Your new favorite woman-founded coffee brand
How the founder of Kahawa 1893 is supporting Kenya's female coffee farmers
In today’s newsletter: a coffee brand making a difference and only murders in the building. This month, a portion of the profits from paid newsletter subscriptions will be donated to the Lilith Fund, an Austin-based nonprofit providing financial assistance to Texas women in need of an abortion. With your paid subscriptions we’ve supported incredible non-profits, including World Central Kitchen, Refugio Animal Holbox, Womankind, Girls Write Now, Women for Women, Heart of Dinner, and Black Mamas Matter. If you’ve found your way here but are not yet subscribed, here, let me help you with that:
I promise this isn’t a sponsored post or paid advertisement for a new coffee brand. Rather, this is a celebration of a Black woman-founded coffee label that I’ve just been introduced to. For too long, women in Kenya have not been fairly rewarded for their labor in the coffee industry, but Margaret Nyamumbo—who is the founder of Kahawa 1893—is working to change that.
As a third-generation Kenyan coffee farmer, Nyamumbo understands how hard female farmers work and saw that they were largely uncompensated for their labor, owning just one percent of their country’s farmland.
Nyamumbo grew up on a coffee farm in Kenya that was started by her grandfather after British colonialists introduced coffee to the country. Eventually, she moved to the United States and earned an MBA from Harvard before going on to work on Wall Street.
With her family history deeply rooted in coffee, Nyamumbo observed that Kenyan women provided the lion’s share of labor in the coffee industry (about 90 percent), but had limited means due to cultural norms and gender inequality. With an MBA from Harvard and experience working at the World Bank on Wall Street, Nyamumbo decided to apply global solutions to a local context and set out to help Africa’s female coffee farmers.
Now, Nyamumbo is the founder of the San Francisco-based Kahawa 1893, which is working to help female farmers, all while ethically bringing delicious Kenyan coffee to the U.S. market. What makes Kenyan coffee particularly unique is the country’s ideal micro-climate, which Nyamumbo describes as being analogous to France and its wine.
“The country’s location right on the equator, a combination of volcanic soil, and ideal weather produce a distinct cup of coffee that’s not possible anywhere else,” explains Nyamumbo. “The distinct taste of Kenyan coffee is prized and is considered the most celebrated coffee in the world.”
With Kahawa 1893, Nyamumbo established a women’s fund, creating a mechanism for customers to tip coffee farmers directly. By combining blockchain technology with social impact, Nyamumbo has created a unique way for coffee consumers to directly support coffee farmers.
“We have a QR code on the back of our coffee bags,” says Nyamumbo. “You can scan and tip farmers directly using bitcoin or any other digital currency.” To double the impact, Kahawa 1893 matches all tips.
These funds have been instrumental in bridging the gap between expected and actual earnings from the crop in the 2020-2021 farming season, when yields were 50 percent lower than usual, likely due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
“By investing in women and providing a market and value for women-grown coffee, it easily makes a business case for the male member of a household to offer land ownership to the woman,” adds Nyamumbo. “It’s a market-based incentive that works by incentivizing behavior based on economic, social, and environmental returns.”
Like most people, I start my day with a freshly made cup of coffee. My morning coffee has become more than a caffeine fix, it has become a cozy ritual—from the smell of brewing coffee to the feel of a warm, hand-crafted mug in my hands. But that cup of coffee represents countless hours of labor from people too often left unseen. The beauty of Kahawa 1893 is it inspires us to look beyond our cup and give gratitude to the women who worked to bring us our coffee.
This newsletter is inspired by an article by Hollie Stephens, written for Unearth Women. Check out Hollie’s full interview with Margaret Nyamumbo here.
My new favorite show, Only Murders in the Buildings
Right now, my favorite show is Only Murders in the Building, starring Steve Martin, Martin Short, and Selena Gomez. This show is like a delightful cross between a Nancy Drew novel and a Nora Ephron film. The show follows a former TV crime show detective (Steve Martin), a struggling playwright (Martin Short), and a mysterious and troubled woman (Selena Gomez) who all live in a historic building on Manhattan’s West Side.
As different as these three characters are, they are united by one common love: true crime podcasts. When a mysterious murder happens in their building (hence the show’s name), the three decide to investigate the crime while simultaneously launching their own murder podcast.
Of course, being a true crime enthusiast does not mean you’re qualified to solve a murder, and so the three stumble awkwardly through their investigation. It’s not clear whether the characters (particularly Steve Martin and Martin Short) are more interested in solving the crime or in gaining new podcast listeners, but what is clear is the show is meant to hold a mirror up to every true crime loving, self-proclaimed sleuth out there.
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