It Started WithOne Kettle

& Delivering Delight Through Unforgettable Popcorn

Our story

Oregon to Hawaii, and back again.

Miss Hannah’s story begins with founders and owners Mike and Linda Jodoin, and a dream that didn’t work out quite as planned.

In 2000, Mike and Linda packed everything they owned—including their cars—into a shipping container and moved their family from Oregon to Hawaii. Their two children, Hannah and Noah, were still young, and Mike had plans to open a BBQ restaurant with a friend. When the restaurant never got off the ground, the family found themselves facing a choice: build an entirely new life in Hawaii or return home and figure out what came next.

A few months later, they returned to Oregon and started again. The family stayed with relatives before moving into a little farmhouse outside Portland, while Mike worked graveyard shifts filling vending machines to provide for the family. Then a friend suggested Mike and Linda try making kettle corn. Linda laughed and said, “Why not?” They gave it a shot at a local mall, and it was a complete bust. Still, Mike wasn’t ready to give up on the idea. He found a man in Washington who built kettle corn machines, drove north to buy one and came home with a propane kettle and a crash course in how to make kettle corn without burning it.

Since 2001

One kettle, one flavor and the whole family pitching in.

2001
Miss Hannah’s Kettle Korn
In 2001, Mike and Linda founded Miss Hannah’s Kettle Korn, named after their daughter, Hannah. It started with one propane kettle, one flavor and the whole family pitching in. Mike and Linda loaded bags of kernels, sugar and everything else they needed and hauled it from event to event, eventually traveling across the region and country. They became regulars at the Portland Farmers Market, where their small family business began to find its footing. Customers came back, word spread and, little by little, something that had started as a way to provide for their family began to grow.
2003
Miss Hannah’s Gourmet Popcorn, Co.
By 2003, Mike and Linda started wondering what popcorn could become beyond traditional kettle corn. They began experimenting with new recipes and flavors, slowly dipping their toes into the world of gourmet popcorn. One flavor became several, and Miss Hannah’s Kettle Korn gradually became Miss Hannah’s Gourmet Popcorn, CO. The flavors were changing, but the way they were made wasn’t. Every batch was still popped over a kettle and stirred by hand.
Bridgeport Village
A holiday pop-up
As the business grew, so did the opportunities. One of the most pivotal came with a holiday pop-up at Bridgeport Village. Until then, Miss Hannah’s had largely lived at markets and events, so opening a temporary retail space was a major leap. Mike and Linda brought in a team, paid retail rent for the first time and popped the popcorn right there on-site. What began as a seasonal experiment proved there was room for something more. Customers kept coming, the opportunity grew, and the holiday pop-up eventually evolved into Miss Hannah’s becoming a full-time tenant at Bridgeport Village.
For a family accustomed to packing up kettles, kernels and sugar and taking their business wherever the next event happened to be, having a place where customers could consistently find Miss Hannah’s represented an entirely new chapter. But as the company grew, so did the challenge of making enough popcorn while preserving the process that had made it special in the first place.
2020
A true production home
Miss Hannah’s popcorn had always been made over propane flames, and finding a permanent production space that could safely accommodate those kettles wasn’t simple. That search eventually brought the business to Yamhill County and, in 2020, to one of the largest projects Mike and Linda had ever taken on. After years of popping outdoors, new certification finally allowed production to move inside. Miss Hannah’s had a true production home—one that gave the team room to grow, increased what the company could make and opened the door to an entirely different future without abandoning the process that had gotten them there.
Today
A person behind every kettle
Today, Miss Hannah’s can make more batches in an hour than the family once made in an entire day. Yet there is still a person standing behind every kettle. The popcorn is still made in small batches, kettle popped and hand stirred. Real people pop it, tumble it, package it, stock it and send it out into the world. The scale has changed dramatically, but for Mike and Linda, growth has never meant taking the people out of the product.

Hannah & Noah

It was always a family affair.

Hannah was seven and Noah was nine, and they grew up alongside the business their parents were building. Hannah stood on a soda crate so she could reach the counter, and the kids spent their weekends helping their parents, running around the market and trading bags of kettle corn with neighboring vendors for bread, brownies, flowers, produce and whatever happened to be on Linda’s grocery list. It was an unusual childhood filled with long event days, farmers markets, road trips and more popcorn than most people could imagine.

The next chapter

But the story doesn’t end there…

…the family business entered another chapter—one that wasn’t necessarily part of the original plan.

Hannah had grown up in Miss Hannah’s, but growing up in a popcorn business didn’t mean she expected to lead one. After earning her Undergrad at Oregon State and MBA at George Fox University, she came back to help her parents for a season. The plan was to use what she had learned to build some systems, bring structure to areas of the growing company and help Mike and Linda before figuring out what was next.

That season never really ended.

As Hannah became more involved, she began to see the business differently—not simply as the company she had grown up around, but as something her parents had spent decades building that still had an incredible amount of possibility ahead of it. Helping for the year became helping lead the company, and eventually Hannah stepped into the role of CEO.

There is something wonderfully full-circle about the seven-year-old girl who once stood on a crate to reach the counter now leading the company that carries her name. Mike and Linda remain the owners of Miss Hannah’s, with Hannah leading the company as CEO, and Noah continuing to be part of the family business as well.

Through every chapter

Of course, the story hasn’t been a perfectly straight line.

There have been risks, mistakes, scary financial seasons, unanswered questions and countless moments when the family had to decide whether to take another leap.

Through each chapter, their faith has remained an important part of how they have navigated the unknown and trusted what came next. When Miss Hannah’s crossed one million dollars in annual revenue for the first time, Mike, Linda and Hannah simply stared at the calculator. They ran the numbers again. The year wasn’t even over yet. It represented years of showing up, thousands of batches, a growing team and customers who had continued choosing Miss Hannah’s along the way.

Twenty-five years later

Grown far beyond that first kettle.

2001

The first kettle

200+

Retailers across the U.S.

25

Years as a family business

Twenty-five years later, Miss Hannah’s has grown far beyond that first kettle. The packaging has evolved, an ecommerce site now ships popcorn across the country, multiple retail locations have opened, and more than 200 retailers across the U.S. carry Miss Hannah’s through wholesale. There are more flavors, more kettles and more people behind it all—but the heart of the business hasn’t changed.

Mike and Linda remain the owners, Hannah now leads the company as CEO, and the entire family is still part of the business. Every batch is still kettle popped and hand stirred by real people, just as it was in the beginning.

Kettle popped. Hand stirred. Made by people, for people.

A lot has changed since 2001, and there is still so much ahead. Miss Hannah’s remains what it has always been: a family business built around good popcorn, good people and the simple joy of bringing the two together.

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