When I first visited Peru in 2010, I traveled to the Cusco region with coffee legend Peter Giuliano, who was then the buyer for Counter Culture. The mountains, the people, and the culture left a lasting impression on me—it was a region that felt powerful and alive in every sense. Since that first trip, I’ve returned many times, and my connection to this place has only grown deeper, especially through the coffee.
Our Peru Espíritu Wari Reserva is a coffee that carries that connection forward. We work with independent smallholder farmers in the Cusco highlands, all committed to growing coffee the right way, under the standards of Fair For All (fairforall.coffee). These farmers are producing something special—not just in flavor, but in how they approach their craft, their communities, and their land.
The name Espíritu Wari honors one of Peru’s earliest civilizations. The Wari predated the Inca by at least 400 years, building terraces in the Andes to cultivate crops—terraces that farmers in this region still use today to grow coffee. In 2017, archaeologists even uncovered a massive Wari temple in Vilcabamba, right in the heart of Cusco. The sense of history, culture, and place is palpable, and it’s something we wanted to honor in this project.
The coffee itself has been a journey. When we first started working with this region, coffees that met our quality standards might have amounted to just 10 bags. Today, we’re producing 600 bags of a roast that we feel proud of. Every cup carries that progression: the care of the farmers, the lessons of the land, and the meticulous work that goes into maintaining consistent quality at altitude.
Espíritu Wari is bright, balanced, and layered—notes of chocolate and fruit shine through, framed by a clean, lively finish. But more than the flavor, this coffee represents the connection between people, place, and history. From the terraces shaped by Wari ancestors to the hands of today’s farmers, it’s a coffee grown with care, respect, and purpose.
Enjoy Espíritu Wari knowing it’s a product of centuries of culture, mountains that inspire awe, and a community committed to fairness, quality, and sustainability. This is Peruvian coffee with a story—and one that we’re proud to share in every cup.
Oliver Stormshak
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