Impact

It’s UP to us

Control the Controllables

Our 3-pronged approach for the environment

We can’t look ourselves in the mirror running a company based solely on profit. We need to do the Earth a solid too. It’s in our blood.

At the heart of every business decision is always asking the question: what is best for the environment? These are our current top 3 priorities for protecting our planet.

  • Plastic bags make us puke. We were contributing over 30,000 of them to landfills every year. One of the single biggest impacts we can have is making our bags fully degrade. We've done that with our garden compostable bags. Read more about these bags

  • Our coffeee is roasted with equipment that emits 80% less CO2 and requires 80% less energy than industry standards.

    How? Roasting coffee emits various gases, including Volatile Organic Compounds (VOCs). To keep these potentially harmful gases from entering the atmosphere (and our lungs), many roasters need to use an afterburner – a secondary fire source which incinerates the chaff at very high temps. Afterburners are incredibly resource (natural gas) and emissions intensive.

    We've eliminated the afterburner need in both of our roasters:

    • One roaster recirculates hot air from the drum to incinerate chaff

    • One roaster we've installed a water cyclone that knocks down chaff and turns it into compost

    Read more about our roasters

  • Every business has an obligation to do right by their community. Whether or not we're making profit, we donate 1% of our revenue to environmental orgs in Maui and Hawaii.

    By supporting us, you are supporting the islands we call home, as well as the folks working hard to keep this place pristine for future generations.

    Read about our donations

Impact in Action

Clean roasters

We realized about a year ago we needed more efficient, more eco-friendly, and safer (from fire) roasters. We made a significant investment in time and resources.

We converted our old roaster to use a water cyclone to knock down the chaff and noxious emissions before entering the exhaust stack. We also bought a used Loring Falcon S15, the most eco-friendly roaster on the market. Installing and operating these new roasters has taken us the better part of a year, and came with a lot of blood, sweat, and tears (or at least a lot of cursing).

Learn about our roasters

We hate plastic bags

Yet most roasters still use them. We often overlook that every coffee bag is equivalent to throwing away a ziplock. We started the process to convert to garden compostable bags a year ago.

To say that we agonized over the suppliers, materials, colors, designs, and roast names on our bags would be the understatement of the year. We hope you enjoy the result, each bag a homage to our home island of Maui.

Dig in on the new bags

Support Organizations doing cool stuff

Our job is to create happiness in a cup for your morning, midday, or maybe even night. We believe a meaningful portion of that business should support organizations working to preserve and protect our most important resource – Earth. For us, right now, that’s 1% of our revenue.

We look for organizations in Hawaii that are actively working to preserve wild places, and those educating the youth to harness an environmental ethos.

Read about our latest donations

FAQs

    • We are working towards delivering our bulk coffee in reusable food-safe bins, so we can completely eliminate bags from that part of our business.

    • We would like to grow our 1% donation program to include a coalition of businesses in Hawaii that all commit to the same revenue going to environmental initiatives. 1% for Hawaii.

    • With the plentiful sunshine of Paia, we'd like our operation to be fully solar-based when we can make the investment.

    • We'd like our delivery vehicle(s) to be EV and charged off our solar.

  • We seek to be positive actors in the international coffee trade by listening to, learning from, and working with people and companies in the supply chain who share our commitment to building sustainable livelihoods with others in mind, taking care of the land, and producing excellent coffee.

    One of our long term goals is to support a thriving local coffee growing community here on Maui. Before the Lahaina fires we were sourcing roughly 50% of our beans from Maui. Unfortunately those fires eliminated the green bean processing center (aka the dry mill) in Lahaina, and we have been unable to source Maui beans since then. Rebuilding the local industry will take time, and we are searching for Maui farmers who meet our bar of excellence.

    With our international coffee sourcing, we only work with people and companies who align with our ethos. We work closely with importers in the U.S. and their international exporting partners who have direct connections to the producers themselves. Our coffee has various levels of traceability. Some coffees can be traced directly to the producers and their specific farm. Other coffees we purchase come from an association of growers within a community. Still other coffees are regional blends that can be traced to a particular dry mill. We love working with "coffee people" and sharing their stories, so stay tuned for more to come!"

  • Currently we are focused on organizations that protect or preserve wild places. This could be an organization who prevents a coastal development, or one that restores a former wetland.

    We also look for organizations that educate the youth on environmental initiatives and get them out in the community practicing their learnings.

    In the future we envision an application process that anyone can apply for.