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CONTACT INFORMATION
San Cristobal Multimercados |
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The Malinal Project: Some Background by Jim Kosalos This project grew out of many conversations with the owner of a coffee shop in Puerto Vallarta in 1994. The Cafe San Cristobal was noted for offering fine Mexican coffees, many of them locally produced, to the people in Puerto Vallarta, both locals and tourists. As a result of this contact, I began considering the merits of bringing the best of the Mexican coffees I had enjoyed at the cafe into the United States, and some months later I started San Cristobal Multimercados, a coffee importing company. | |
 | Left: Christian Wolthers and James Kosalos examine coffee cherries. Beto Ocampo, president of the Production Sector of El Ejido Malinal, shows us the fruit from a Tipica plant that is over 100 years old. |
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After many conversations and explorations I narrowed the quest for the best source of fine Mexican coffee to one of the cafetaleros from Malinal-Benjamin Ocampo, one of the few people to have a completely integrated coffee business. He grows the coffee, processes it, roasts it, and sells it wholesale and retail. Through this connection I met his nephew, Beto Ocampo, who had just been elected president of the production sector of El Ejido Malinal, a coffee growing cooperative. It turned out that the growers of El Malinal were very interested in offering their traditional shade-grown coffee to a wider market.
In 1996, we moved some of their coffee to the U.S. and it was very well received. Later that year we signed a long-term marketing and profit-sharing agreement with the Ejido and set up a Joint Venture in Seattle called Cristobal Coffee Importers, to market and sell the coffee in the United States. We also formed an association with Christian Wolthers (Blaser & Wolthers Specialty Coffee), in Miami, to help market the coffee in Europe. Cristobal Coffee Importers focused on bringing fine world origin coffee into the U.S, particularly the Northwest. The growers clearly understood the importance of sustainable farming and Cristobal Coffee Importers supplied the marketing and sales system to respond to production and market fluctuations. Together we realized a partnership of Nature, grower and importer-dedicated to producing consistently excellent coffee while protecting the diverse forest ecosystem of El Malinal. In 1997, aided by high coffee prices, our project got a good boost because Beto was able to realize much-higher-than-anticipated returns. This, combined with technical and financial help we provided, resulted in new machinery at the beneficio to enhance the quality of the coffee. In 1998 this support resulted in a tremendous increase in the quality of the coffee; our partnership with El Malinal was off to a good start. In 1999, coffee from El Malinal is imported and distributed exclusively by San Cristobal Multimercados, and the coffee is better than ever.
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