In 2017, Counter Culture started working with an importing partner, Red Fox Coffee Merchants, to explore various subregions of Oaxaca as farms began to recover from the coffee leaf rust epidemic which began in 2012. Working directly with small mills and producer groups, Red Fox supports specialty coffee production by paying prices well above the local average, and meticulously cupping small lots in order to differentiate quality. Over the years, we have been particularly impressed by coffees produced in the Costa and Sierra Sur regions of Oaxaca. Many of the farmers in this part of the state come from Zapotec communities—an indigenous group whose origins can be traced back to 500 BCE.
Pompilio Garcia Luna has organized with family and nearby neighbors in the San Vicente Yogondoy community. During a visit in March of 2020, we toured Pompilio’s farm and the centralized wet mill used by the group to produce some of the most physically pristine lots our partners at Red Fox purchase each year. Typically, lots from San Vicente Yogondoy will be combined with others from the region for our yearly Oaxacan offering called Rio de Abejas. When we tasted samples from the Garcia Luna family’s operation this season, Pompilio’s coffee stood out for its well articulated fruit and acidity. It was so delicious that we simply had to release this coffee separately as a single farmer lot.
