More Than Just A Cup of Coffee
April 9, 2019
Most of us start the day with a cup of coffee, whether it’s from a Keurig before you leave the house or the crafted cup of coffee from a De Jong Duke when you get to the office, we enjoy whatever form it comes in.
But have you ever stopped and asked yourself, who grew these coffee beans? What process did it undergo to get here? How are these roasteries treating their farmers? You might not think much about this when you’ve indulged in your usual cup of coffee, but at Agora we think about this… a lot.
At Agora, we pride ourselves on the roasters we partner with and the story each roaster brings to our attention. Why? So you, our wonderful clients are only offered the highest quality coffee.
We’re going to shine a spotlight on a roaster we’ve partnered with that demonstrates sustainability, quality, and transparency throughout their coffee production process.
Stumptown Coffee Roasters
Stumptown is B Corp Certified:
Qualifying as Certified B Corp for a business is an honor, and Stumptown recently received this outstanding recognition. Certified B Corp measures the social and environmental performance of a company i.e. employee culture and wellness, recycling and electricity usage, etc., which is certified by B Lab, a non-profit organization. This is assessed under 5 categories: Accountability, Transparency, Performance, Availability, and Cost.
Sustainability at Stumptown:
Stumptown’s definition of sustainability is at a global level, including the waste reduction from cafés, the material used for roasting, reduction of carbon emissions due to climate change, and reduction of water use due to water scarcity. Their vision of sustainability is beyond what most companies see and includes coffee sourcing and company operations. To uphold their legacy of direct trade Stumptown offers price incentives for quality coffee, along with building long-term relationships with coffee farmers to attain consistent quality, and to stay profitable. In other words, they take care of their materials, people, and coffee all at the same great eminence.
Co-Investments:
Every employee that is part of Stumptown’s coffee journey is treated fairly no matter where they are in the production process, from farm to warehouse to café, employees of Stumptown are understood and valued. Stumptown co-invested into the Suke Quto Project in Ethiopia, where one of their coffee farms is in the village of Kumure. They asked the locals what is needed in their village, and they had requested for a hygienic school to educate their children in, so they would be able to stay in the village and continue to keep producing amazing coffee. Other projects include the development of a composting facility in Peru, a mechanical dryer for an easier drying process in El Jordan, Colombia, and that’s just a few things they’ve accomplished.
Overall, we all know that coffee is delicious, addicting some might say, but where it comes from and how it got into that cup of yours, is so important. We care about who we choose to partner with because not only do we support our roasters, but what they stand for and what they’re willing to do for fairness and quality.