//Coffee With A Mission

Coffee With A Mission

By Lisa Talley

It’s an early morning, and your hands wrap around a familiar warmth. The sweet, yet curt aroma wafts pleasantly from the steam rising from your cup and you breathe it in as you begin to unfold for the day. Coffee is the gift we give ourselves before the hectic rhythm of a busy day launches itself. And as we savor each sip, soaking up the oh so short-lived quiet, we think more about what’s ahead of us than the story of how that coffee came to be in our very hands.

Nestled in the heart of Downtown Fresno, Lanna Coffee Co. is always thinking about it. Since 2010, they’ve been working on how coffee can be an essential tool for bringing generations and communities out of poverty in Thailand.

“We bring the coffee in from Thailand, roast, package and deliver it to local businesses, coffee shops and homes across the valley and nation. Great coffee with a great mission,” offers Bryan Feil of Lanna Coffee Co.

The coffee Lanna roasts comes directly from the villages of Thailand, the very same ones they’re constantly making efforts to uplift. Every pound purchased here in the U.S. and by Central Valley residents is a direct contribution to those villagers who grow and harvest the coffee. It supplies them with a solid economic foundation which further allows them to not only be self-sustaining away from the drug trade, but to also maintain a certain quality of life. Lanna Coffee Co. dedicated to their mission that they’ve even taken it one step further.

“We have set up a non-profit alongside of our coffee company called the Lanna Foundation that is able to raise funds to send to the various projects that we are helping to further [such as] clean water & sanitation, education and healthcare,” says Feil.

The work in Thailand goes back 50 years and is the heart of Lanna Coffee Co., it is at the center of what drives them forward to continue to do bigger and better things.

So it goes without saying that Lanna Coffee Co. isn’t exactly a coffee shop. You won’t be able to stop in for a cup and spend a few hours writing your next screenplay. You’ll have to take their coffee home… or have it delivered right to your door, and work on your masterpiece there. Lanna Coffee Co. offers a subscription via their website (LannaCoffeeCo.com) where you can choose a biweekly or monthly delivery schedule for any of the roasts they offer. They carry a light ‘Artisan’ roast, a House roast that goes a little darker, and all the way down the line to their darkest roast expressing chocolatey notes is their French roast. And for all you hardcore coffee connoisseurs, they offer an espresso roast as well.

One of the things that put their coffee on a different tier is the quality of the roasts.

“Our beans from Thailand are really special and unique, there is less acid than many other coffees and people often comment that it is less bitter and more smooth,” explains Feil.

If you’re not sure you’ll like their style of coffee, no problem. Lanna Coffee Co. offers a free trial on their website where you can receive a 4 oz sample of a roast of your choosing. They even offer a free samples of their cold brew down at their warehouse, just go to their website for details.

They may not be a coffee shop in the traditional sense, but they do like to stay connected with their community and other coffee lovers. On September 24 they’re hosting ‘Brewer’s Cup’, an event which aims to highlight the specialty coffee world and bring together those who love brewing in a big way. This will be the first year that they’re featuring the brew method of an Aeropress, which is a somewhat updated and modified version of the French press. Those who love their press are encouraged to compete in Brewer’s Cup. And if you’re missing it this year, don’t worry, it’s planned to be an annual event. So start practicing!

Lanna Coffee Co. is making an effort to host monthly events where they fill growlers (large size bottles) of cold brew. Keep in touch with them and what they’re up to by following them on social media. You can find them on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter.