Former Rays pitcher is behind new Raining Berries location in Sarasota

During his career as a Major League Baseball player from 2003 to 2019, Edwin Jackson played for a record number of teams. 

Among those 14 teams are the Tampa Bay Rays, the Arizona Diamondbacks, the Atlanta Braves and the Baltimore Orioles.

He says his approach to the sport involved "just being resilient, never giving up, never losing grasp of who I am as a person and not just a player, not letting what happens on the field dictate who I am off the field."

The Arizona resident says that resilience will be useful in his business venture in Sarasota, a branch of the coffee shop Raining Berries at Southside Village.

Jackson co-owns the shop with NFL player Kenneth Gainwell, who was a Super Bowl champion with the Philadelphia Eagles in 2024, and recently joined the Pittsburgh Steelers.

People also know Jackson for his All-Star performance in 2009, his 2010 no-hitter, and his place on the 2011 World Series champion St. Louis Cardinals.

Playing in a new field

A Florida-based lifestyle brand, Raining Berries centers on products including coffee, açaí bowls, smoothies and gelato.

Like founder and CEO Bimal Bhojani, Jackson says the brand was an easy fit with the image of an athlete. 

"I feel like the way the world is moving now, is a lot of people are moving towards health, and a lot more people are health conscious, so that is an extra bonus that we have, that you can come here and it's something that's good for your body," he said. 

Bhojani urges guests to try the premium coffee, which he says is the real story behind the store; the Uganda native says his family has ties to the coffee business for almost 250 years.

After meeting Bhojani at a wellness summit and being impressed with him, his story, and his products, Jackson and his wife flew to Florida to taste the items on the menu.

"I was a big believer in, I don't want to just go into something looking at it from a monetary standpoint, I want to make sure that if I put my name behind something, that I also like what I'm putting my name behind," he said. "That's big for myself."

On June 21, he was present at the Sarasota location to greet fans and offer signed baseballs in celebration of the store's grand opening. 

Jackson still carries the experience of his MLB career with him, he says, including the ups and downs of the game, and of the changes between teams, which he says occurred for varying reasons.

Photo by Ian Swaby

"It's been a little bit of everything," he said. "Some of it's just been the business. Some of it, I didn't play well enough. Some of it, I played too well."

Yet he says just like when a baseball game set for a certain time and faces a rain delay, his mindset will still be based in the game.

"It's the same with business," he said. "Everything is not always smooth, but being on a field and handling everything I handled on a field, I can take that into the business world, in a franchise world, and I can use it in a different way, but the same mentality, to get through any obstacles that we deal with. When you're opening up stores, whether it's inspections, whether it's something that can go wrong, whether it's budget, whatever it may be, I can keep the mind frame."