Coffee itself is a long-term investment for a farmer: It can take up to five years for a new coffee plant to bear fruit, and it can take most of a lifetime to learn how best to care for those plants, and how to tend to the fruit and seeds they produce. At Cafe Imports, we believe that these investments are best made in partnership, and that by learning and growing together with our producing partners and customers, and by digging in and making long-term investments with them as a buyer for their coffees, we have the potential not only to find, but in many cases to help develop the finest coffees in the world.

Our goal is to be able to identify potential in coffees and in coffee growers, to pay the right price to ensure that quality is rewarded and sustained—and, in many cases, improved. That also means that the investment needs to be more than simply an exchange of money for goods: It’s an exchange of ideas, of trust, of resources, and of understanding. We are proud of the quality incentives, educational initiatives, and health and financial projects we’ve been able to back with our producing partners, and we look forward to tasting the fruits of all of this collaborative labor for many years to come.


Please enjoy the report, and we welcome feedback and questions about it and future Development progress; feel free to e-mail progress@cafeimports.com with your thoughts.

Click to read our 2017 Development Report