Origin Coffee Lab is the brainchild of two Peruvian coffee veterans, Alex Julca and José Rivera, aka Pepe. Alex, the son of coffee farmers and the former head cupper for the largest coffee cooperative in Peru, is perhaps the world's foremost expert in coffees in this area. Having cupped roughly 1200 samples a week for the last 16 years, he’s no joke. Pepe also shares deep roots in coffee: the son of a coffee exporter, he grew up in Peruvian coffee cooperatives learning how to bridge the gap between roasters and coffee growers.
Origin Coffee Lab was founded with the hope of seeing coffees from their home turf find the acclaim they deserve. By supporting sustainability and empowering farmers through education, paying sustainable wages, and focusing on increasing the quality of harvests they are committed to elevating the coffee from the ground up.
Two of our recent new releases feature coffees from Alex and José. Our Organic Winter Solstice Blend comes from the farming communities surrounding the city of Jaen, in the Cajamarca region. The diversity of coffees in this area is dizzying and to fully understand the landscape would take a lifetime. With Origin Coffee Lab's help, we’ve been lucky enough to find some of the best Peruvian coffees we’ve tasted for this blend.
For our Organic Peru Estrella Divina Origin Coffee Lab has worked closely with a group of quality focused producers in Estrella Divina to offer training to refine their post-harvest processing, as well as provide financing and better access to markets. This particular lot is made up of coffees from just 35 of those producers, whose coffee showcases a distinct fruitiness that we loved on our last trip there back in 2019. By investing in quality, Origin Coffee Lab is able to offer the farmers they partner with a premium for their coffee and support the future of specialty coffee in the region.
To learn more about the mission of Origin Coffee Lab visit: