“We met Gran when we were living in Haiti. She’s the grandmother to one of our Konbit co-founders, but she’s Gran to everyone. She hiked in the mountains behind our house every Sunday, grabbing a handful of beans and roasting them over charcoal. Her coffee was dark and smooth. We later realized those beans were similar to Jamaica Blue Mountain Coffee, but Haiti hadn’t done much to market their beans. We started dreaming of opening a coffee shop with Haitian beans when we moved back to Daphne, but it took us a long time to open. 

The name Cloud Mountain came from the mountains behind our house in Haiti. It was always cloudy. Some people want to be connected to the world so we are making it easy with a simple cup of coffee connected to fair trade. We want to remind people that so many good things come from other countries. The pictures of the farmers are on our wall. They can feed their families, and the money pours into the local economy. 

Times are much harder now in Haiti. We still have Konbit Haiti–a group of Haitian and Christian community development partners working to develop families and communities.  2020 was the last time we were in Haiti. We meet our partners and Haitian friends for meetings on the Dominican side. We have a staff of about fifty Haitians who are anxious to keep working and doing something to help their country. We just finished a six-week camp to feed kids twice a day and give them a safe place to play.  We had more than 400 kids–the most we’ve ever had. 

Some people want to be connected to the world and find ways to help. We are making it easy with a simple cup of coffee connected to fair trade or jewelry and gifts made by Haitians.. We want to remind people that so many good things come from other countries.”

Stephanie

This is an update to a story we did on Stephanie and Konbit Haiti, and the coffee shop was just something they dreamed about. Here’s the link to the original story.