The tale of a Portland coffee shop’s tangle with free speech and the free market continued this month, as the wife of the owner of Ristretto Roasters wrote several articles, including an op-ed for the Los Angeles Times, and then the coffee company began soliciting donations on its website.

If you’re just tuning in, the story began in December when Nancy Rommelmann, a writer and the wife of Ristretto owner Din Johnson, started a YouTube series and now podcast called "#MeNeither” with columnist Leah McSweeney.

The title of the show, and its content, positioned it in direct opposition to the #MeToo movement, and a group of 30 employees and former employees of Ristretto sent a letter of protest to Portland media outlets.

“We believe it is a business owner’s responsibility to create a safe and supportive working environment for their employees,” the letter said. “Invalidating assault survivors throws into question the safety of Ristretto Roasters as a workplace and has the potential to create a demoralizing and hostile environment for employees and customers alike. This cannot be tolerated.”

Rommelmann, who previously reviewed books and wrote feature stories as a freelance writer for The Oregonian/OregonLive, at the time insisted she was in no way involved with the business. But business records, earlier news reports and emails signed by Rommelmann that were sent to employees, disputed that claim.

Later, Rommelmann admitted she was behind a Twitter tirade against a former employee that came from the official Ristretto account.

Rommelmann and McSweeney continued to produce the #MeNeither show -- the most recent episode went up two weeks ago -- and consequences compounded.

New Seasons Market and Market of Choice stopped carrying Ristretto’s coffee in their stores, and then a Ristretto location in Northwest Portland suddenly closed. Ristretto said the location closed because its lease was up. But Sara Fritsch, the president of Schoolhouse, where the coffee shop was located, said in a statement, “It has been an abrupt and unfortunate ending to a long relationship," adding, "We are now focused on establishing a fresh coffee partnership with a company that shares our values and complements our brand.”

In mid-February, Rommelmann began writing op-eds about the backlash against Ristretto.

On Quillette, attached to a picture of Rommelmann and Johnson behind the counter at Ristretto, Rommelmann wrote an article called “The Internet Locusts Descend on Ristretto Roasters,” blaming one former employee -- the same one she earlier attacked on Twitter -- for the problems facing Ristretto.

“In her email to Ristretto employees, Camila described our show as ‘vile, dangerous, and extremely misguided,’” Rommelmann wrote.

And when Camila took her complaints public? “The career-destroying potential of the internet mob immediately snapped into action,” Rommelmann said.

In the Quillette piece, Rommelmann describes herself as at the victim of an internet mob, intent on destroying her husband’s business: “The digital activists swarm like locusts, descending and leaving the earth shorn before moving on to the next field.”

It is a theme she returned to in her other articles.

In “A Guide to Surviving Your 15 Minutes of Hate,” for Reason, Rommelmann compares herself to Nicholas Sandmann, the “Covington Catholic” teen.

There are some differences, of course. Sandmann is a minor and he was caught on camera acting in a way that some people interpreted as being disrespectful. Rommelmann is an adult who repeatedly expressed controversial opinions on camera.

In the Reason article, Rommelmann talks about the consequences of her YouTube show: “Within days,” she writes, “a quarter of the Ristretto staff quit and the company lost major accounts.”

She offers advice for what to do if you are ever in her shoes, including “Build a war room” with an oblique reference to initial coverage in The Oregonian/OregonLive: “This last helps when the first major story states that you ‘could not immediately be reached for comment.’ Within a minute of it posting, you can call the reporter and say she did not try to contact you, and while she makes the correction, you now know what’s it’s like to deal with reporters who have different standards of truth-telling than you do, which on top of everything else should not be crushing, but is.”

For the record: We had reached out to Rommelmann on Facebook -- the only contact we could find -- but she did not see the message.

In her L.A. Times op-ed, called “Outrage culture is out of control,” Rommelmann again compared her situation to that of Sandmann, blamed the former employee and the media for baristas quitting and wholesale accounts leaving.

Meanwhile, Ristretto Roasters took the interesting step of soliciting donations. On Wednesday morning, the home page of the company’s website said: “Donate to Ristretto,” and added “Your support allows us to continue doing what we love most: roasting coffee and sharing it with the world.”

Ristretto Roasters homepage, Wed. February 27, 2019.

The Oregonian/OregonLive emailed and called Ristretto Wednesday about the nature of the donation campaign, but didn’t receive a response. Later, the home page changed to one advertising a type of coffee. But a donate tab, suggesting donations of $10, $25 or $50, either one time or on a monthly basis, remained up.

Embattled companies asking for donations is nothing new. In 2015, the people behind Sweet Cakes by Melissa raised hundreds of thousands of dollars after violating Oregon’s anti-discrimination laws by refusing to bake a wedding cake for a lesbian couple.

That crowdfunding page continues to take donations.