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Daniela Gutiérrez, a young woman who runs most of the
milling process at La Montaña, part of their family business.
Mario Marín, also a young producer and third generation of
coffee producers whose grandfather helped funding COOPE-
DOTA, one of the most important cooperatives in the country.
Emilio Ureña from La Chumeca that special-
izes in natural and anaerobic coffee process-
ing and Bayron Quirós from La Joya, who This year they had to
started processing their coffee in the last
couple of years and started seeing promising send their samples which
numbers in order to export.
The first negative impact that produc- takes a long time and
ers encountered was the lack of visits from
potential buyers. During April, most of the this implies extra costs.
farmers are visited by their clients of poten-
tial ones and they have the chance to expe-
rience everything directly on the farm. The
plants, the mill, the views, the food, the relationship with the
farmer, and most importantly the cupping. Costa Rica shut their
borders almost immediately after the first case was detected
and that meant all visits got canceled. This year they had to
send their samples which takes a long time and this implies
extra costs.

There is Always an Opportunity

Now with the closure of most coffee shops and the con-
C offee production has never been an easy task and sumption habits getting modified by this situation, buyers de-
cided either to lower the volume of coffee they intended to buy
the volatility of the prices does not assure that
farmers will be able to cover their costs and con-
the case for Mario Marín, who doubled his production during
tinue next season. Being a coffee farmer is an act or they canceled their order. Interestingly enough, this was not
of passion rather than a stable business that will consistently this harvest. His close relationship with the buyers allowed to
increase its revenue year after year. Now with the arrival of sell almost all his coffee despite being doubled because he had
COVID-19 to the producing countries, the uncertainty has a high demand from previous years. La Chumeca and La Mon-
settled and many producers are not sure if they will have a 2020 taña had to lower their prices even to half their price and start
harvest to offer. searching for new buyers.
Fortunately, a newborn phenomenon started in Costa Rica
Brace Yourself thanks to the people working from home who decided to buy
coffee online and not from the supermarket. This opened new
The first coronavirus case was detected in Costa Rica on possibilities to La Montaña with their coffee brand Don Lucas.
March 6th, right after the 2019 harvest was finished. Fortunate- Their roasted coffee brand has always existed but they relied
ly, almost every producer had everything ready for their buyers on the income from the exports and not from the national
to cover this year’s demand. However, the global picture was demand for roasted coffee. This shook their comfort zone so
different and Asia and Europe were amid this pandemic without they rebranded and started a social media marketing campaign
knowing what was going to happen next. Was this situation along with some important influencers and focused on the
going to be over in a couple of months or will it last until a internal market. Something similar happened with La Joya, they
vaccine is found and widely distributed? We don’t have the focused on their roasted coffee brand since the coffee shops
answers yet and not every producer was lucky enough to sell that they sell their coffee to were closed. As per Mario Marín
all their coffee also not at the price they intended. I asked the with their brand Vara Blanca, so far they have multiplied their
same three questions to four different producing families, all roasted coffee sales by five, something never seen before. Cos-
of them from the most famous coffee-producing region of ta Ricans now have the chance to buy coffee that would nor-
Costa Rica: Tarrazú. mally have gotten exported.

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