With this new release, we are thrilled to be welcoming Marilyn Laucata back to our Reserve Lot menu for the second consecutive year. Among the single producer lots we released from Cusco last year, Marilyn’s coffee immediately stood out with its berry-forward profile, plush sweetness, and impeccable balance. Given the opportunity to purchase some of her coffee again this most recent harvest year, we couldn’t say no, and we are delighted to find many of the same qualities we enjoyed last year in this new harvest. Marilyn Laucata’s farm is located in La Convención, the largest of thirteen provinces that make up the broader Cusco region, in southern Peru. Her four hectare farm in the district of Santa Ana is named Agua Dulce (or Sweet Water) after the creek that runs through her land. At present, Marilyn has planted bourbon and caturra trees on over 50% of her land, and uses organic methods to cultivate her plants. While she credits her father as the original source of her enthusiasm for coffee production, Marilyn has since taken on the endeavor largely by herself: managing her farm single-handedly for most of the year until the harvest season when her family arrives to assist her. Marilyn’s story is sadly rare in specialty coffee. In addition to being a talented female coffee producer within the often male-focused culture of coffee production, it’s increasingly rare to find younger-generation producers so eager to produce coffee at all, given the difficulty of the work and the risks offered by increasingly volatile global coffee markets. Given all of the above, we are truly inspired by Marilyn’s story, and her beautiful coffee is quite inspiring on the cupping table as well.

Marilyn is one of a growing number of single-producer Reserve Lots that together represent an evolving chapter in the Passenger's Foundational sourcing program in the Cusco region. While our team has bought and presented coffees from Cusco for many years, it was only more recently that Cusco officially joined the Foundational menu alongside our five other year-round offerings from producers in Ethiopia, El Salvador, Colombia, Burundi, and Brazil. For each of these Foundational Partnerships, the goal is the same: to try to add value for the relevant producers as a reliable, ongoing buyer - intentionally prioritizing the purchase of a broad representation (i.e. not just the 'cream of the crop') of the coffees and quality grades that each partner produces.

To that end, Passenger’s green buying team is working with our Peru sourcing partners at Caravela Coffee to carefully evaluate each small delivery of coffee that each member of a small group of Cusco farmers produces throughout the harvest. By tasting each lot individually, we are able to make collaborative decisions regarding which lots to blend for the Passenger Foundational offering, and which lots to feature as special separations - as we are with the present Reserve Lot from Marilyn. This is the same purchasing model that informs the development of all of Passenger’s Foundational Partnerships and, given the nascent stage of these relationships in Cusco, we are especially excited to see these single producer lots added to the menu for a second consecutive year.