Papua New Guinea coffee producer and exporter Patrick Killoran of Banz Kofi, is diplomatic about coffee drinking in different countries. He would not say which country had the best coffee – only that different countries preferred their coffee made differently and ultimately they get coffee the way they liked it. Good, bad or ho-hum.
Pacific Periscope met up with Australian Patrick Killoran at the Pasifika Festival recently after Mr Killoran and a small group of Papua New Guinea business owners were invited by Pacific Islands Trade & Invest (PT&I) NZ to attend the festival.
Mr Killoran is passionate about coffee but he says he doesn’t want to be the story. Instead he tries to keep a low profile and throws the attention squarely back to his coffee.
Banz Kofi is a premium brand of roasted single origin Arabica coffee beans grown in Waghi Valley of the Highlands of PNG. The high quality coffee beans are processed, roasted and packed on site at the Banz Kofi factory. The coffee is bought from various villagers who grow the bean without the use of chemicals or pesticides.
The main market for Banz Kofi is the local PNG market but he is also exporting to Australia, New Zealand, Europe, USA and Canada. The coffee is packaged and sold as roasted whole beans or as roasted ground coffee and packed in aluminium-laminated packs with a one-way valve to preserve the coffee and prevent moisture getting in. Banz Kofi also makes Nespresso-style capsules.
Mr Killoran has come a long way since he started roasting in the mid-1990s as a hobby. A decade later, he decided to take it up seriously and today he has 20-30 staff, a factory and a coffee shop. Sourcing the best coffee beans is very competitive and the coffee beans often go to the highest bidder providing a good return for the grower, he says.
However, the biggest obstacle to getting his coffee to overseas markets is the high cost of freight Mr Killoran said. “The freight kills us.” He hoped to reach a wider market through online sales and mail orders, which was already looking positive. He had already received two 100 kg orders for coffee from as far away as Estonia.
The new Banz Kofi website was launched the night before the opening of the Pasifika Festival. The mail order system takes only about 10 days for the coffee to be delivered freshly roasted for each order and for around the same price as buying a packet of coffee in a good café, he said.
