Akha Ama Coffee, a social coffee brand, comes from the hometown of an Akha hill tribe family in Ban Mae Chan Tai, Chiang Rai Province. It has received awards from the World Coffee Council and many other international awards.
Akha Ama Coffee Co., Ltd. operates a social coffee business, from the planting, roasting, brewing process to serving you delicious and fragrant coffee at their own coffee shop or by delivering quality coffee beans to your home. Every coffee bean undergoes excellent roasting and quality control to ensure that every customer’s spending is the most worthwhile. Importantly, customers not only receive delicious coffee, but everyone also participates in helping society.
Now, the admin will take everyone to get to know a popular business that has been developed into a social business, selling coffee beans, as everyone has seen on social media and various places where cafes or coffee shops have started to open up and compete. If counted together without dividing by brand, the number is almost equal to convenience stores. Akha Ama Coffee is a social coffee brand that has a DNA of wanting to help society stronger than dark roast coffee in its blood. Let’s get to know this coffee brand through an interview with Mr. Lee Ayu Chuepa, founder of Akha Ama Coffee Co., Ltd.
beginning
If we talk about social enterprises, many people have probably heard of them already because social enterprises are now more grown than they were before. When Mr. Lee started his social enterprise business, it was just a gap that everyone still wondered what it was exactly. Was it a foundation or a charity? Therefore, many people had the wrong understanding and failed from trying to do social enterprises.
“The challenge is how to help society clearly.”
Mr. Lee said that the initial point of starting a social enterprise, what many people have to set as a problem is how to help society clearly, how to create real change, where the business owner or social enterprise operator must have enough income to sustainably support the organization and the sample. Therefore, the wrong understanding or not maintaining a balance between helping society and helping oneself will ultimately lead to failure.
“Helping society is already in my DNA.”
Lee has been helping society since graduating. She started working with Child’s Dream, a foundation that focuses on taking care of refugees and youths on the border. She began to feel that she had a good rhythm in life and had received opportunities to work, both in terms of knowledge and experience. When she looked closely at the society around her, she saw that society deserved help, and Lee was ready to help.
“If we just give, it will be unsustainable help.”
When we want the assistance we provide to have good results in the long term, we have to look for a model of assistance that creates sustainability and stability. Because if our assistance is to provide assistance to what society lacks but does not create a sustainable model, that assistance will create short-term results and we will have to provide assistance all the time. So, Mr. Lee came up with a model for developing the overall society while also being able to take care of their own lives.
“It’s not just about finding allies, but also about finding common goals.”
After that, Lee found a model of social enterprise, which Lee thought of from balancing his own life with helping society, while also being able to live sustainably. Doing social enterprise is not something that we can sit and think about and do alone. We need a team or partners to create impact in terms of income and solve social problems at the same time. Lee therefore went into the community where he was born and worked with people in the community to find problems that could be raised to help together. The conclusion was coffee to help society.
Why coffee?
The idea of selling coffee came from looking for products or services that clearly reflect the identity, lifestyle and culture of the community. In any case, a social enterprise or social enterprise must have products or services that create an impression first.
“Coffee is not just a drink, it’s an opportunity to connect with the wider community.”
When Lee thought about it with the people in the community and came to the conclusion that he would sell coffee, Lee looked further. The company’s products must not be just coffee, but is it possible to organize trips? Provide knowledge about coffee, go to see how coffee is made, etc. Therefore, when looking at coffee, Lee saw that Thailand has good coffee production. There are many entrepreneurs behind the coffee beans. Therefore, coffee is not just a drink, but an opportunity to help society by pushing them into the wider society.
What can coffee be?
Coffee has a global trade value of no less than 30 trillion US dollars. It is the second most popular beverage after tea. Thailand is the 25th largest producer of coffee in the world. There are farmers, brewers, processors, and people behind the transformation of coffee into various products. Coffee can create a great impact for all those involved with coffee.
“Coffee should not just be a drink, but also an inspiration.”
The next thing to think about is that the people who come to buy don’t just look at coffee, they also look at inspiration. So the question becomes whether it can inspire people to rise up and help society. It doesn’t have to be limited to just coffee, but it can rise up and do other things that help society as well. Lee explains that doing social enterprise here is like trying to make yourself a role model to push others to follow in helping society.
Measuring success
Mr. Lee explained that measuring success can be thought of in many ways. If we think of the results in quantitative terms, we can measure it by the positive impact that the company has made on the community, such as how much coffee has been distributed to help society. Has there been an increase in the number of farmers or new generations joining or helping society together? Results in this aspect are something that can already be measured physically.
“People who drink the company’s coffee don’t just pay for the aroma or taste of the coffee. Their payment is an investment not only for their own happiness, but also for the farmers who grow the coffee for everyone.”
What the company needs to assess is the accumulation of experience, collecting data from farmers who join the company. We need to think about what the company’s stakeholders will get in return. Do farmers at the upstream have the opportunity to develop themselves? The company will take the assessed data and forward it to farmers and all stakeholders so that everyone has the opportunity to develop themselves. It’s not just about harvesting crops for the company, but the company is trying to push everyone to have a role and participate as entrepreneurs.
“Growing coffee but drinking canned coffee is like a carefully selected Thai export product that Thai people don’t have the chance to drink.”
Lee said that when she was a child, her parents would say that even though they grew coffee, they never had the chance to taste their own coffee. Or even if they did, they didn’t have enough knowledge to answer what kind of coffee is good, delicious, perfect, and what kind of coffee is bad, not delicious, and what is the cause. This is why Lee pushed for all farmers who grow coffee to have the chance to eat their own coffee. They must be able to tell what kind is good and what kind is bad.
“They don’t drink coffee because they’re addicted to it. They’re addicted to the sugar and cream in their coffee.”
Lee told us that the day her parents had their first cup of coffee, they complained that it was bitter, not sweet, not creamy. This made Lee understand that they were not addicted to coffee, they were addicted to sugar, to the cream in it. This led to further development in knowledge about health, the environment, raising the level of education, pushing for farmers’ children to have more access to education, creating correct knowledge and understanding for themselves.
Conclusion
Being a social entrepreneur is a natural agenda. If you want to be an entrepreneur who helps society and can survive sustainably, you need a good plan. A good plan means a financial plan, a business plan. Think about how many years you plan to do this kind of business, short-term or long-term. And in the current era, have complete Design Thinking skills. Don’t be afraid to take action to experiment. No matter how good our ideas are, if we don’t dare to do it, we will never know the real results. No one can tell us whether we will succeed or fail. Have clear goals, be determined, and be mindful of your work.
“We can find knowledge and skills every day, but we must seek determination and awareness from within ourselves.”
Akha Ama Coffee, coffee from the top of the mountain to world-famous coffee | The Practical Sustainability, a “friend” of society enterprise
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Contact channels
Akha Ama Coffee Co., Ltd. Tel. 088 267 8014 Website www.akhaamacoffee.com Email: info@akhaama.com
Supported by the Office of Social Enterprise Promotion (OSEP)
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