We seek deep, trusting friendships with people in a handful of key coffee-growing communities throughout the world. We are looking for communities who value relationships, not as a means to an end, but as the source of empathy that leads to selfless collaboration. Without deep relationships there can be no trust, and without trust, very little good can happen.

We prefer not to establish and fund brand-new efforts and solutions that improve quality of production, quality of product and quality of life among coffee farming communities. Instead, our favorite role is as a connector of existing resources with small-scale coffee farmers and their communities. We believe that existing resources tend to fit most naturally and efficiently into the context in which they are needed.

We rely on local churches and community leaders to surface and advance initiatives that will strengthen the spiritual and social health of the community while economic measures are gaining traction. We depend on close partnership with healthy churches and leaders, knowing that they understand their context and have earned trust, influence and access that would take decades for outsiders to develop.

We believe that a free-market economy can be small-scale coffee farmers' best friend if they learn to refine their practices and processes to produce adequate amounts of specialty grade coffee that actually earns higher prices within direct trade relationships. The backbone of our approach is to help farmers earn higher prices with quality coffee and to find direct trade partners who are willing to pay them.