Inspirations

Start the day with a coffee from Mexico

Sometimes we do things out of habit without question. When you enjoy your daily hot cup of coffee, do you ever wonder where it comes from? If you’ve got your hands on a bag of Van Houtte® Mexico Signature coffee, you can stop wondering. This is its story. Coffee is a very important crop in Mexico, the eighth-largest producer of coffee in the world. It’s hard to believe that this industry only really took off around 1920 in the land of the Aztecs as a result of the agrarian reforms of that time. Today, more than 300,000 Mexican farmers make a living from coffee. Many of them work the land in the mountainous states of Veracruz, Oaxaca and Chiapas. Of all of these farmers, about 85% come from Indigenous communities where Spanish is not the first language.

Favourite Coffee

GRAPOS, a cooperative of Mexican coffee growers

The GRAPOS cooperative in Chiapas is made up of Indigenous communities. Some of the beans in our Van Houtte® Mexico Signature Fair Trade coffee come from farms belonging to this cooperative, which has 3,000 members. The majority of them are from three communities in the Soconusco region, near the Guatemalan border: Unión Juárez, Cacahoatán and Tapachula. GRAPOS is certified Fairtrade, which ensures a better quality of life for its members.

Van Houtte® provides support to these communities and the projects they launch thanks to the fair trade premium. Among other things, we have helped them improve coffee production and quality. For the members of these communities, this translates into more sustainable practices and diversification of economic activities, leading to greater food security for their families.

A fair trade and traceable product

Fair trade refers to established social and environmental criteria and a better price for farmers. Fair trade coffee has a minimum price, which guarantees that even if the average price of a pound of coffee falls on the international market, the price of the fair trade product cannot fall below a certain threshold. In addition, for every pound of green coffee sold under fair trade conditions, the producer organization earns an extra 20 cents that goes directly into a community development fund.

Van Houtte® Mexico Signature coffee is also part of a traceability project. This means that, thanks to blockchain technology, you will soon be able to follow this Signature coffee
along every step of its journey, from the Mexican coffee cooperatives right to your cup. It’s a 100% Fairtrade-certified circuit and a single-origin product.

Bright flavour that represents the terroir

What exactly does single-origin coffee mean? It’s a product whose beans come from a single country. This creates a distinctive flavour and taste profile unique to a particular region of the world, as each one has its own soil and agricultural processes. Similar to wine, terroir strongly influences the taste of coffee.

Much like its country of origin, Van Houtte® Mexico Signature coffee has a warm and festive taste. Its fruity, spicy notes are topped with a balanced finish and a hint of spiciness. With a base of Arabica beans, this dark roast fills your cup with dark chocolate aromas enhanced with a slight acidity.

Photos: GRAPOS Cooperative