Coffee business is my life, my passion, says the enterprising Dison Kaleng

KAPCHORWA – Dison Kaleng, 35, the proprietor of Bros Coffee in Kapchorwa town, says his growing coffee value chain business is his life and passion.

Bros Coffee may sound a name unfamiliar, but it has crossed borders, stormed the European market, and served in coffee shops, particularly in Italy, Germany as well as the US.

Kaleng’s dream to begin the coffee business, he says, started a little 10 years ago in Binyiny Sub-county in the ranges of Mt Elgon in Kapchorwa district.

With the intention to have a specialty trading in high-grade Arabic coffee beans, Kaleng realised that it would be good to work with the coffee farming community in his home area.

He started the journey by buying Arabic coffee from the farmers and establishing a small makeshift central processing point at a shop near his home, where coffee cherries would be soaked, cleaned, and dried to attain low moisture content beans.

Kaleng told this writer, that a few years later, “We formalised a small company that would give us courtesy dealing with the coffee farmers as well as the growing market.”

In 2016, Kaleng contacted the managers of Sebei Elgon Cooperative Union [SECU], who gave him green light to rent part of the union’s premises in Kapchorwa town council to enable him to establish a bigger central processing point for the coffee cherries.

“This space has helped us grow our business, achieve quantity and quality, but also gain trust from the farmers and our partners from Europe and Asia,” he said during an interview in Kapchorwa town.

Luck would come in 2016, hardly three months after registration. Bros Coffee was given an opportunity to partake in a competition in Italy code-named, World Coffee Brewer’s Cup. Several coffee brewers participated in the race, but Kaleng presented one of the finest Arabica coffee drinks that puzzled several coffee addicts in Italy.

With a strong Aroma, and the taste built over time, that came with magnificent brand packaging and composure in delivery, Bros Coffee came off victorious, winning several accolades in one of the top coffee races in Europe.

“It was this competition that gave Bros Coffee a…stepping stone to enable us to go markets. Until today, we have never looked back,” he says.

From the competition, Kaleng says they received several orders from Italy and Dubai, although they didn’t have enough capital at the time to invest.

“This was also coupled with the limited trust back home amongst the individual farmers, who would not provide their coffee without instant pay.”

Trading with his European partners took off at a slow pace, and limited growth, although he was earning off it to sustain the venture.

Covid -19 hits business

Kaleng says in 2020 when everything seemed getting better and picking pace, Covid-19 rocked the world, disrupting his entire coffee value chain business as it came to a standstill.

“When Covid-19 struck the world, our market in Italy closed as we could not even export half our consignment, and at one point we stopped exporting to Italy completely,” he says.

He adds that Dubai, German,y and the US offered some business avenues although with hugely reduced quantities, affecting the company’s profit margins.

Winning national competition

As the old adage goes, luck only meets the ready ones, in October 2021, Kaleng’s Bros Coffee was invited to the United Kingdom [UK] to participate in an all-Uganda Arabica Coffee producing competition, where at least 56 companies took part, including giant conglomerates, unions, and consortiums.  In a rare show of business acumen, Bross Coffee emerged top, knocking out several Ugandan high-quality Arabica producers and exporters to the United Kingdom.

“It was the aroma of our coffee that we managed to retain, the high-grade coffee cherries, and the quality we struggle to achieve right from the farm that earned us the accolade in the UK,” Kaleng said, while at the same time appreciating farmers for maintaining the standards on the coffee farms.

However, he says the achievement in the UK did not add much to their trading profile, but a slight increase in quantity by their existing partners, save for Belgium as a new addition.

Still Struggling to add Value

The businessman says endeavours have been made to add value to the green coffee beans exported, as a way to boost incomes, although he says he is yet to achieve much success.

Kaleng intimates that after realising what the market demands in Europe, he engaged his partner in Germany to roast the beans in Kampala and export them to Germany. This strategy, he says, worked for a while before it was bogged down by the high taxes in the destination country.

“The partner joined us in Kampala to roast the coffee beans, we attained the level and quality needed, and exported one ton, but the amount of tax he was charged in German frustrated him that he would not further engage in the business,” he says.

Meanwhile, Kaleng attributes this to the lack of trading cooperation between Uganda and the European Union [EU] which would attract tax waivers and other better trading arrangements for the Ugandan business community.

Kaleng promoting domestic coffee consumption

The businessman’s failure to reap big from the EU market has not stopped him from being creative in his coffee business. He established a coffee joint named Royal Café for those who love to drink and chew coffee. His clients are both local and foreign, especially foreign tourists who come to spend days in Mt Elgon National Park.

He says he blends coffee at varying degrees of concentration depending on the customer’s desire. He says they also roast coffee beans that are chewed while hot as they are served right away from the charcoal stove. This is done during cold conditions in the high-altitude Elgon region.

At the café, they also brew coffee in traditional clay pots, where wooden straws are used by the clients to sip brewed coffee from the pots.

“We are promoting coffee consumption locally by establishing the café. People have now picked up coffee consumption, especially those that do not enjoy alcohol,” he affirms.

Clients testify

Robian Chemayek, an ardent customer at the Royal café, says he comes purposely to drink the coffee because of its uniqueness. “You do not find this kind of coffee anywhere, not even in Mbale. I just enjoy this,” he said.

For Moses Nguni, the roast beans have won his love for the café. “These cherries we chew here are really good. At first we did not think we would spend our money on chewing the beans, but here we are, very nice stuff,” he said.

At the café, Kaleng employs at least 6 youths, whom he pays a monthly wage ranging between 200,000 and 220,000. These include three cooks, two waitresses and a cashier who also doubles as a café manager.

Partnership with the farmers

In a drive to achieve the growing demand, Kaleng decided to aid the farmers by providing them with over 50,000 coffee seedlings. With about 500 individual farmers scattered in Kapchorwa, Kween, and Bukwo districts, Kaleng expects to have at least 8,000 metric tons in a single season.

He says the company has built trust with the farmers through training on the production of quality cherries and distribution of farm inputs. This, he says, has helped create a cordial relationship, which is beyond money.

“When it comes to buying, we also give our farmers prime rates, so as to enable them to give us that specialty high-grade coffee cherries,” he adds.

Buying equipment

Kaleng was employing at least 35 women to sort, winnow and grade the beans, until recently when he acquired an Ecopulper machine that made work easier. He says Uganda Coffee Development Authority [UCDA] helped in the procurement of a Shs 40 million machine.

He says he would like to have more sophisticated equipment at all stages, including sorting, grading, winnowing, and roasting.

Looking at the future

Kaleng says he will acquire more equipment to boost his coffee business.

“When you have the machinery, you are sure of the quantity and quality you are producing. We shall increase production once we get the machines we require,” he explains.

His company also intends to distribute at least 100,000 coffee seedlings in the next financial year, to enhance production as well as boost farmers’ incomes.

Meanwhile, the Company also intends to start up a Bros Coffee shop in Kampala in November this year. “This would create our much-desired target to achieve numbers in the local market before we expand in the foreign markets,” he says.

To boost coffee consumption, Bros Coffee plans to institute a campaign to promote coffee consumption in schools and institutions around the Elgon region.

https://thecooperator.news/coffee-exporter-now-wants-youth-as-industry-game-changers/

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