Finca San Luis Microlots
Omar Arango is the owner of Finca San Luis,
a 42-hectare farm in El Libano, in the department of Tolima, Colombia.
Finca San Luis is organic and Rainforest Alliance certified, and
located at an altitude of 1600 meters. Predominantly producing coffee
of the caturra varietal, Omar creates a cup profile that has well
structured acidity, and rich flavors that range from ripe stone fruit
to mild, sweet tobacco. While Omar often sells this coffee with the
producer group Cafinorté Orgánico, this year we are working with him to
separate some of his higher quality coffee in order to sell directly to
us as Finca San Luis.
In most countries, coffee producers live harvest to harvest. Production
costs are very high, and increasing. Microlots are indications that a
producer does not compromise quality for a higher yield. Small lot
differentiation means that the producer can meet the demand for unique
small lots. Lot differentiation takes perseverance, as the producer
must trace each picking from the fields, through the washing stage,
through a sampling process and into the secure freight. It takes a lot
of work to produce a small amount of coffee.
Contrast that with legacy cultural practices, where producing a higher yield with less effort on quality is the norm. In Colombia, as a fitting example, the typical mechanism for selling coffee is through buying agents of the Federación Nacional de Cafeteros de Colombia (FNC), the non-profit, government sponsored entity that provides support to Colombian coffee producers, and is essentially the marketing agent for Colombian coffee. If you've only ever heard of clean, mild Colombian coffee and Juan Valdez, it's because of the FNC.
The FNC is known as the 'Growers Association' and is the buyer of last resort, meaning that if you are a coffee producer and need to sell your coffee, the FNC will always buy it, regardless of quality. If the quality meets their export standards, the coffee will be milled, separated by size and then exported. If the coffee does not meet their export standards, then the coffee will be sold internally (within Colombia), decaffeinated, or perhaps sold to make soluble coffee (Folgers crystals) or extracts. However the coffee is resold or exported, what is important is that the producer:
So, what does this have to do with Finca San Luis? When I met Omar in
September of 2009, it was during the FNC's annual ExpoEspeciales
conference in Ibague, Tolima. During our conversation, Omar learned how
committed Gimme Coffee is to investing in quality. After that, he had
one question, "How do I send you my coffee to sample?"
In the month following the ExpoEspeciales, I received an email from Alejandro Cadena, general manager and co-founder of Virmax Café, indicating that he had received a sample from Omar Arango that was quite good, even though it was from his first pickings of the harvest. Once I had the opportunity to cup the coffee, I also thought the quality was excellent. But by the time we had informed Omar that we wanted to buy that lot of coffee, he had already sold it to the FNC warehouse. Omar needed to pay his pickers immediately, so he had sold that lot of coffee to the FNC in order to fund his harvest, even though in the end we were to pay him well beyond the price he had received from the FNC.
These legacy practices create a cycle that is difficult to get out of. A producer cannot risk holding coffee because of costs, and the prices they receive are not nearly enough to hold for future investment. With on going communication with Omar, we were able to quickly secure 2 unique microlots from the beginning of this season's harvest. We were also able to prefinance the remainder of his harvest so that Omar can afford to pay his pickers and other costs upfront. This means that the result of Omar's dedication to his coffee crop will not be blended in with lower grade coffees simply because he could not wait for a higher price. It also means that by financing his harvest, Gimme Coffee is able to secure a much larger lot of Finca San Luis for August/September 2010.
It is a sad reality that beautiful coffees are being sold at commodity prices and blended with coffees of a lower caliber. We know that Omar Arango is capable of producing high quality coffee and we look forward to our ongoing relationship with Finca San Luis.
Contrast that with legacy cultural practices, where producing a higher yield with less effort on quality is the norm. In Colombia, as a fitting example, the typical mechanism for selling coffee is through buying agents of the Federación Nacional de Cafeteros de Colombia (FNC), the non-profit, government sponsored entity that provides support to Colombian coffee producers, and is essentially the marketing agent for Colombian coffee. If you've only ever heard of clean, mild Colombian coffee and Juan Valdez, it's because of the FNC.
The FNC is known as the 'Growers Association' and is the buyer of last resort, meaning that if you are a coffee producer and need to sell your coffee, the FNC will always buy it, regardless of quality. If the quality meets their export standards, the coffee will be milled, separated by size and then exported. If the coffee does not meet their export standards, then the coffee will be sold internally (within Colombia), decaffeinated, or perhaps sold to make soluble coffee (Folgers crystals) or extracts. However the coffee is resold or exported, what is important is that the producer:
- will always have a buyer for their coffee
- will always be paid a set price (think minimum wage) for their coffee
- will be paid this price almost immediately upon arrival to the FNC's warehouses
So, what does this have to do with Finca San Luis? When I met Omar in
September of 2009, it was during the FNC's annual ExpoEspeciales
conference in Ibague, Tolima. During our conversation, Omar learned how
committed Gimme Coffee is to investing in quality. After that, he had
one question, "How do I send you my coffee to sample?" In the month following the ExpoEspeciales, I received an email from Alejandro Cadena, general manager and co-founder of Virmax Café, indicating that he had received a sample from Omar Arango that was quite good, even though it was from his first pickings of the harvest. Once I had the opportunity to cup the coffee, I also thought the quality was excellent. But by the time we had informed Omar that we wanted to buy that lot of coffee, he had already sold it to the FNC warehouse. Omar needed to pay his pickers immediately, so he had sold that lot of coffee to the FNC in order to fund his harvest, even though in the end we were to pay him well beyond the price he had received from the FNC.
These legacy practices create a cycle that is difficult to get out of. A producer cannot risk holding coffee because of costs, and the prices they receive are not nearly enough to hold for future investment. With on going communication with Omar, we were able to quickly secure 2 unique microlots from the beginning of this season's harvest. We were also able to prefinance the remainder of his harvest so that Omar can afford to pay his pickers and other costs upfront. This means that the result of Omar's dedication to his coffee crop will not be blended in with lower grade coffees simply because he could not wait for a higher price. It also means that by financing his harvest, Gimme Coffee is able to secure a much larger lot of Finca San Luis for August/September 2010.
It is a sad reality that beautiful coffees are being sold at commodity prices and blended with coffees of a lower caliber. We know that Omar Arango is capable of producing high quality coffee and we look forward to our ongoing relationship with Finca San Luis.
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