Speaker 1 00:00:00 Okay. Thank you. So, Good afternoon. Good afternoon. Or, you should say welcome to me because I'm currently on your premises. where am I? Speaker 2 00:00:09 So. Well, first, welcome to Spring Valley. Thank you. Has double meaning. We're actually in Spring Valley. We're in the valley. And you're in the Spring Valley Coffee Roastery. We're sitting actually in the roastery amongst the bags of coffee. Speaker 1 00:00:20 This is so cool. you started a a coffee business. But a little birdie told me that before. We're going to dive into coffee. You said before you had a pizza business. So have you been a serial entrepreneur or how did you get into entrepreneurship? And then I want to hear the pizza story. Speaker 2 00:00:37 Sure. So let's take a step back. I didn't start Spring Valley. I bought the business. I was an enthusiastic customer that bought the that bought the business eight years ago. Yeah, but I'll tell you, I'll come back to that. So, I mean, my background is very briefly, perhaps a little bit useful. Speaker 2 00:00:50 I've been born in, born in the US, raised in Kenya, worked in finance all over the world, in Europe, the US, the Middle East moved back to start what I would say was Kenya's first proper pizza delivery business. There were a couple of brands around, but they were pizza places that kind of delivered if they felt like. And this was in 2012. This is in a pre UberEats pre globo world where Google Maps didn't even exist properly in this part of the world and moved back and someone said and the reason was I was living in the Middle East, living in Jordan, came back, couldn't get a pizza delivered and took an hour or one night to 90 minutes the next night. And I'm like, anywhere in the world I've lived, I can get a pizza within 30 minutes. Why not Kenya? Everyone said it can't be done. And that kind of sparked those entrepreneurial tendencies. Of course they'd be done. Yeah. So move back and started the first pizza, first proper pizza delivery business. Speaker 2 00:01:39 We had one little location in Westlands. Yeah, started with 20 delivery bikes, in 2012 and built that into the fastest growing pizza delivery business that we ended up selling to Pizza Hut in 2016. Speaker 1 00:01:50 The infrastructure you sold to. Speaker 2 00:01:51 Infrastructure, the brand, they rebranded it to Pizza Hut, of course. but yeah, the delivery bikes, the team, the logistics, everything. Speaker 1 00:01:58 But how did. How did you do that? Did you invest in in getting, actual bikes, or was it like the drivers, like the bodas you have in town here? Speaker 2 00:02:07 We we bought the bikes, we hired drivers, we trained them. We had big maps on walls, literally massive walls. That has had maps of Nairobi, lots of roads, for example. The road that we're on now didn't have a name, and there used to be a big UN tank parked at the top that had broken down many years ago. So we literally called this UN Tank road because it didn't have a name at the time. Speaker 1 00:02:26 And then you trained your drivers to be able to do. Speaker 2 00:02:27 That. And we mapped out all of Nairobi with these massive maps, you know, probably like three meters by five meters up on every wall in the coffee shop. We mapped out every single road. Speaker 1 00:02:36 Of this story. Speaker 2 00:02:38 and yeah, so we mapped out Nairobi. And then at the end of that, at the end of that, literally handed literally boxes of binders to the guys at Google said, hey, you guys might want to update Google Maps. Speaker 1 00:02:47 No way. Speaker 2 00:02:49 Because I mean, yeah, that's something that should be a public good, right? Speaker 1 00:02:52 Absolutely. But someone had to start doing it and you did it for the pizza business, and now it's a public good. Yeah. Speaker 2 00:02:56 And I think it started it then. It's of course grown from there and, but yeah. So we, we started a pizza delivery business that ended up being a logistics business. We happened to sell great pizza. Okay. By the end of it. Speaker 1 00:03:06 Yeah. And then you sold it. Speaker 2 00:03:08 Correct. So when I first came to market, nobody wanted to come. Speaker 2 00:03:11 This biscuit. Speaker 1 00:03:12 Yeah. Speaker 2 00:03:12 Hi, biscuit. Hi. Speaker 1 00:03:15 We're gonna get the dog in, in the scene. Hi. Hello. Okay, so we have biscuit. And biscuit is named after. Speaker 2 00:03:23 Biscuit is named after the biscuit. That's next to your cookie. Next to your coffee I apologize. yeah. And she's named after. She's actually named after my grandmother's biscuit because she's that color and, And. Yeah, she was born on the day my grandmother passed away. And she's the same exact color as those biscuits. And she's. Speaker 1 00:03:40 Part of the family, I. Speaker 2 00:03:41 Guess. Speaker 1 00:03:41 So, yeah. Yeah. Speaker 2 00:03:42 So you will see her in and and about. She'll come and. Speaker 1 00:03:44 Go. I like that she can come back whenever she pleases. Speaker 2 00:03:46 I'm sure she will come back in in a second. Speaker 1 00:03:48 Nice. But so you before you started the piece of business, you were in finance? Yes. What kind of finance were you in? Speaker 2 00:03:53 So I started my career in. In private equity and investment banking in London. Speaker 2 00:03:57 And my last job in finance is actually in the Middle East. I work for a bank called HSBC. Okay. And I was looking after their business in Jordan. Speaker 1 00:04:04 Okay. And how did you. Did you always have a passion for FMcG? Because he's past two. Speaker 2 00:04:10 He lost to business. Yeah I think it's interesting. I think first I was I was an entrepreneur stuck in a financiers body for a long time. I grew up around a lot of entrepreneurs, a lot of extended family members. My dad started a business much later in life, and I knew I always wanted to do something on my own. I wasn't sure what. and I think I've grown up in a large extended family, and I think hospitality has always come naturally. For example, growing up at our house, there's always two extra places set for meals every day. Just because somebody will bring somebody. I mean, literally happened last week. There's two extra places set at my house for dinner. I called my mum, my parents, you know, live with us. Speaker 2 00:04:42 They retired and I'm like, hey, I've got two Italians in town. They're going to join us for dinner. And it's just something that we've always done just as second nature. So I didn't realise. I knew it in a professional sense, but it's something that we've always kind of value that we've always lived get. Speaker 1 00:04:55 So it's not necessarily the food. It's also the experience that you're able to offer that comes with it. Speaker 2 00:05:00 And I absolutely love pizza. The why the pizza business. I absolutely love pizza. And I just want it to be able to eat a great pizza delivered at my door. And I just could never get one. Speaker 1 00:05:08 Yeah, a problem and a solution. Yeah. So then tell me about why you started Spring Valley. Because you said you were a fanatic customer. When when was this? Where where did where did it start? Speaker 2 00:05:18 So Spring Valley has been around since 2009. I became a customer in 2012 when I moved back to Kenya, and I was what I'd call first I was I was a fanatic customer of the brand. Speaker 2 00:05:26 I just loved the product, love loved the business. It was a little cafe. I think you visited the the the original cafe. It didn't look like that. And there's a little cafe at the front, little roastery at the back, and I just fundamentally loved the product. Yeah. And, I'm like, I asked the guys that owned it, why do I like your coffee? Why do I like it the best? And they said, well, we keep the best stuff here, whereas everything everybody else exports the best stuff. So that was the thesis of why I liked the product. Yeah. for me, after spring, after Naked Pizza, I took some time out to really think about what I wanted to do, and I just didn't. I didn't want to build another business where we're importing a bunch of stuff into Kenya. I didn't want to build a business where I wanted to take the best of what Kenya had to offer and to take it to the world. I just couldn't find anything that I absolutely loved. Speaker 2 00:06:09 And I was looking, I was searching, and I got to know the guys that owned Spring Valley. And over the course of many conversations, I asked them. They wanted to invest it. They said no. Fast forward to a few months later. They wanted to emigrate, and I ended up buying the business and we jokingly say, now, I didn't want to lose my I don't want to lose my daily supply so. Speaker 1 00:06:25 I can hire on your own supply. So not in this field. Speaker 2 00:06:28 No, literally that is that is what. Speaker 1 00:06:30 You were there every day? Speaker 2 00:06:31 Yeah. Literally every day. So I'm like I literally I'm like, hold on, I don't want this coffee to go away. I want to be able to drink it. And I bought the business. So I was an enthusiastic amateur. Knew nothing about coffee. Technically, yeah, except I knew what I liked, what I didn't, and I ended up buying the business. Speaker 1 00:06:46 But when you bought it, how many people were there? It was just those two guys. Speaker 2 00:06:49 There was two owners, the two brothers. There was three guys working in the roastery. All three of them still worked with us. There were three baristas and a cleaner. So it was a team of seven people. Yeah, I mean, the three original roasters that have been there since the beginning are still with us. Speaker 1 00:07:02 Nice. That says something. Speaker 2 00:07:03 so, yeah. So they've been at the business for 16 years now. almost pushing on 17 and, yeah, of course the baristas and other people have moved on in things. Yeah. So. Speaker 1 00:07:13 Yeah. Barista for life is not always there. Speaker 2 00:07:15 No, no. Look, it's a stopgap job, and people move on, and that's okay. Yeah. Speaker 1 00:07:19 Tell me a little bit about the size of this now. Speaker 2 00:07:21 I mean, when I took over, it was a little cafe that you visited with a little roastery at the back with. With the little roaster, in fact, you see the roaster sitting just back there. That's the original. Speaker 1 00:07:29 The original. Speaker 2 00:07:30 Roaster. That's the original roaster that I inherited when I bought the business. Yeah. And today. so that was one site. One location. Today we have nine cafes here in London. Sorry, nine cafes here in Nairobi. Yeah, we have one cafe in London. and we also have a hospitality business. So we supply a lot of the leading hotels, restaurants, cafes, primarily in Kenya, but across the region we supply them with coffee. And then we're also available in retail. So high end premium retail. Our coffee is also available there. Speaker 1 00:07:56 So you've really decided to put your product at the high end. Towards luxury. Luxury coffee actually. Speaker 2 00:08:02 So I don't like to use the term luxury but within the coffee world because I want I want an incredible coffee to be accessible. Yeah. So so so so for me it was I wanted incredible coffee to be accessible. This could come. Okay, I want come on. Come look. Look what I have. Speaker 1 00:08:19 See if we can get her down here. Speaker 2 00:08:20 Look what I have. Speaker 1 00:08:20 Look at the rest. Oh, biscuit for biscuit. Speaker 2 00:08:25 Say, jumbo. Jumbo. Not to say jumbo to her. Speaker 1 00:08:29 As this is so cute. Sorry. Speaker 2 00:08:34 Do you wanna give it one? Speaker 1 00:08:35 I would love to. Speaker 2 00:08:36 Say. Speaker 1 00:08:36 Jambo. Speaker 2 00:08:37 Yes. No. Yeah. Speaker 1 00:08:41 Yeah. Speaker 2 00:08:42 Good girl. Sit. Cool. Okay. Go. It's a walk time. Go. You can go for a walk. Go. Come on. Speaker 1 00:08:50 Or we could set her. Can she lay here or not? Speaker 2 00:08:52 She would sit. Speaker 1 00:08:54 Let's see if we can get it out. Nikki said she's too excited. Speaker 2 00:08:57 She might just sit. She might stay anyway. So. Yeah. Speaker 1 00:09:02 Mike, is she in the mike? Are we okay? Yeah. Speaker 2 00:09:09 Are you okay with it? Speaker 1 00:09:09 I love this. I love it, but I'm afraid all my attention is going to go to her. So if we keep going like this, it just makes me a very happy woman. Speaker 2 00:09:16 Well, you can play with her anytime. Speaker 1 00:09:18 So she needs to get some more biscuits. Okay. It's biscuits with some peppermints in it. Speaker 2 00:09:23 Go go go. Where's Alex? Go! Speaker 1 00:09:26 Okay, that was biscuit. Speaker 2 00:09:27 That was biscuit. Speaker 1 00:09:28 Okay, we'll cut that up for the audio part. We'll get back. I need that. So sorry. The luxury term. Speaker 2 00:09:36 Yeah. So coffee is graded. So coffee is graded on on a scale of 0 to 100. Anything that scores. And this is traditional specialty coffee association again that's also changing. But anything scoring 80 and above is considered specialty coffee. Speaker 1 00:09:48 Wait, wait. Before we go any further. How do you score coffee. Speaker 2 00:09:51 So that's based on. So when you taste the coffee, when you taste the coffee, it's there's some positive and negative. You want no negative attributes. Is it. Hey. Like is it. Are there any defects in the coffee. Some of it's visual. Some of it's taste. Some of it's sensory. And then there's the positive attributes. What are you looking for? Are we looking for acidity or are we looking for certain flavor flavor profiles. Speaker 2 00:10:09 So it's a great way to kind of just, you know, across the world, whether it's from Latin America or Asia, Africa is the coffee can be scored. It's a bit subjective. Some parts of it are objective. Yeah. That's not changing. There's different ways of doing that. But traditionally coffees scored on the scale of 0 to 100. Yeah. Anything scoring 18 above is considered specialty or and therefore premium. And the reason especially is one of the quality of the beans. But it also means that farmers are getting paid a better price. There's often better traceability. It's not bulked. So it just means that it's a better quality product. Yeah, you can trace it. Also, the farmers perhaps taking a little bit more care of that coffee in a post-harvest kind of process. Yeah. so Spring Valley had by default, not by knowing what it was, but but has been Kenya's oldest specialty coffee roastery. There has been commercial groceries, but it really has only been roasting the best stuff from a quality perspective. Speaker 2 00:10:58 So that's why. So I realized that's why I like the product. Yeah, the best specialty was being exported green in the 60 kilogram bags that you see behind you. And nobody was keeping it in country for domestic use at the time, except for Spring Valley. And there was one other small coffee shop and that was it. Yeah. so I don't like luxury because I want premium coffee to be accessible. Because. Speaker 1 00:11:19 Yeah, because luxury as an association of not being available for a certain. Speaker 2 00:11:23 Cause, you can still buy a great coffee. You can still drink a great tasting coffee. It doesn't have to be inaccessible. Yeah. Speaker 1 00:11:29 And you can you you can actually serve it here because. So one of the things you said is a lot of it was continuously being exported. So the best coffee was going to Europe or. Speaker 2 00:11:38 Well, the best Kenyan coffees in the world that I was tasting. I was tasting them in Berlin, in London, in Amsterdam, in New York, in Tokyo. Speaker 1 00:11:45 Yeah. Speaker 2 00:11:45 And not here in Melbourne. Not. Yeah, not here because it was all being sent out. Speaker 1 00:11:49 Yeah, but isn't Kenya by origin a tea country because of the the colonies? Speaker 2 00:11:53 Yeah. So Kenya is so. So yeah. Because of colonial kind of connotations. Kenya is traditionally been a tea country. Coffee has been a large export of ours that's diminished by about 60%. It went from 150 tons at its peak to under 50 tons today. So it's come down massively for various reasons. But, it's traditionally been a tea drinking country. Growing up, we all grew up drinking tea. Yeah. Speaker 1 00:12:12 Funny. And then now. But now the also coffee consumption has that gone up amongst Kenyans. Speaker 2 00:12:17 It has gone up. So coffee. So coffee. When we gone in this business you know. So when I got in about eight years ago, it's about 5% of all beverages consumed, of which 4% was still instant and only 1% was brewed coffee. Speaker 1 00:12:27 I do have to say I love the instant coffee here. Speaker 1 00:12:30 It's better than in Europe. The instant coffees. Speaker 2 00:12:33 I mean, a. Speaker 1 00:12:34 Lot of them made. Speaker 2 00:12:35 A lot of it's made in Tanzania, which is at least it's produced on the continent. It's still okay. Look, there's a home for coffee of all quality levels, right? Yeah. The the lower grade coffees often end up in instant coffee or as blenders, which is fine because farmers also need to get paid for that. I mean, our focus has traditionally been on the stuff. Speaker 1 00:12:50 At the higher end. Yeah, but tell me a bit more about this entire coffee value chain that we're talking about, right. So you've mentioned the word traceability. You've mentioned better pay, better care. How how does the how does. How does the entire chain actually work. Let's go from from like growing the bean to actually then grinding it and and pouring hot water over it. Speaker 2 00:13:12 Sure. So Kenya is quite a unique one in that the system that we operate is a little bit different to most places in the world. Speaker 2 00:13:17 We still operate an auction system. So typically in Kenya, you'll have people that grow the coffee that you call growers or producers. If they're large enough, they can have their own estate or they can have their own farm. And on which then once you harvest the coffee, let's go back to the planting. The seeds generally provided by the Coffee Research Institute or by approved suppliers of of coffee seedlings. Okay. And in Kenya, we grow five varieties of coffee. Okay. and those are five different kind of bean varietals from a technical perspective. Then growers grow those. If they're small farmers and most of Kenya's farmers are smallholder farmers, but typically with an acre or less in terms of total land under cultivation. So coffee is one of the multiple things that that they are growing. Yeah. And they are then often part of a cooperative. And that coffee, then once it gets picked, picked as a cherry comes off as a red cherry on the tree, gets taken to the court that they're a member of, and it gets processed at that cooperative. Speaker 2 00:14:10 Yeah. And then once processed, that is different processing methods. And some cooperatives have a better reputation for higher quality post-harvest processing. They have better equipment or they just take a bit more care of that coffee. And that's that's reflected in the taste of the coffee. Yeah. That coffee then has to go to a mill. So it's a different it's a different place. There used to be some private ones largely they're now owned by the government or by local counties. The coffee gets milled and separated from a size perspective. Yeah. And then that coffee is then brought to the auction by, by an agent. Speaker 1 00:14:41 What do you mean, size? Perspective? Like the size of the beans? Speaker 2 00:14:43 Yeah. So it's interesting. So in Kenya you may hear the term Kenya aa aa aa. So AA people think it's high quality. It's actually not. It's been size double a from a screen size perspective. It's screen size 18. So you have slightly bigger beans and a B will be a screen size 16 or 17. Speaker 2 00:14:58 So B slightly smaller a C will be a 14 or a 15. For for example. So it really is a moniker of size not of quality. But our, our domestic marketing agencies and the government kind of coffee marketing has always said Kenya is the best and there is a correlation to size and quality, but it's not. But it's not linear. Speaker 1 00:15:18 Okay. Speaker 2 00:15:19 so so back to that. So then then. Speaker 1 00:15:21 Is this also the point where most of the the beans didn't get exported? Speaker 2 00:15:25 Yeah. No. So it goes to the mill. Then after the mill, the, the the agent and the agents appointed either by the co-op or the farmer presents that coffee to auction. But before it comes to auction, we have a tasting room. So or a sample room where all the coffees are available. We can pick up samples we taste and cup them. So kind of what we've done in the in the lab that you've seen here, we'll taste and cut those coffees and then auctions every Tuesday during the season. Speaker 2 00:15:48 And then we will buy coffee at the auction. So an agent presents it. A dealer purchases that coffee. Yeah. And then the dealer pays agent. The agent pays the co-op. The co-op pays the farmer. So there's a chain of product movement. There's a chain of money movement. It can be quite long, quite convoluted. There have been reforms and changes to the coffee sector over the last couple of years. Where there are there are mechanisms under which more direct trade can happen. So for us, it's interesting. We don't buy all of our coffees directly. We have all of our relationships are direct, but we have to follow the coffee through the legal chain. Yeah, the farmer will give it to their agent, goes to the mill. Back to traceability. One of the things that we have that I see is a remnant of colonial times is we have a really great system that's not in blockchain, not in technology, but it's called an outturn number using numbers and letters. So we know which week in the coffee season that came from which coffee came from which mill milled it. Speaker 2 00:16:40 So on every single bag. You see this green little tag that has an outturn number on it, and that will tell you. Speaker 1 00:16:45 It tells you. Speaker 2 00:16:46 That tells us all the information that we need to know. so it's all traceable. So some of our relationships are direct and some coffees, we bet we buy directly. So there's a mix of the two, and there's under certain circumstances where you can buy coffee directly if the farmer has or the cooperative has the licenses that enable them to sell directly. Speaker 1 00:17:04 Yeah, but it must be hard for a smallholder farmer because you're looking at size as well of is that possible. Speaker 2 00:17:11 For a super smallholder farmers? Hard. Yeah. but then we'll work directly with the cooperative. So there might be, you know, 200 to 300 farmers when you bulk their coffee. It's quite significant. And they, they grow their coffee, they pick it at the time where it's ripe or it's not under ripe or overripe. They really take care of the coffee when it's processed or when it gets cold. Speaker 2 00:17:28 When the fruit comes off, the skin comes and they really take care of that and they have a better reputation. They will have a better reputation for how they process their coffee. So we may buy directly from them. Yeah. the only farmers we're able to buy directly from, they have to be of a certain minimum size, just in terms of the sheer production that they have for it to be worth their while. Speaker 1 00:17:45 So that's what really depends on if they only grow coffee, and then on how big the ground is that they're working with. Correct, correct. Okay. This is so interesting. I'm I'm loving this. Speaker 2 00:17:54 And I'm going to do a follow up. We can also then go out to one of the we've just come out of a harvest season kind of towards the end of, towards the end of last year. But we can always take you back onto our farm so you can see what the harvest is like and see what that process looks like. Speaker 1 00:18:05 I'll be back in the end of April. Speaker 2 00:18:06 So we can we can try and do something then. Speaker 1 00:18:08 I like that, I think that's a great idea. tell me a bit more about, You said Kenya is one of the only countries with with an auction system. Yeah. How does it usually go? Or in other countries. Speaker 2 00:18:18 Do you think about, like, Uganda and Uganda? Anybody can. You can go to Uganda, contract a farmer and by the by the coffee directly for him, you have to figure out the supply chain. A place like Ethiopia, you can only start your government. You can only sell your coffee to the government. And the government exports all of it. So there's a lot of every country operates slightly differently. But we still operate an old auction system which has pros and cons. Tommy. I mean, the pros are that there is theoretically price transparency. The cons are that there is a lot of time. By the time the coffee comes and the farmer gets paid, there's huge time lag. It can be up to 180 days. Speaker 2 00:18:51 So by the time the farmer harvests that coffee and they get paid and a lot gets lost along the value chain. So, you know, there's pros and cons, I think I think there is room for a hybrid system. And the government is trying to make reforms. Some of those are positive, some of them not so positive. but I think, you know, coffee is evolving and it's rapidly evolving back to us being a tea drinking country. I mean, going back to when I took over the business in 2018, very few people are drinking coffee. Now you're seeing everybody from all walks of life, you know, even across income spectrum, across culture, drinking a lot more coffee. The only people in the early days of our business that are drinking coffee were people that were expats or Kenyans that had lived and worked abroad and had developed an acquired a taste for coffee and coming back. Now we're finding people that actually have never left Kenya that are drinking coffee as opposed to just tea. Speaker 1 00:19:39 Yeah. Speaker 1 00:19:39 So it wasn't inherently part of the culture, but now it's being built in because it's still one of the core products. Speaker 2 00:19:44 But it's also becoming aspirational, right? Saying, I'm going for a coffee. Nobody says I'm going for a tea. And it's funny, even growing up, a lot of people will be like, oh, let's go and have a coffee, and then you'll order a tea and all or a dollar. Yeah. And then people don't drink coffee. But now people are like, let's go for a coffee and they'll let you drink a coffee. Yeah. I mean, back in 2021, I think it was, you know, The Economist wrote a great article about coffee consumption at origin and especially in Kenya. And it was it was nice because, you know, we've kind of been a thought leader in that, trying to drive consumption at the quality end of, at the quality end, because all the commercial stuff's been available for a long time. And like all of us growing up, I always say, you know, doorman introduced Kenyans to coffee growing up. Speaker 2 00:20:18 It was in my pantry. Java made it accessible. There was Java cafes that opened up everywhere. Art cafe made it aspirational, but we really wanted to introduce specialty coffee to like, why is the best stuff being exported? I'm Kenyan, I want to drink the best coffee at home. Speaker 1 00:20:34 Yeah, I think you may. I think maybe you guys are making it as you're making premium accessible, right? So basically going from, you know, it's not a luxury, it's premium. And it should be for the community. It should be available here. Speaker 2 00:20:46 It should be available. Yes. It's going to cost a little bit more. Of course it's going to cost a bit more because paying a better price for that coffee, the way that it's roasted, the way that it's extracted, the equipment that we use to make it in the cafe, it's all quite different. but and there's and there everybody's going to appreciate that. But a lot of people do. Speaker 1 00:21:02 Yeah. And then tell me more about how then the value chain continues. Speaker 1 00:21:05 So we've gone we've then there's an auction that has taken place. Yeah. So you guys go there and buy them. Speaker 2 00:21:11 So it's not a physical auction anymore. It used to be in a pre-COVID world, there was a physical auction, and we'd actually have to go into the auction to to buy coffee. It was like a physical old school. Speaker 1 00:21:18 You miss it? Speaker 2 00:21:20 it was very nostalgic. I really liked it. It was very nice now, and some people still go. And because you can connect to the internet and the screen is still on. But the reality is there's no need to go anymore. Okay. So you can literally do it from your laptop. Yeah. which of course makes it more efficient. But that old school charm is gone where, you know, you'd have conversations, people in the hallways and things. Speaker 1 00:21:40 You'd meet the whole everyone who's active in the sector also every time. Speaker 2 00:21:43 Correct. And you just get Intel about the crop. There's looking interesting that that stuff now is happening in phone calls or individual conversations over coffees. Speaker 2 00:21:50 Over coffees. Over actually. but but so from that point when it's when it's then bought, then we get the coffee in these bags. So, so so if it gets extra. Speaker 1 00:21:59 Kilos is in one of these. Speaker 2 00:22:00 So one of these bags, one of these jute bags. Yeah. is 60 kilos of green coffee. Yeah. and typically this is how the coffee gets exported. So about 95, 93% of our coffee gets exported green. Yeah. So it's, it's exported green. And and we say because it looks green, it looks like it looks like a bean or like a lentil. Speaker 1 00:22:19 Yeah. Because I think the bag there is open. So you can see like these like green. Speaker 2 00:22:22 Yeah. So literally is. Speaker 1 00:22:24 It's like green. Speaker 2 00:22:25 Yeah. It's like a light green. So this has no taste, no flavor. You can put it in your mouth, but if you bite it you could chip a tooth. It's like a very dense bean. Speaker 1 00:22:31 I'm not going to try that on camera. Speaker 2 00:22:32 And and, but it has no taste. It has no flavor. That happens when you roast. So again, this coffee by and large out of Kenya gets exported, ends up all over the world. And at the premium end is single origin. Kenyan might even be single estate single co-op. For for the slightly lower grades, it ends up being becoming a great blender because Kenyan coffee is high quality, so it often gets blended with other things to elevate the with the coffee. Yeah, I don't. Speaker 1 00:22:56 Create a mediocre. I can say that you can't say that I can't. Speaker 2 00:23:00 But to elevate to elevate the levels of other coffees. Yeah. And that's what happens there. Here we get it like this. And then we roast it on one of these roasters. Speaker 1 00:23:07 Yeah. So you said 60 kilos. And then I see you sell bags starting at 500g. So does that. Does the weight remain the same after roasting? Speaker 2 00:23:15 Really good question actually. So when we roast a batch. So like the roaster is sitting right in front of it, that's a 12 kilo roaster. Speaker 2 00:23:20 So we'll pop in 12. We lose about between 15 and 20% depending on how dark we're roasting. It will lose. Let's call it 20%. So you lose 20% of moisture. So you're putting out putting in 12. You're getting out, let's say just under ten, 9.8 or so. And then we pack in three different pack sizes. I'd say three primarily for. For retail customers we pack in 250. Yeah. we have done 500. That's something that we're kind of phasing out because we want people to drink their coffee more. We want it to be fresher. So you're buying 250? Yeah. You're gonna have 250. You're gonna come back next week. You buy a fresh batch, you can go buy 500. That might last you a month, but by week four. And it's nothing wrong with coffee that's a little bit older. But we just want you to enjoy the coffee. Speaker 1 00:23:57 But I didn't know that that had an effect, because I've always bought 500 gram bags. And then sometimes, you know, even after a few months, been like, oh, it's still. Speaker 2 00:24:05 So coffee's fine. Like what happens is it diminishes from a flavor and a taste. Speaker 1 00:24:09 Because it gets because of the oxygen, it gets. Speaker 2 00:24:11 Of oxygen, it oxidizes and it has like a half life. Right? A bit like wine. If you open a bottle of wine. Speaker 1 00:24:17 Yeah. Five days. You're good. Speaker 2 00:24:18 Yeah. So coffee. So we do 250. We do one kilo for hospitality. So for our hotel camp we. Speaker 1 00:24:24 Go through way more. Speaker 2 00:24:25 They go through a lot more. So we do one kilo for them and then we have a few different kind of like what I call like a like, like a Safari solution. So we do little sachets of like 50g or 28g that are perfectly premade to put into a French press. So you can open a pack. Yeah. And it goes into a French press so that when you're on safari, don't have to think about it. Yeah. And things like that. Speaker 1 00:24:44 And you also do do you also do like special blends. depending on seasons or so. Speaker 2 00:24:50 Not depending on season will release them across the year. But, you know, when I bought the business, we had two blends. We had something called gourmet, which is a medium for something called espresso, which was a dark roast. Over the years, we've introduced a ton of different coffees. We we were the first people to roast a naturals coffee in Kenya. What that means is it's naturally processed as it goes, as it goes to the co-op's kind of mill, the wet mill, it's processed a bit differently. Okay. you know, so we love to showcase coffees from different parts of Kenya. So we have coffees from Western Kenya and Mount Elgon or Nandi Hills and Kericho, which traditionally tea country. We have coffees from Kitale, we have coffees from Rongo and South Nyanza. People like South Nyanza is quite low. It's dry. We have coffees from Machakos, from Embu. So people are like, you know, some of these places like Madina where there was coffee, there are a lot of Kenyans. Speaker 2 00:25:34 Yeah. I didn't know there was coffee in South Nyanza until we started buying it. so that's one, one angle going to showcase different regions. The other part is showcasing different processing methods. So traditional coffees will all go through what we call a washed process where the skin comes off, the fruit comes off, and then and then they're dried, or we now have coffees that are naturally processed that are just left in the cherry, that left the sun dry before all the outers come out. there's different processes like, you know, aerobic fermentation or anaerobic fermentation. You take the coffee, you cover it with water, and then you throw it in a vat for 48 to 72 hours. And that really enhances the flavors. Yeah. so we're beginning to work some interesting farms, co-ops that are doing interesting things with different processing methods. So really showcasing different regions, different flavor profiles. So, you know, as much as, let's say, the heart of Kenyan coffee volumetric comes from central Kenya. I personally feel right now some of the most interesting coffees are coming out of western Kenya. Speaker 2 00:26:27 Okay. And maybe because it's a little bit newer, and a lot of the farmers and the cops are willing to try things in different ways, but also there's different flavor profiles. So we love coffees right now out of western Kenya that are very fruit forward, very natural, quite floral. Speaker 1 00:26:41 Does that have anything to do with sun water? sun water. Speaker 2 00:26:45 Altitude, other things that are. Speaker 1 00:26:46 Just like with wine. So I would think about. Okay. Speaker 2 00:26:49 Yeah. If you think the same way you think about wine. Yeah. Very similar. The terroir, the temperature, the altitude and the and what you're growing around that. So like there's a coffee we have, there's one of my favorites ago when we first started roasting that coffee in 2018 or 2019, right after I bought the business. And that coffee is a super fruit flavored coffee. So we will have, you know, literally a few years ago, the dominant flavors were like pineapple. Then over the years, we've seen it shift to like strawberry. Speaker 2 00:27:13 And that's because of kind of other things that are growing. Speaker 1 00:27:15 There are tropical flavors enhance in the coffee because we're in a tropical climate or like equator. Speaker 2 00:27:20 To some extent. But also, I mean, all coffee grows in the equator, but also in terms of also in terms of what you will get, like what's going around there? What else is being cultivated in the area is a yes, but is a cross pollination. What are the bees doing? There's a lot of interesting things that will impact the flavor of coffee. Speaker 1 00:27:35 But you guys don't, so you don't grow your own coffee. You keep importing it from those cooperatives. We buy. Speaker 2 00:27:40 Apocalypse. Yeah. So so, so in Kenya, businesses are allowed to be at different parts of the value chain. So it is technically we're not allowed to be at all parts of the value chain. But actually that's a blessing for us because it means that we can identify incredible producers, incredible growers, work with them. Yeah. to, to buy and to really grow great coffees that we are then able to, to bring to market like focus on what we're really good at. Speaker 2 00:28:04 We're really great at roasting. We're really great at extracting that coffee. I mean, you came to the coffee shop on Saturday. Yeah, yeah. You know, being able to extract great coffees and serve them to guests and really work closely with the farmers, either directly or through other agronomists to help them kind of get the best out of their coffee. And the higher the quality of their coffee is, the better prices we can achieve in the market and therefore we can pay them a better price. Speaker 1 00:28:24 Yeah. So is this because, I mean, I know the coffee culture is a huge thing where, well, I mean, in France, you know, it's it's still quite you have this group of, you know, espresso and long coffees, black, and that's it. And of course, you have this, huge. you have you have so many options with regards to what specialty coffees you can get. if it's a hipster, you know, with the hipster thing that we had, we said at some point and but also we look at price, right? So I get my espresso around the corner for €1.20. Speaker 1 00:28:59 I go to one of these specialty shops, and I easily pay €5.50 for a cappuccino with oat milk, for example. Yeah, but we're very willing to then do that due to the experience. I also see that when I go to London, everything is around grabbing a coffee run, club, coffee, meeting coffee, afternoon work session, coffee, moms coming to town first. Coffee. Everything surrounds it, but there's a willingness to pay a lot of money for it. How does how is that here? How can you? Is already kind of a can you play a bit with your margin and your pricing. Speaker 2 00:29:35 So so you know, again it's interesting because we, we were I don't think we were the first kind of do specialty here. So initially we were price tags right. We were like well what's the market at. We can maybe price a little bit more. Yeah. Speaker 1 00:29:47 Because you had to sell the story at the same time and premium right. Speaker 2 00:29:50 I mean, you know, you see the different colored cups that we're drinking out of. Speaker 2 00:29:52 You know, we introduced five different, six different five different cups in a glass for different beverages to have the right ratios and the right recipes. And initially people are like, oh, why is my flat white small? Why not flat white? Why is that? Why is my cappuccino small like. Because that's the right recipe. Yeah. You're used to getting a cappuccino at Starbucks or the Starbucks Super Bowl. Speaker 1 00:30:08 You don't even taste the coffee. Speaker 2 00:30:09 No, it's. You're drinking a lot of milk. Yeah. And there's a lot of educating that happened in the early days. And I think what's been nice is, is that there's been brands that have come before us that have brought to the table. We were able to introduce specialty in an accessible way. And there's now a lot of other roasters, a lot of other brands that have come, and it's so exciting to see the coffee sector grow, right? The category is growing. And yes, it's competition. But actually what's nice is there's more people drinking coffee. Speaker 2 00:30:32 There's more people demanding a higher quality of coffee. Sometimes they'll drink it at Spring Valley, sometimes they'll drink it somewhere else. And my view, like holistically, is you never own a customer, especially the coffee you borrow a customer. I also don't like. I love my coffee, but I don't love drinking our coffee every day. I want to try something different. There's a lot of great little emerging roasters and some of them are new. Some of them are little coffee shops. They might use our coffee. They might use somebody else's coffee. there's new barista schools. Some of these people, it's a small ecosystem, like a guy who used to work with us as a barista. He's now the head roaster at another really great roastery. Somebody who used to be one of our baristas is the head barista at a different cafe. And it's amazing because it's such a great community. And my view is if we grow the community of people in coffee of coffee drinkers, then the category by definition will grow. Speaker 2 00:31:15 Yeah. and what's been really nice is there are more people drinking coffee. It's it's not to the extent that you might see in, in the global north, but it's changing. It's very much aspirational. So if you're affluent or you're be getting more, you're becoming more affluent. We're seeing a lot more people come in and having a date at a coffee shop, right. We're having a lot more people. We're seeing a lot more of that, that even eight years ago I was not seeing. We're seeing a lot more people that are coming in and grabbing on their way in. We're seeing people of different demographics, whether that's gender, culture or socioeconomic. There are some people, it is their treat and we only ever see them on a Saturday. There's some people that come in twice a day. Yeah. so we're seeing that. Yeah. So we're seeing that use, we're seeing that use case change. Yeah. Speaker 1 00:31:56 But it's interesting. Right. Because you say that you had a lot of educating the market to do. Speaker 1 00:32:01 that's interesting. Just to, to kind of see the perception that people have. Right. So the first one is you don't really go for coffee is probably what people had. I mean, people. Speaker 2 00:32:10 Would go for coffee. Let's see if like, you know, there's a lot of great like coffee brands around and like even growing up, like, let's go for a coffee. And, you know, I would go for a coffee, I'd have a dollar. You'd have a tea. Yeah. And no one's drinking a coffee yet. We said let's go for a coffee. Yeah. and that's changing. Now people are like, let's go. I mean, we were so adamant that we want people to drink coffee for the first two years. Yeah. I refuse to serve tea. I literally I'm like, we're not even serving tea here. You want to come? You come here for a coffee. Until one of my mom's friends complained to my mom, saying, I went there and they turned me away. Speaker 1 00:32:39 And you're like, sorry. Yeah. Speaker 2 00:32:41 Unfortunately, then, of course, we had to serve tea so I wouldn't get in trouble at home. but, but but again, we take txt. We don't do any of the tea. We work with a great tea brand on that because again that sector is also going again. A lot of Kenya's teas exported. But there's more people drinking higher quality teas here. And that's also an interesting space to me. But but I think people there's a lot more use cases for coffee. You know as Kenyans we all love meeting over a coffee, a drink, a beer, a meal, and a lot of people that don't have offices and people, you know, again, the co-working thing is relatively new here. So a lot of we still see a lot of business meetings happening in cafes. We saw we see a lot of interviews happening. We see a lot of people sitting down and writing business lines together. So it's really nice. you know, it's a space where people can kind of, you know, where we can capitalize connections. Speaker 2 00:33:24 And that's that's important to me. Speaker 1 00:33:26 Yeah. Because you have seven cafes in Kenya right now. Nine. Speaker 2 00:33:29 We have nine. Speaker 1 00:33:30 And then what is that one in London doing over there? Speaker 2 00:33:33 so we opened in London in June, June of 2025. Okay. Speaker 1 00:33:38 that's that's been that's not that long. Speaker 2 00:33:40 About eight months. Not even. Yeah. Not even a year. we the thesis of that came from, you know, as we continue to grow in Kenya. What I hold on, we have coffee that that we genuinely believe from a quality perspective can compete. I wouldn't say best because I think that's so subjective, right? But I think. Speaker 1 00:33:56 You're supposed to say it, right? Speaker 2 00:33:57 No, no, no, but I can compete on a global playing field with some of the best coffees in the world. Yeah, right. Whether they're coming out of Europe, Asia or the US, they're incredible coffees that are roasted closer to the customer. And we're like, hold on, we're roasting at origin, at the same quality, at the same standards. Speaker 2 00:34:13 We're using similar equipment or the same equipment. In some cases, we're extracting our coffee in the same way we can do that. And how two things kind of prompted this. One was our online business started growing. A lot of people are like, well, I used to live in Kenya. I moved somewhere, wherever they moved, I. Speaker 1 00:34:26 Moved. Speaker 2 00:34:26 My coffee. Netherlands. I moved back into the UK, I moved back, moved to the U.S., I need coffee, I need a coffee. And actually, someone in the Netherlands who used to live here is like, I miss your coffee so much. Can we sell your coffee in the Netherlands? And they used to come here, buy it by the suitcase, take it back and sell it. And when I hold on, there are people that still want our product. Every time I travel, I would take gifts and literally give away. Speaker 1 00:34:46 An extra suitcase filled with. Speaker 2 00:34:48 Probably two, in some cases giving. Give me a lot of coffee and we realize a lot of people actually, that's what people are asking for. Speaker 2 00:34:53 And that was one two. We also wanted to demonstrate, you know, as the narrative changes, you know, we're not just a producing country. We're also a consuming country where we can add value to a global standard, and we really believe that we can compete on a global playing field. And for us, it was to say, actually, our coffee is as good as anybody in London. And to demonstrate that and we really want to take something grown in Kenya sourced here. We still roast everything here we shipped out of every week. Speaker 1 00:35:20 Something is done. Speaker 2 00:35:20 Here and it's all done here. And literally and even our team there. You know, we have a team of six people there. four of them are Kenyans. Speaker 1 00:35:28 it feels like home. Probably. Speaker 2 00:35:29 It does, it does. And sometimes you walk in, somebody came in behind. They came by the other day and on shift that day. And I was there two weeks ago, and I was there talking to the other three guys in Swahili. Speaker 2 00:35:38 And somebody walked in and they stopped and they were from Kenya and they're like, oh my God, I feel like I've come home. but for us, it was great to showcase incredible Kenyan coffee, but we were so lucky we have the opportunity to go. So what we've done is we've taken other great Kenyan brands with us and a third of our shop, a third of our cafe is a retail space and we've taken incredible Kenyan brands that we have relationships with that we work with. So Kenyan artists, there's three Kenyan artists whose art appears in our shops in Nairobi. They're also on the wall. There's great brands like sandstorm, like kangaroo, like Patti Ando, whose work we absolutely love, and we're like, let's take this. Let's provide a platform to other Kenyan and African brands. There's a brand out of Zimbabwe called Doro. you know, farai was a graphic designer for many, many years. So taking those products and taking them to the UK and make them available to people. so that was, that was important to us. Speaker 2 00:36:27 So showcase great coffee, but actually let's just showcase. Speaker 1 00:36:30 A community space and. Speaker 2 00:36:31 Just showcase all the great. Speaker 1 00:36:32 Things. Yeah. And but it must be difficult to, compete not necessarily for the quality of your coffee, but for the the amount of coffee shops that there are in London. Because here it's it's less. There's there there are many. I've seen a lot with, you know, the Java's and the art cafes and, but there are a lot of regions that don't really have great coffee shops yet. So you can spread out faster. But if you go to a city like London, I feel like there's just as many barbershops as coffee shops. Speaker 2 00:37:05 but if I come back to Nairobi, I mean, there were a lot less when we started in this business when I started in 2018. There's a lot more. Now, we're very lucky that we we own a handful of those. What's interesting is quite a lot of those used are coffee. So we've been able to also make that coffee accessible through other people. Speaker 2 00:37:20 Yeah. So a lot of them are serving our coffee and a lot of them are not. And that's also okay. But just there are more people drinking coffee, which is great. Love is interesting. We're on a pedestrian street in London called Camden Passage. It's literally there's no cars on that road from the from the station, from Angel tube station to the end of our passage, there are 14 coffee machines. 14. It's insane. I mean, the barber you mentioned, Barbara's two barber shops have coffee machines. The Cheese mongers has a coffee machine. The art shop has a coffee machine. there are three. You know, there are three kind of specialty coffee shops or self-proclaimed specialty coffee shops. But for us, it was really important to be authentic about who we were. So what's on the wall? We've literally taken the building back to its bare basics the original brick, basic basic wood on the floors, and we really wanted to showcase the journey of that coffee. So what's on the wall? Pictures of our roastery. Speaker 2 00:38:06 Pictures of our roaster. The picture, literally right above the machine is a picture of Muhammad, our head roaster. The pictures on our back wall is of one of the coffee estates that we buy coffee from. Yeah. we really wanted to highlight and showcase that downstairs we built a coffee tasting room so much. You mentioned wine. Much like going wine tasting or gin tasting. There's a room where you can go in. And of course, it's at certain times, led by one of our baristas, where you can go in and actually cup coffee, taste coffee, experience different coffees from around from around Kenya. Speaker 1 00:38:34 It sounds like you're still educating the market to a certain. Speaker 2 00:38:36 We are, but in a different way. Here we have to educate people about specialty coffee, about what it was there. We said, well, we don't need to do that. People have done that, but we do need to educate people about is, hey, coffee that's roasted. Origin can still be at this quality coffee that's roast sourced and roasted. Speaker 2 00:38:50 There is and it's authentic. We literally know where who's how many hands that coffee has gone through. Speaker 1 00:38:54 Yeah I like that. And like this traceability. Right. So a lot of people then say fair trade. Then we also have B Corp. we have a lot of things that say they protect the value chain or regard certain aspects of the value chain. How do you guys fit within those. Speaker 2 00:39:12 So I generally feel that there's a lot of I don't just want to say greenwashing, but I think there's I think a bit of greenwashing, a bit of ethics washing generally that happens. I mean, it was funny because we became B Corp certified in 2023 here. Yeah, that was a long journey. We started in 2019. Why did we do it? We it's funny before we went to the UK I go to London now everybody's a B corp. I mean I think I think my local neighborhood dog walkers has a B Corp certification. Literally everybody has one. The reason we did it here is for us, where we talked about doing all of these things and we were doing them anyway. Speaker 2 00:39:45 Right. So so for example, we we don't serve meat in our cafes and the one cafe we serve meeting, we donate the revenue from that to the CbCa and to a children's food charity for for us, in terms of what we pay our team, in terms of how we take care of our staff. Are we are we not just paying minimum wage, but actually are we paying a living wage? Are we are we at the top decile of where we're at? And we talk about all these things or we do all of these things. We weren't talking about it and measuring them. So for me, a really good friend of mine is one of the original founders of B Corp. and he said to me, Ritesh, you do all this stuff, you should measure it to see if you're getting better every year. So asking what if you're doing all of these things because with B Corp you get a score. Yeah. So he said if you're doing these things, you should become a B corp so that you have a score. Speaker 2 00:40:27 So you're measuring it. Yeah. And if you're measuring it then, you know, are you getting better every year. So in the first year our score was 83.8. Speaker 1 00:40:35 That's high. Yeah. Speaker 2 00:40:36 Well no not really because it's out of 100. But you need 80 to qualify to be a B Corp. So we kind of just scrapped. We just scraped over the surface. Right. But it's how do we get better. And we're like okay well on the sustainability piece this is what we need to do better on the human capital, on the human piece. This is what we need to do on the environmental piece. This is what we need to do, and it forces us to think about all of those things in our business. I mean, we're a coffee business, but our first core values do the right thing. And if that's the lens with which we do everything, this becomes a measure for our leadership team to think about that thing. We're having that debate with somebody with a supplier and example I give is packaging. Speaker 2 00:41:13 We've been through this whole journey of packaging. When I started, I'm like, we have to be more sustainable. Then I went down this route and we did everything that was compostable except that we realized, well, there's no industrial composting facility here. So actually the compostable packaging. Speaker 1 00:41:25 Is yeah. Speaker 2 00:41:25 Is is not compostable. So then we went back. We went back and now we use for example, LDP four, which is very easily recycled plastic, but it's very easily identifiable and recycled in Kenya. And people get paid to collect it. So that works for our ecosystem and for us. So getting B Corp was was was important for an internal measure. We never put it on any documentation from 2023 up until late 2025 when we opened in London. And we're like, actually, that serves as a as a symbol. Marketing, I think is a symbol to say, hey, we really think about what we do and business, you know, that business is a force for good and we can be and we've been doing it. Speaker 2 00:42:01 But but talking about it, we've looked at things like fair trade, we've looked at things like Rainforest Alliance. It's not really appropriate to what we do. I, I think if you ethically conduct business in the way that we aspire to and the way that we do, then those things naturally fall into place. That shouldn't be something I shouldn't have to bet a fair trade. And the truth is, most of the farmers that have fair trade or that need it can't even afford the certification process. So for us, like fair trade is not interesting. It's only the bigger, larger co-ops of farms that can afford it. And often they don't necessarily have the best coffees. Yeah. Speaker 1 00:42:34 So and what is your beef herb score now. Speaker 2 00:42:36 So so the only they re-evaluate you every three years. Speaker 1 00:42:39 Okay. So we'll know. Speaker 2 00:42:40 So we'll know at the end of this year. So we're up for re-evaluation at the end of this year. But I do expect it to be significantly higher. Yeah. Speaker 1 00:42:46 So can I ask which dimensions are you measured on in your B corp. Speaker 2 00:42:49 So it's across multiple things. So there's a human element. And that's about people in terms of how they're compensated what the work conditions are like. Are there any other benefits. For example little things like health care. We provide health care to all of our staff, whether it's a cleaner or the most senior executive in the organization. And that's important. But like, what are their work conditions like how much are they getting paid? one relative to the market, but relative to the role that they are, they paid a living wage. So for us, that's really important. Yeah. on the sustainability piece, there are things around packaging, but there's also things about where are we sourcing our coffee from, what does that look like? One of the reasons that as much as I love a lot of these naturals coffees that are fruitful and whatever, they also use a lot less water. So we're beginning to think about our supply chain. And do we do we need to want to source more naturals coffees that are better for the environment, or working with co-ops that are using, for example, like an eco pulp, which uses less water? Yeah. Speaker 2 00:43:43 when you when you lay on the dimension. So we talked about people, we've talked about the environment, but the sustainability beyond the environment. Right. I mean, are we profitable so that we can continue doing what we're doing? You know, and as we think about what does that look like? Are we contributing back into our local community and in a positive or negative way? So for example, a lot of roasters will emit, you know, chaff, smoke weed, run everything through a water filter that's at the back here, and that makes a water super nitrogen rich. And that water then gets poured into all the plants you see outside. So actually not emitting anything other than steam. So there's an environmental impact. But also back to one of the reasons of why we stayed in the area, not because of big corp. We made that decision a long time ago. Yeah, but we decided that we've got to do it from a human perspective, right? Our staff, this is easier for people to get to. Speaker 2 00:44:26 It's easy to commute to. We support a lot of the local small industries around us, and we don't want that and we don't want that to change. Speaker 1 00:44:33 Yeah. And so how are, maybe going back shortly to just like the pricing of coffee here and willingness to pay for either premium coffee or, also all the, the types of coffee that people start drinking now. Right. So I tend to very easy. Just ordered an Americano. Yeah. just for the ease of taste. But is there, is there a big, in France at this point? The waiter is almost not angry at you anymore. When you order a soy milk in the UK. We've passed that stage a long time. The Netherlands as well. In France, they find that a little difficult because they love their milk. but how is that here? How do people experience different types of coffees flavors? You know, I haven't really seen a Starbucks here. Sounds stupid, but. Speaker 2 00:45:16 There's no. Speaker 1 00:45:17 Starbucks. I see Starbucks everywhere, but I haven't seen one here and there. Speaker 1 00:45:20 Of course, known for the for the syrups and the. Speaker 2 00:45:23 So so super interesting. So I mean, I think as Kenyans, we're all really proud of our homegrown brands. I think as much as I have a lot of respect for what Starbucks has done for the coffee community in the world, I think they wouldn't survive here simply because you have great brands like Java or Cafe, that is Kenyans. I think if you look around the room, everyone is super loyal to Java. Like we will all go to Java to have a coffee to have. Yeah, I'll go and have a meal and what have you. And I think, I think what's changing is so as Kenyans we love milk. Not too dissimilar from the the friends. Speaker 1 00:45:50 I saw a lot of milk in the supermarkets. Speaker 2 00:45:51 A lot of milk in the supermarket. There's a lot of milk brands and most people like milky coffees. So the number one selling beverage in Kenya as a whole is a cappuccino. Why? Because it has a lot of milk. Speaker 2 00:46:01 Yeah. that has evolved. And now people are drinking. They'll have a flat white which has less milk, more coffee, because there. Speaker 1 00:46:09 Are a lot as well. Speaker 2 00:46:09 Yeah. Yeah. And then and I mean, you know, we're like the de facto home of the flat white. I mean, a lot of people are serving it now. You know, then people go to an Americano, then people drink an espresso, but then starts getting interesting. Now people are drinking pour overs. They're like, oh, it's at the back of our original cafe. We have a pour over bar where you want a black coffee made on a on a hairy over 60. Or if you want that made on a Chemex or an Aeropress. Speaker 1 00:46:30 Yeah. Like the the machine that you use is becoming more important as well. Speaker 2 00:46:34 Yeah. So like I mean so there's two types of equipment, right. There's your commercial coffee machines. So we exclusively use a brand called Soco in terms of our espresso machines. So we started using the machines about three weeks after I bought the business in 2018. Speaker 2 00:46:47 Today we are the distribution partner in Kenya. So we use them in our cafes, but we supply them to a lot of leading hotels and restaurants. Why? Because great coffee's great coffee. But if it's if it goes through not so great equipment, you can do it. Do a lot of damage to it or not to not get the best out of it. So that's on your espresso machine side. But you also have incredible Other kind of vessels to make coffee. You know, Ariel comes out of Japan, Cemex comes out of Japan. There are great ways to use and you don't. Then you don't need a fancy espresso machine. Anybody can use one of those at home to make great coffees. And we have, you know, at all of our cafes, we'll always have 1 or 2 coffees available to be had that way. That's still new. you talk about non-dairy milks. It's we have more and more people, I think, since about 20, 2020. More and more people are asking for those. Speaker 2 00:47:29 Yeah. so we do offer four types so that that is changing. There's one that's a little bit more localized. We use coconut. You know, we have a lot of coconut. Speaker 1 00:47:35 A lot of coconut products. Yeah. Speaker 2 00:47:37 Yeah. Because we have it it's easily available at the coast. But also it's a flavor people are familiar with. So we'll do coconut. And in addition to the usual oat soy almond. Yeah. and with syrups. It's really interesting. I resisted serving syrups in our cafes for the first five years. I'm like, I was I was. Speaker 1 00:47:55 Educating the market. Speaker 2 00:47:56 I was a purist. I'm like, we are butchering this incredible coffee that we paid this farmer a great price for. We're charging you a lot for. Yeah. And you want two shots of hazelnut syrup. Like, you know, I'm going. Speaker 1 00:48:06 To swear on my podcast. Speaker 2 00:48:08 Okay, I can't, I can't. Speaker 1 00:48:09 Don't. Speaker 2 00:48:10 Okay. Okay. All right. We'll keep it. Speaker 1 00:48:11 I'll have to Bleep you out. Speaker 2 00:48:12 We'll keep it PG. So. So I'd be like seriously. You know this kind of happened. but but to be honest my team also convinced me. And they said Ritesh there are. Speaker 1 00:48:20 People who enjoy it their way. Yeah. Speaker 2 00:48:22 And it's interesting you say that. A lot of people ask me, a lot of people say, Ritesh, what's the best way to have coffee? I get asked that on podcast Usual Time and I say it's how you enjoy it. My mom used to drink a cappuccino with one sugar. That's okay. I might like my coffee made on a hairy over 60 with a pour over. That's okay. You might like an Americano. That's okay. But what we do is people we first want. People started drinking great coffee. And if that means they're starting with either having it as a mocha with a bit of chocolate powder, or they're having a syrup, they're experiencing great coffee. And they will then graduate from that to having the coffee, that sugar or without syrup. Speaker 2 00:48:52 They then make they may not and they may just drink their coffee that way forever. They may then at some point move on to a flat white and move on to an America or an espresso. And they might not ever. But if they're enjoying their cup of coffee, you know what? Let that happen. So really we're really considerate intentional about the input. So we won't just use any syrup. We're very particular about what flavors we allow. How does that blend with the coffee and what do those ingredients look like. Yeah. So we are particular about that. Yeah. but we now want to offer all of those things. So do we ever aspire to be a want to be the Starbucks of this model? Absolutely not. We want the coffee to be premium, but also the consumer base here is shifting. And that's a way to introduce people to incredible coffee. Speaker 1 00:49:29 Yeah. But how does it work? Because of course you're not. Kenya is not the only country exporting a lot of coffee. You're competing on a large global scale. Speaker 1 00:49:39 how how how have these issues like the supply chain issues during Covid? how do global markets really influence the volume of what you guys can export, or are you seeing quite a stable, growing, client base? Speaker 2 00:49:53 So, so if you take us back, I mean, Kenya's coffee production has come down from about 150 tons to 50 to just under 50 tons. Speaker 1 00:50:01 It has has not been replaced by domestic consumption. Speaker 2 00:50:05 No, no. So that's general growth. That's general amount of coffee grown. So it's not about the consumption side okay. The percentage of how much of that is domestic consumption. Consumption has gone up is what is the absolute number. But it's still less than 10% of all the coffee that we produce. So it's still tiny. Yeah. It's it's actually still a tiny, tiny amount of, of how much coffee is produced. Coffee is listed on the New York Stock Exchange at least arabica. And can you grow arabica? You get robust in other parts of the world and it's called a C price. Speaker 2 00:50:32 So it fluctuates like the stock market on an almost daily basis, which which has a correlation to what coffee prices here look like. If that price is super high, like it was a couple of months ago, coffee prices are super high. When that comes down, coffee prices ease off. Speaker 1 00:50:47 But does that then make it negative to have an auction system? Because the auction can be immediately influenced by this. Whereas for example, if in Ethiopia you have the government system, maybe government is slower to sell, so you can still buy it at a cheaper price before being influenced, I don't know. Speaker 2 00:51:02 So at a global level, if we take arabica coffee, the surprise informs coffee. Now most coffees will trade on what's called a differential. Yeah, above or beyond the see price. Yeah. So Kenya generally trades at a slight premium above okay. So Ethiopia generally trades at a slight premium above. You have other producers that are mass producers with the qualities you know, maybe a little bit lower that trades at a differential below. Speaker 2 00:51:22 So it's influenced by the C price. But so there is a correlation but it's not directly connected. Yeah that makes sense. Yeah. so a lot of that's driven by demand. A lot of that's driven by supply. Brazil is the largest producer in the world. You know, a few years ago Brazil had a had a frost and a crop failure. Price is jacked up. That means everybody globally. A lot of the producers benefited from higher prices. It means we're paying higher prices sometimes if the price goes up last. Two years ago, our prices went up 40%. I can't increase the price of my coffee. If your coffee today costs €4 and tomorrow it costs six and a half. You're not going to. You're just not going to absorb it. So unfortunately, the people that produce in the middle often have to. The roasters often have to absorb that, or the coffee shop or what have you. in a world where the prices are easing off, unfortunately, the the farmers that are doing what I call a lot of the mass market production see some of that drop off. Speaker 2 00:52:15 What's interesting is farmers that are producing higher quality coffees can still command a premium. So a lot of the more interesting coffees we talk about some of the pour over coffees, some of the more more interesting processed coffees, whether they're, you know, aerobic or anaerobic fermented, the people that are really taking care of their coffee will always be able to achieve their price. Yeah, because there's a market for that. But that's really the specialty end. And at the top end of the specialty. Speaker 1 00:52:37 Yeah, I like this. just unfortunately we have to end this conversation already. But because of course, this is a lot about perception and narrative and, growth in consumption, which of course is led by a different perception which leads to different behavior. I think what is very interesting is that I'd like to ask you, to tell me in your own words what you think Kenya is and what you think Kenya isn't. So maybe something you've heard a lot about how Kenya might potentially be. Tell me what's not true, and then tell me what you think is true about, this country. Speaker 1 00:53:13 You can relate it back. Of course, to me. You're in. Speaker 2 00:53:15 What do I think Kenya is? I think it's a real question. You know, the average age in our organization is quite young, and I think I think we're a young country. We're a dynamic country, I think. I think Kenya is at an interesting inflection point where we are now ready to compete on a global playing field in some areas. Not at all. But I think Kenyan consumers are. And the Kenyan population is like, it's probably no different to most places in the world where we have a lot of young, educated people with access to information or information has now become easily available and where people aspire to things and in life, and a quality of life that perhaps was inaccessible. For example, when I was growing up, you just didn't know those things were happening out there. I think Kenya is. Kenya is growing despite the challenges around us, whether that's political domestically or in the region. I think we're growing despite the economic constraints that are happening. Speaker 2 00:54:10 I think people work really hard. I think you walk down the street, no matter how hard it is. People are smiling. People are happy. I think we're very grateful for the lives that we have. There are challenges out there. Don't get me wrong, but I think we are generally an optimistic. We're an optimistic population. That's true. We are, we are, we we are. There's two parts, I think depending where people are economically, the thinking. Some people are thinking very short term, but some people are thinking long term. I mean, you look at as you've been here for a week, you look at the skyscrapers, you could be in any major city in the world, and I dare say Nairobi can compete with any major city in the world in some cases does things better. You know, I spent a lot of time in Europe the past year as the opening cafe there. Our levels of hospitality, the quality of some of the produce that we're getting here locally, that tradition has always been exported. Speaker 2 00:54:54 Now available here. I think people are demanding more. People want more. Kenya is a regional hub. Kenya is is, in my mind, the de facto capital of Africa. I think there's exciting things happening. What is Kenya? Not what I think this this old narrative. And one of the reasons that we wanted to go to London now connected back to that is this. We don't need people's aid anymore. I think I think that boat sailed in the 80s. What we want is for people to trade with us as a country on, on, on equal footing. Speaker 1 00:55:22 Equal playing field. Speaker 2 00:55:23 Equal playing field. You know, we want to compete. We can compete. And we want to compete in the global marketplace, in the regional marketplace. And we can. And I think there's a lot of incredible businesses that have been recruited that have gone to the world. a lot of things that are starting that are going across the continent, whether that's in education, whether that's in electric mobility. you know, we'd like to do it in hospitality and in coffee. Speaker 2 00:55:44 And for a long time, industries like coffee, like tea have been you grow here. Send it out. A lot of that validation happens outside, and that's important. Don't get me wrong, you can't export all the coffee. Roasted because a lot of the market is still roasted externally. But for us, I think that there's a world where what we're not is we're. And I don't think people associate with Kenya, but I think what we're not is we don't need any favors. We don't need we don't need a sad story. What we want is just opportunities that create a level playing field, which I think are happening increasingly. Speaker 1 00:56:17 So thank you. Thanks for participating on this podcast. Speaker 2 00:56:21 Thank you for having me. Thank you for visiting us. Speaker 1 00:56:22 Yeah, this is really cool. I think we're going to do a little tour of the roastery. Sure. you guys happy? Yeah, that looks great on you, by the way. Yeah, thanks. Speaker 2 00:56:32 Did you get what? Did you get what you needed? Speaker 1 00:56:33 I absolutely got what I needed. Speaker 1 00:56:35 I think I don't need any. No, I think we're good. Yeah. Are you happy? Is there something you still want to touch on? Speaker 2 00:56:44 No, no, I, I just whatever you want to talk about. Speaker 1 00:56:46 No, I'm really good. I mean, I could keep sitting here for two hours. Unfortunately, they tell me to stop, but we'll do a second one. I'll come back in April. Speaker 2 00:56:52 We can. Yeah. Speaker 1 00:56:53 Okay. Happily, it's due back.