How 85 women in Colombia changed how we think about blends

Pitalito, Huila

Most blends are anonymous. You know the countries — maybe Brazil and Colombia, or Ethiopia and Guatemala — but you don't know much beyond that. The blend exists to be consistent, affordable, and repeatable. The people who grew it rarely make it onto the bag.

Our House Blend is different. And it starts with 85 women in a mountainous corner of southern Colombia.

Huila is one of Colombia's most celebrated coffee regions. It sits in the southwest of the country, in the Colombian Massif — a mountain range that, among other things, supplies up to 70% of Colombia's drinking water. The volcanic soil is fertile. The elevation is high. The conditions for coffee are close to ideal.

Within Huila, there's a subregion called Pitalito. Farms here tend to be slightly larger than elsewhere in Colombia — typically 3 to 5 hectares — and many families have been growing coffee for generations, having migrated from the neighbouring department of Nariño in the 19th and 20th centuries.

This is where Asobombo operates.

The cooperative

Grupo Asociativo El Bombo Pitalito Inza — Asobombo for short — was founded to give small producers access to better markets and fairer prices. Today, many of its members are Organic certified and sell their coffee through the cooperative to reach buyers who pay more for that quality.

The 85 women behind this lot are full members of Asobombo. They farm their own land, process their own coffee, and receive the full premium from its sale. They're also IMPACT-verified — part of a responsible sourcing programme that tracks environmental and social outcomes, not just cup scores.

What they're building

Asobombo estimates that each of these 85 women supports a family of three to five people. That's 300 or more people — children, spouses, parents — whose lives are directly connected to this coffee.

The premiums from sales go back into the farm and into the community. Better processing infrastructure. Training in new techniques. In 2023, Asobombo conducted research with community members to understand what families needed most. What they found was that monocultural farming practices — growing only coffee — was creating food insecurity. So they began supporting organic vegetable gardens to give families more nutritional variety.

They're also working on integrating agroforestry — planting trees alongside coffee — to prevent deforestation and improve the long-term health of their land.

What it tastes like

The coffee itself is fully washed, dried on raised parabolic beds, and grown between 1,350 and 1,800 metres. In the cup: lime, orange, cacao nibs, dried fruit. Clean, bright, with a long finish.

It's the kind of coffee that's easy to drink every day and never feels tired. Which is exactly why it anchors our House Blend.

Blends don't have to be anonymous. Sometimes the most interesting thing about a coffee in your cup is the story of exactly who grew it — and what happened because they did.