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We have been working with Catracha Coffee for 3 years now. For us Catracha is about relationships, which is why year after year you will continue to see coffee from Blas on our shelves. Catracha exists because of Mayra Powell. Mayra has a heart for small producers all over the world, and invests her time intentionally with the farmers from her home town of Santa Elena, Honduras, just 20 minutes from the El Salvador border. In year 1, Catracha consisted of 13 producers and this year there are 30 new producers contributing coffee to Catracha making up about 90 total producers exporting around 80,000 pounds of coffee this year.
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Mayra’s goal with Catracha Coffee is to recognize the efforts of small coffee producers in Santa Elena through traceable micro lots and transparent individualized profit sharing determined by the quality of each producer. Beyond coffee, Mayra and her husband Lowell, invest in the women and children of Catracha to help them create small businesses and express themselves through art. They also invest in the local youth by holding an annual youth conference at their home in Santa Elena.
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This is Blas. We have worked with Blas for 3 harvests now. After meeting Blas, we’ve discovered hes a family man. His brother sells coffee through Catracha, along with his father and mother. After asking him why he likes farming he said, “I like farming coffee. I like being outside, I love that I am able to export my coffee internationally and it inspires me to produce high quality coffee.”
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Blas is extremely close with his siblings, children, and his wife Dorila. Dorila made us breakfast before we visited Blas at the farm where he was drying coffee with his children and niece. They were ecstatic to have us at the farm and their hospitality showed it. He took us to a gorgeous waterfall on their land, the girls gave us fresh squeezed orange juice from their orange trees, and made a gift for us to remember our time there. Blas is growing beautiful Catuai coffee and we couldn’t be happier working with this beautiful family.
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Another big reason we work with Catracha is traceability. Generally coffee farmer profits are hard to trace. It’s hard to know how much the farmer is actually placing in their pockets. A fantastic benefit to working with Catracha is traceability. $2.50 per pound goes directly into the farmers pocket while another $1.50 goes to packaging and dry milling in preparation for export. It can go up from $2.50 depending on the quality of the cup score (specialty minimum is generally 84-85).
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Coffee quality is where Lowell comes in. Lowell is essentially a resource to each farmer. He visits the farmers often and jumps right into testing ph levels, helps sort cherries, and encourages them and tends to their needs like equipment, questions, or anything else they might need. It's amazing to see his joy and commitment to helping each producer obtain the highest quality coffee possible. Lowell also helps with moisture readings and gets the samples roasted throughout the entire harvesting season, which is a great way to give the farmer feedback on how they are sorting, processing, and drying.
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To learn more about Mayra and the Catracha Coffee community, please do not hesitate to send us a message or visit catrachacoffee.com. Mayra also has a video on Youtube explaining more about Catracha Coffee and her heart for her community. This presentation was featured at Re:co Symposium at SCA Expo in Seattle in 2015. We are incredibly honored to be part of a group of roasters that have the opportunity to partner with this sweet, family oriented community.
