According to the USDA Biennial Report 2021, Peru is the ninth largest coffee producer in the world and the fifth largest exporter of organic coffee worldwide in 2021/2022. After Colombia and Honduras it is the largest producer of soft coffee, too. 

Omar Narrea, professor at Universidad del Pacífico School of Public Management, pointed out that in 2020 the accumulated coffee exports were US$ 643.4 million compared to US$ 634.9 million the previous year; in other words, there was a small increase of 1.3%. However, in the same period, the exported volume fell by 18.6% compared to 2019.

He added that, at the production level, according to Promperú, 424 thousand hectares of aromatic bean are cultivated, which represents 4.7 million quintals in 10 coffee growing regions. He also explained that the main export destinations are the US (27%), Germany (22%), Belgium (9%), Sweden (5%), France (5%), Canada (5%), Italy (5%). "According to Promperú, Europe is characterized by having few buyers of quality coffee. The United States, on the other hand, values presentation over quality," he explained. 

For Narrea there are five major challenges that Peruvian coffee exporters must overcome: 

1. Position themselves in high quality segments that pay better premiums, that is to say, to work on positioning the brand "Cafés del Perú" (cup score over 80) and "Café del Perú especialidades únicas" (cup score over 84). To this end, we must work to maintain consistency and compliance with contracts in order to improve Peru's image. 

2. Promote Peruvian coffee as a specialty coffee, because "organic" is no longer a differential. 

3. Become a reliable and relevant supplier for the traditional coffee segments that represent nearly 80% of the total coffee exported. 

4. Visibility challenge, since - according to a study carried out by 40 Brands - Peru is not yet in the "top of mind" of the international consumer and it is necessary to work to become a benchmark for a greater number of green coffee buyers. 

5. Sector professionalization, since there is disorganization and financial weakness in the cooperatives. 

On the other hand, another challenge for coffee producers is the absence of Peruvian coffee in the local market. In this sense, according to the Chamber of Coffee and Cacao, it is estimated that in the first quarter of the year the import of soluble coffee exceeded 7 million dollars. 

 Given this context, we also contacted two ventures incubated by Emprende UP that seek to enhance the value and increase the consumption of this product. 

• Cosecha Coffee is a brand of specialty coffees that works with micro-lot producers from different regions of Peru. Its purpose is to make the best coffees of our country known throughout the world and to generate a positive impact in the producing areas. They currently have a specialty coffee shop in the district of Jesus Maria and in the coming months will launch an e-commerce to be more accessible to those who wish to try excellent Peruvian coffees. 

What motivated its founders, Catia Ari and Julio Torres, was the immense potential of Peruvian coffee but the lack of knowledge and diffusion in the local market. This drove them to investigate from the production process to barismo, in order to meet a demand with constantly developing consumption habits. 

"In Cosecha Coffee we want to bring the work of hundreds of specialty coffee micro-producers to the Peruvian consumer and thereby generate development through fair payment and the application of a redistribution model," they said. 

Currently, Cosecha Coffee works with 5 organic coffee producers in Cusco and Cajamarca, but its goal is to work with more producers year after year. In the short term they expect to work with 10 producers nationwide and in the medium term with more than 20 producers. 

Like many consumer-focused businesses, Cosecha Coffee was affected by the biosecurity restrictions implemented by the government to counteract the Covid-19 pandemic. However, the obstacles motivated them to think about a more global strategy and so they made a radical change to their business model. 

For Catia and Julio César, Emprende UP training and mentoring helped them to question and self-evaluate their business model and thus focus on defining and understanding the problem and the consumer. 

• Don Salazar coffee originated in the family of Arturo Marín, its founder, who belongs to the third generation of a coffee growing family in the Chanchamayo valley. "I grew up knowing the coffee production cycle, seeing the needs of the producers, their effort to achieve a good product. Therefore, when I inherited my father's farm, I decided to raise it because I love that farm. That's why Don Salazar's logo is my father's caricature and the last name is my mother's," he said. 

This motivated him to become interested in coffee and to look for a way to promote Peruvian coffee growing. In addition, he always wondered why Peruvians preferred to drink imported instant coffee, being a country that produces a bean of excellent quality. He reached the conclusion that one of the weak points was the difficulty in the form of consumption, for which he devised a simple way in which any person could drink a specialty coffee as easily as an instant coffee. 

"We want to bring good Peruvian coffee to everyone and we want anyone to be able to prepare it and enjoy a Good cup of coffee, without the need to be an expert barista. Under this premise, we have developed a range of products that provide our clients with everything they need: the exact measurements, the precise grinding and the precise method to obtain the perfect coffee in an easy and quick manner", he explained. 

As with other ventures, the pandemic also forced them to transform from a B2B business, focused on capturing an important demand for coffee to provide a market for their farm's production, to a B2C business. "When the pandemic hit, the B2B idea collapsed, because companies and coffee shops closed. So, we switched from day 1 to B2C. I created the website in less than 1 week, and we started to enhance our product: "The perfect coffee kit" as the perfect solution to have a specialty coffee at home, without the need to go to a specialty coffee shop. We started to make a lot of digital content, to constantly innovate by bringing out new products that really succeeded in the market. I believe that, in that sense, the pandemic favored us", he said. 

 In this regard, he highlighted the support provided by Emprende UP through the mentoring of experts, the sharing of their approach and experience, as well as the help in the search for financing and contacts. 

"When I decided to dedicate 100% of my time to my start-up and quit my office job, I started to live a lot on a day-to-day basis, and I think I lost a bit of the macro or "managerial" focus, because in a start-up you are all the areas yourself: you sell, pack, ship, do the accounting, etc. You really do everything. So, I think that when our sales increased, I started to do a lot of this operational stuff and started to lose a little bit of the "strategic" management focus. What I really appreciate about the incubation and acceleration program is the mentoring we had, where they made me take a step back to analyze and see the route we had taken and realize that I had to look at the business strategy, analyze the data, and see the business in a more macro way, without losing sight of the client," he said. 

 You can find Cosecha Coffee on Facebook and Instagram and Don Salazar Coffee at www.donsalazar.com.