The campaign is over!
Connect growers and roasters. Make quality the common language in the coffee trade. Support coffee growers to receive an IKAWA.
- USD 12,155.00 contributed
- 14 backers
- 4 IKAWAS sent to origin!
Crowdfunding: Connect Growers and Roasters
Algrano and Ikawa partner for campaign to give roasters to growers
#connectgrowersandroasters
Producing outstanding coffee is for many coffee growers the only alternative in an environment of low market prices for commodity coffees. This crowdfunding campaign raised money to support coffee growers in their quest for quality.
A conversation around quality starts with understanding differences in taste profiles and requires a consistent roast of green beans. Unfortunately, most coffee growers do not have access to roasting devices and depend on costly quality laboratories hours away from the farm. Fast learning cycles and consistency are lost.
Thank you for supporting coffee growers!
Special thanks goes to:
Meet the Growers
We selected four famers/coffee-producing groups for you to get to know and support!
APAS Coffee, Brazil: A history you can taste
The first partner to trade coffee through Algrano four years ago, APAS is a Cooperative that focuses on people. They now include 69 farmers in Minas Gerais, Brazil. Through producing specialty coffee they may focus on the improvement of life and self development of its members. After receiving their export license last year, December 2019 marks the first time the Cooperative has exported their coffee direct to Europe!
Ademilson from APAS shares, "My point of view on coffee roasting with IKAWA is that we can standardize the roast and the information with our customers. We can develop and share profiles with our partners in real-time. The quality of the roasting and the practicality of the equipment all make a difference in quick decision making. With just a cell phone or computer, one becomes a roaster.
For us producers, it is very important to have access and understand what the customer is saying about our coffee. This way we can be sure that the roasting will always be the same. Here in Brazil or Germany... No matter where you are.
In my view, I think this is also the Algrano platform proposal/proposition; connecting people through technology. This goes beyond coffee roasting on an IKAWA and allows information about coffee to be shared with anyone you want on various communication platforms."
Norcafé, Peru
The association founded in 2015 by young coffee producers in the Peruvian Lonya Grande District (Amazonas) are quickly making a name for themselves after ranking in the top ten of the Cup of Excellence in 2019 two years in a row. Many of them, such as Nixer and Roiber, are school friends that came back to their hometowns after university to support small producers, young families and to change the landscape of local coffee production. And they are succeeding!
“Receiving this gift is very rewarding and will help us:
- Respond more quickly to deliveries from producers, achieving efficiency in quality control.
- Meet our objectives of having laboratories directly in our origins Lonya Grande, Jaén, and Chirinos.
- Train young people in quality control with excellent quality equipment.”
La Marianela, Colombia
Pablo the son of the owner Hernán has been handed down the farm to continue developing operations on their uniquely located farm between three volcano and fresh water springs. Their team is on an everyday search to surpass the quality of its coffee, develop better plantations, and improve the production processes and each cup for the desired taste that every coffee lover craves for!
“It would be of great value to us to use an IKAWA because it would allow us to roast and evaluate our coffees on the farm. This would help us to constantly improve the quality and identify for instance if we have a problem in the mill in time.
It would save us a lot of time because we currently have to go to a laboratory that is more than an hour from the farm to taste our coffees. This would be a great advantage and would impact the quality of our processes in a positive way. We could guarantee 100% of our processes and the profile of our coffee."
It would save us a lot of time because we currently have to go to a laboratory that is more than an hour from the farm to taste our coffees. This would be a great advantage and would impact the quality of our processes in a positive way. We could guarantee 100% of our processes and the profile of our coffee."
Aprocassi, Peru
At 1700 meters above sea level, the province of San Ignacio is located in the department of Cajamarca; where summers are cloudy and winters are long, it is one of the most important coffee producing areas in Peru. Its exotic flora and fauna that characterize the region, keeps in its land the propitious place to give fruit to a considerable variety of coffee plants.
“We are currently increasing production efficiency and optimizing post-harvest processes under the demanding standards of the specialty coffee market. This in turn, focused on coffee processes such as Natural Coffee (drying the fruit without depulping) and Honey Coffee (depulped, fermented and dried beans with mucilage) also known as semi-washed coffee; so that a quality in cup can be obtained.
“We are currently increasing production efficiency and optimizing post-harvest processes under the demanding standards of the specialty coffee market. This in turn, focused on coffee processes such as Natural Coffee (drying the fruit without depulping) and Honey Coffee (depulped, fermented and dried beans with mucilage) also known as semi-washed coffee; so that a quality in cup can be obtained.
Therefore, to conserve and improve the soils is our work; implementing practices of conservation and incorporation of raw material, having as purpose to improve the productivity and quality in cup in function to the type of agronomic handling with a harvest and specialized post-harvest.”
How did the crowdfunding work?
Your support provided coffee growers with a IKAWA Pro V3 Sample Roaster. This simple to use technology allows coffee growers to roast coffees at the farm, understand quality and engage in a conversation with roasters about cup profiles and prices to forge long-term partnerships.
To start with, we selected three coffee grower groups in Brazil and Peru and a young producer from Colombia. We selected these producers because they’ve shown in the last years their dedication to producing excellent coffees. Moreover, their previous set-up didn't not allow them to engage with coffee roasters in a direct communication about quality. As enough funds were raised, additional coffee growers joined the campaign!
To start with, we selected three coffee grower groups in Brazil and Peru and a young producer from Colombia. We selected these producers because they’ve shown in the last years their dedication to producing excellent coffees. Moreover, their previous set-up didn't not allow them to engage with coffee roasters in a direct communication about quality. As enough funds were raised, additional coffee growers joined the campaign!
The cost breakdown
Investing in an IKAWA Pro V3 Sample Roaster costs US$4,270. For a Brazilian grower, the costs quickly rise to US$5,991 including shipping, VAT and import duties. Algrano contributed US$6,000 to cover for the first IKAWA that went to our long-time partner APAS. You were invited to contribute as much as you wished, there were no limits. You could contribute in EUR, USD, CHF or GBP, through a wire payment, we applied daily interest rates.
In support of this crowdfunding campaign, IKAWA doubled the impact by matching each funded Sample Roaster with a second! Therefore, the second Sample Roaster that went to Norcafé was already funded!
Why we believed in this campaign
At Algrano we connect coffee growers and roasters daily. We believe that technology has the ability to turn coffee growers into entrepreneurs and that transparency in the supply chain is the first step towards fair prices being paid to growers. The moments we celebrate are those when a coffee grower knows the harvest’s quality and can stand behind a higher farmgate price based on the quality premium. Unfortunately, these moments are rare.
The majority of coffee growers do not control post harvest processes with a scientific approach. Many rely on external labs for cupping and grading. Only a few receive direct feedback from roasters about why they decided to buy or not to buy their coffee.
With you, we wanted to change the unequal access to technology. Let’s empower growers to roast samples at the farm, engage with roasters in conversation around quality and its development and learn from direct market feedback in order to improve the quality of their coffee and their lives.
IKAWA matches every contribution!
“Algrano has done a great job at summarising why this project is important already, and we are excited to support them on this fundraiser as it overlaps with so much of what we believe in. Everyone should be able to get great sample roasts, easily. It is fundamental.
Additionally, connecting producers and roasters is incredibly powerful. We built a share function into the roaster for a reason. Sharing profiles and data will help anyone easily get great results, tap into current roasting knowledge, and allow them to understand their coffee better.”
— Alex Georgiou, Head of Marketing IKAWA
Why IKAWA?
IKAWA’s sample roaster has become an industry standard. It is being used in the quality control lab by an increasing number of roasters across the world. Two of the functions that are interesting for our mission is that IKAWA allows the user to store coffee profiles, replicate them, as well as to share this data with other users.
A poorly roasted sample can lead to misjudgment of a coffee's potential and ruin a deal. If a roaster and the grower can discuss the roast profile by sharing "roast curves", they avoid any misunderstanding.
The mission of IKAWA was born in the coffee origins. From day one, Andrew the founder wanted to build a device that improves coffee and the value chain of smallholder coffee growers. Using an IKAWA improves collaboration in the coffee chain and learning through profile sharing. "Collaborate, experiment, share" is their message to the coffee community!
The initiator: Algrano.com
5 years ago, on the day of its launch, Algrano.com was awarded best IT and Tech Innovation by the SCAE. Since then, Algrano is seen as the leader in the coffee industry regarding transparency in the coffee trade and digitisation of trade execution. Algrano.com allows coffee growers to market their coffees directly and independently to roasters. Roasters choose coffees at origin from trusted partners, enjoy price transparency up to the farmgate and control over a customisable supply chain: quality assurance, transport, warehousing and financing.
For more information, please visit the Algrano platform.
For more information, please visit the Algrano platform.