The Wheelbarrow, The Insistent Chef and a Nebraska Halloween…

Act One - It all started with a wheelbarrow

Someone on our team dumped a load of dirt on the farmer’s coffee bush, the farmer got mad and made us quit working on the house. We’d flown from the U.S. to Guatemala with Habitat for Humanity’s Global Village program to build houses. What should we do now?

While the farmer and local Habitat coordinator discussed the fate of the coffee tree, our team sat in the shade and talked about coffee. Wonder how much coffee he gets from that little tree? Wonder how much he gets paid for it? Wonder how many other families depend on coffee as their main source income?

After an hour and a half of discussions, the farmer let us go back to work with promises that we wouldn’t cover another coffee bush. We were working again— but those lingering coffee questions remained unanswered.

That was five years ago and that’s how we entered the intriguing and exacerbating world of specialty coffee. The original idea was simple — assist coffee farmers in creating direct markets for their products here in the U.S. while ensuring that they receive a fair price. The idea hasn’t changed — but Café Campesino sure has!

In 1998, after learning that the answers to the questions posed above are about a pound (from one coffee bush), about 25 cents (what the farmer gets paid for a pound of coffee) and millions (how many families depend on coffee as their main source of income), we imported our first 40,000 lb container of green coffee and began selling it to coffee roasters all over the eastern United States.

Act Two -Stage Left : Insistent Chef Appears

Coincidentally, Bill’s brother Lee opened a bakery/deli the same year and insisted on serving Café Campesino coffee. After all attempts to rationally explain to Lee that we sell green, not roasted, coffee failed, we succumbed to his wishes and started selling roasted coffee, too. Careful what you wish for, Lee (we will hear from him again..)

By late 1999, Café Campesino’s roasted coffee efforts had fortunately expanded beyond our one local customer and we were regularly shipping orders to internet customers and a few grocery stores. Our green coffee business, however, was suffering from lack of additional capital and a gnawing desire to restructure the importing business into a roaster-owned cooperative. In November, seven roasters (including Café Campesino) met in Atlanta and formed Cooperative Coffees. Most of the founders were customers of Café Campesino and all embraced the idea of collectively owning an importing company that would only deal directly with small scale farmers. Cooperative Coffees now has 14 members and has greatly expanded our original importing capabilities.

So, where did this leave Café Campesino’s roasted coffee efforts? Since most of the company’s sales were associated with green coffee, our sales fell dramatically as this business shifted over to the cooperative. But with help from a series of part-time folks, we rocked along for the rest of 2000 and developed our website and wholesale customer base. In late August, we hosted Daniel Pistone for a few days as he passed through town in preparation for a Habitat trip to Sri Lanka and India. Daniel painted our new packing room and, as he headed off for the airport, casually mentioned that he might return in November if we needed help for the holiday season (Careful, Daniel…).

Act Three: Halloween in a Nebraska Bus Station

By October of 2000 our little roasted coffee hobby had evolved into a real business with real customer who had real service expectations. On October 31, Daniel called from, you guessed it, a snowy bus stop somewhere in Nebraska and asked if we could use some help back here at Café Campesino’s International headquarters. Bill offered to drive up and get him that night!

Our holiday business boomed under Daniel’s watchful eye and by early in 2001, he had assumed day to day management of the rapidly growing roasted coffee biz. Under his direction, our roasted coffee sales double last year and will do so again this year.  

Remember Lee, the insistent Chef? In July, 2002, Lee moved back to Americus after 2 years in Tallahassee, Florida as part-owner of the celebrated Cypress Restaurant. Lee left the restaurant business to join the Café Campesino team in charge of our roasting and production efforts.

Well, that’s the story of the wheelbarrow, the chef and the Nebraska Halloween. Did our business plan anticipate the convergence of these seemingly unrelated events? What do you think… As we continue to change, improve, define and redefine this company, we stand by our original mission of helping to create a system of trade that ensures that the farmers receive a fair price for their product. Admittedly, it sometimes feels like we are shoving that wheelbarrow through a foot of Nebraska snow. But we often feel that it is barreling down a hill and we are simply along for the ride. Regardless, the work is exciting and meaningful. And we thank you for helping us keep that wheelbarrow moving.