Starbucks Adds Visitor Center to Its Costa Rican Coffee Farm, Hacienda Alsacia
March 13 2017 - 9:00AM
Business Wire
Slated to open in 2018, the immersive coffee
farm experience will complement the company’s new premium retail
spaces by providing customers opportunity to learn about coffee at
origin
Investment in Coffee Farming Research and
Development Center Will Showcase Impact of Starbucks $100 Million
in Ethical Sourcing Commitments
Today, Starbucks Coffee Company (NASDAQ:SBUX) announced that it
will be developing a visitor center on the grounds of its wholly
owned coffee farm, Hacienda Alsacia. Purchased almost four years
ago, Hacienda Alsacia is located in Costa Rica on the slopes of the
Poas volcano and serves as a global Research and Development
facility and working farm for Starbucks. The new facility will soon
allow visitors from around the world to get a first-hand
understanding of the agronomy work the company has been supporting
and investing in for two decades.
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Rendering of Starbucks Hacienda Alsacia
Coffee Farm Visitor Center (Graphic: Business Wire)
“Our Roastery in Seattle, Washington offers one of today’s most
immersive retail experiences, where the theater of coffee craft is
on full display. We have a tremendous opportunity to demonstrate
what happens on coffee farms so that our customers understand the
humanity and care that goes into each cup of our coffee,” said
Cliff Burrows, group president Siren Retail and Global Coffee,
Starbucks. “This visitor center allows us to create a connection
between the people that grow the coffee, the role our farm plays in
helping to ensure their economic stability, and the stores that
roast and brew it for our customers every day.”
Visitors of the Hacienda Alsacia farm and café will be able to
explore a 46,000-square-foot area located on the Starbucks farm
allowing them to engage in the journey of coffee from seedling to
coffee field, the wet milling process, drying patio all the way to
roasting and brewing. Designed by members of its in-house design
team who helped pioneer the company’s first Starbucks Reserve®
Roastery in Seattle, this locally relevant, sustainable ecosystem
will pay homage to the more than 1 million coffee farmers and
workers that Starbucks helps to support around the world.
Since purchasing the 600-acre (240 hectares) farm in March 2013,
Starbucks has maintained it as a typical working farm to learn more
about the resources necessary to grow high-quality arabica coffee.
In doing so, it has helped to inform its multi-million-dollar
investment in ethical sourcing resources for coffee farmers
including:
- A firsthand understanding of the
company’s Coffee and Farming Equity practice (C.A.F.E.) sourcing
standards, developed with Conservation International, in
maintaining healthy coffee trees which resulted in a nearly 50%
increase in yield on the farm since 2013.
- The development of hybrid coffee tree
seedlings at the farm’s nursery in collaboration with industry
experts to directly address the impact climate change is having on
the coffee industry including the increased incidences of coffee
leaf rust or “roya” in parts of Latin America. In 2015, Starbucks
donated thousands of seedlings from five different coffee tree
hybrids developed through its research to the Costa Rican Coffee
Institute (ICAFE).
- Establishing and verifying best
practices for coffee farming which is disseminated throughout the
coffee producing world by housing global agronomy summits and the
company’s nine Farmer Support Centers and supplier network.
As part of this construction project, the company anticipates
that it will create dozens of short-term jobs as well as provide
new opportunities for long-term employment on the farm when the
visitor center opens. Starbucks has been offering coffee from Costa
Rica since the company opened its doors in 1971; its first Farmer
Support Center opened in Costa Rica in 2004 and has since moved to
the coffee farm. Starbucks has 11 stores in Costa Rica that are
operated by its licensing partner Premium Restaurants of America.
Starbucks Costa Rica recently launched a special edition
single-origin packaged coffee sourced from Hacienda Alsacia for
customers to enjoy in market.
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