Albeiro Calambas Bernal

Coffee has played a major role in nearly all of Albeiro Calambas’ life. Twenty years ago, he decided to start producing coffee on his own. He found no one, however, that would teach him new or innovative ways to produce coffee and so just followed what he had seen his father do when he was a child. Ten years ago, Albeiro found out about a cooperative in Bruselas, a small town located in the municipality of Pitalito, called Café Andino. He took a sample of his coffee there and returned home to await their feedback. A few hours later, they called him, wanting to know exactly what he was doing to his coffee. He simply replied that he picked it and did the regular post-harvest process that he has always done. To this, all they told him was that the coffee tasted delicious and to keep up what he was currently doing. This small but rewarding piece of feedback was all Albeiro needed to realise that his farm, with its favorable altitude, had great potential to produce specialty coffee.

Albeiro decided not to expand his farm, he is comfortable with his two hectares and knows that keeping it this way means he can concentrate on proper management and quality processing.We were lucky enough to start working with Albeiro through the cooperative Café Andino soon after he made contact with them. He says that the most rewarding part of being a coffee producer is when he is told that he makes great coffee, for him knowing that people enjoy what he produces makes him fall in love with his outstanding two hectares of farmland.