their son, Jim, was in high school and teaching faith formation at the time, Conor was one of his students. Their daughter, Mary, was Conor’s nanny for a time.
“(I)t started a relationship (with the O’Mearas) that just grew and developed over time,” John said.
When Highland Popcorn opened, “it just so happened to coincide with my retirement and then Margaret retired a few months after,” John said. “So, we had extra time on our hands, and we felt (that) this is a great way for us to volunteer our time, with a family we love, in a mission that we really are supportive of.”
Margaret, a retired nurse, said she sees Highland Popcorn’s mission aligning with the late Pope Francis’ reflections on the dignity of work and purposeful living, acknowledging “the dignity of a human being … it’s all part of: ‘You’re worthwhile. You are a part of the community. You’re a respected part of the community.’ … It’s the dignity of honest work.”
“I think about the changes that I’ve seen in James and Conor and all the other workers here because it’s meaningful work,” she said. “I know it’s right and it’s good. It’s fun; it’s so much fun.”
“Everyone wants to feel needed in some way,” John said. “And you can just see it in the smiles on their faces when they’re here that they get so much out of it besides a paycheck. … (W)ork is more than a paycheck; it’s all the relationships you develop, it’s the skills you develop, and things that will carry with you your entire life. And they get that opportunity here.”
“We have faith in the O’Mearas, we have faith in this business, we have faith in the people (who) get hired to work here,” John said.
Applebaum said that for him, “coming to work every day, knowing you’re making a difference is pretty special. But coming to work every day knowing that someone is making it special for you is even better. They’re making a difference in my life as much as I’m making a difference in their life.”
Shamus considers Highland Popcorn as a way to put faith into action.
“Faith is a lived experience,” he said. “I think what binds us together is our belief in better things and that together we can accomplish great things. And I think that faith, certainly for our family, binds us together and helped us have the courage to start a new thing, to start a business like this. And also, to have the faith that it will continue, and the people will see it for what it is, which is trying to provide life opportunities for those (who), for whatever reason, need a helping hand.
“And if that’s not, at its core, what faith is about, I don’t know what it is.”
PROVIDING OPPORTUNITIES
As a 501(c)(3) nonprofit, Highland Popcorn President Shamus O’Meara said most of the St. Paul-based shop’s revenue is generated through donations.
“We’re grateful for people that donate and help provide support so that we can provide other opportunities” to those with intellectual and developmental disabilities seeking employment, O’Meara said.
All the proceeds Highland Popcorn generates go to covering retail shop costs, product ingredients, packaging materials and labor. “And so those donations are huge,” O’Meara said.
Donation information can be found on the Highland Popcorn website at highlandpopcorn.com/#donate.
