Historically, Peru, alongside Honduras, has been regarded as a Latin American origin of unremarkable and often unreliable quality. This reputation and its accompanying price discount are the results of supply chains built to aggregate large volumes of average quality, to serve roasters seeking price value over higher quality coffee. This happens at the expense of Peruvian farmers who don’t reap the rewards of higher household income through improved quality. We believe that Peru has the potential to match up to any of its origin counterparts in Latin America for quality. We set up Falcon Coffees Peru to prove this to be true.
THE PLAN
The altitude of the Andes combined with rich volcanic soils and tropical rainfall means that Peru has the ideal topography and climate for producing high quality arabica coffee. We identified the key problem area as post-harvest processing. Farmers had received little to no training on the chemistry and precision required to maximise the quality of their coffees once harvested. Our intention was to provide training that focused on attention to detail, while providing financial incentives to farmers to motivate their adoption of better practices.
In 2018 Falcon Peru SARL was registered as an export company and we opened a small warehouse with a quality control laboratory in the northern coffee town of Jaen, Cajamarca. Farmers bring their dry parchment to the warehouse for quality analysis, some tasting their own coffees for the first time. They receive a cup score and an offer price immediately, which they may accept or refuse. In 2019 and 2020, on average, Falcon paid double the commercial market price for parchment coffee in Jaen.
THE RESULTS
Since its founding in 2019, Falcon Coffees Peru has built a sourcing platform that revolves around two northern warehouses—Jaén and Moyobamba—where a 20-plus-strong team works directly with more than 500 smallholders and eight cooperatives. From our Moyobamba hub we buy parchment at the farm gate, paying quality-differentiated prices and committing to purchase from programme farmers with premiums based on the scores they earn. We identify interested growers, capture on-farm baseline surveys digitally via our Copera-built app, run in-depth training workshops and provide ongoing agronomy support. Pre-harvest due diligence and cupping calibration ensure that every sample, and then every 50-bag tranche, meets our exacting standards. Our QC personnel we’re able to monitor milling in real time, analyse and cup each processed lot and have coffee on the water within five days of milling.
In January 2025 we partnered with responsAbility to launch a three-year Soil Health Initiative across 600 farms in San Martín, pairing rigorous soil and carbon diagnostics with hands-on guidance in precise fertiliser use, composting, wastewater treatment and conservation practices. Detailed technical guides and personalised soil analyses underpin a programme that is already delivering richer soils, lower input costs, reduced on-farm emissions and hints of renewed biodiversity. Alongside this, our Falcon Specialty Plus project has driven a +1.32-point lift in cup quality—peaking at 88 across 107 producers—proof that when farmers have the tools, the knowledge and the fair premiums they deserve, Moyobamba can deliver exceptional coffees.
As Falcon controls the supply chain from farmer to roaster door, these coffees qualify for our Blueprint Project label, supported by credible economic transparency data from every farming household.