Coffee klatch grows into eco-friendly brew business

Kismet brought the professor and the businessman together. Coffee keeps them there.

The two strangers sat next to each other at a local-food lecture last year and hit it off. The result: an unusual partnership between Stephen R. Madigosky, environmental science professor at Widener University, and John Sacharok, chief executive officer of Golden Valley Farms coffee roasters in West Chester, that brought forth WU Brew, an earth-friendly coffee brand created just for the college.

They're calling their project Cultivation to Cup. Golden Valley, a certified organic, fair-trade and bird-friendly enterprise, gets its coffee into the Widener cafeteria and possibly other colleges. A percentage of sales revenue gets donated to Widener's environmental science department for students' learning trips to Costa Rica, where WU Brew coffee beans are grown.

But the academic and the entrepreneur insist their collaboration is about more than money or WU Brew, which debuted on the Chester campus in April.

"We're not just selling coffee here. Coffee is just the vehicle. This is all about preserving tropical habitats," said Madigosky, who is all about fair trade, living wages, and sustainable ecosystems, especially in Central and South America. He serves as research director at the Amazon Conservatory of Tropical Studies in Peru.

WU Brew's beans come from Las Lajas, an organic family farm on the volcanic, shaded slopes of Sabanilla, in the Alajuela region. The organic part is unusual: Less than 1 percent of the world's coffee is certified organic, meaning it's grown under a canopy of shade trees, as the crop evolved historically, without pesticides and synthetic fertilizers.

"Making things the natural way, I believe, is the best way," said Sacharok, a 1980 Widener grad who was Wawa's marketing and purchasing director in the 1970s and early '80s. He was involved in developing the chain's coffee brand, which became one of its signature products.

In 1986, Sacharok left to start Golden Valley Farms, now a 10-person family business that buys organically grown beans from 19 countries and sells 600,000 pounds of coffee a year. Customers include schools, restaurants, hotels, convenience stores, corporate offices and food-service companies.

His path crossed Madigosky's on Jan. 23, 2012, when they were sitting side by side at a Kimmel Center lecture by food activist Michael Pollan. After introducing themselves, Sacharok quickly realized, "This was awesome, a kismet moment... He's a scientist and I'm a businessman. You'd think we'd have nothing in common. My God! Every word he spoke resonated deeply with me."

Same for Madigosky, who visited Golden Valley, in Matlack Industrial Park, the next day to sample his new friend's coffees - three cups, to be exact. While no connoisseur, Madigosky found Sacharok's coffees "delicious."

The pair then traveled to Las Lajas, with whom Sacharok was already doing business, and on Dec. 31, Madigosky escorted seven Widener students there to learn about organic coffee production. The 10-day trip earned them three academic credits.

The students' education began, literally, at ground level, as they strapped baskets around their waists and picked ripe coffee beans, called "cherries." They also compared organic and conventional growing methods, observed climate conditions, and came to understand the importance of shade, diverse vegetation, soil structure, and wildlife to healthy coffee plants.

The experience has Katie Randolph, a junior from Phoenixville, thinking about a career in environmental science. "I want to inform everyone about sustainability and what they can do," she said. Randolph sees coffee differently now, too.

"Every time I have a cup at school, I wonder if it was made with the beans we picked," she said.

Another junior, Peter Pulhoc of Bordentown, called the trip "a life-opening change" and hopes to go to Las Lajas again this year.

"It had a huge effect on me and it wasn't just coffee," he said. "Maybe it's healthier to have everything organic."

Madigosky and Sacharok hope to form a national coffee consortium of schools that will replicate what Widener is doing in Costa Rica and expand into Peru. Talks are underway with a handful of colleges and two farms adjoining 80-acre Las Lajas have expressed interest in converting from conventional growing to organic, Sacharok said.

The soil-restoration process is complex and takes about seven years.

"But people see the benefits we have, the benefits to health, more bird life. Families want to do this for their children," Ivania Chacon said in a telephone interview from Costa Rica, translating for Oscar and Francisca Chacon, her brother and sister-in-law, who run Las Lajas.

Coffee grown under trees not only provides bird habitat - it could influence human behavior, said research scientist Robert Rice of the Smithsonian Migratory Bird Center, which bestows the bird-friendly certification. "If they succeed in taking it national," he said, "it will be something that college students get exposed to now, and ideally carry into the future, into their coffee-drinking habits, for the rest of their lives."

Changing habits on a larger scale is tough. For all its benefits, organic coffee-farming costs more and has lower yields and a more limited market than conventionally grown.

"Unfortunately, the economics on organics are complicated. Otherwise, it would be a slam dunk," said Jorge Cuevas, of Sustainable Harvest, a coffee importer in Portland, Ore., who works with Las Lajas and Golden Valley. "If demand does not grow beyond a market niche," he said, "there will be few farms converting to organic coffee production beyond existing market participants and enthusiasts."

To taste WU Brew
A 12-ounce bag of WU Brew coffee (whole beans or ground) sells for $13.99 and can be purchased at several farmer's markets and supermarkets in the area. They're listed on goldenvalleyfarms.com. Coffee can also be ordered on that site.