Our Quality Manager Georgia has been with Bennetts for over 14 years. Recently she took some well-deserved long service leave and went on an adventure in Mexico. Along her journey filled with spicy food, colorful art, refreshing cenotes and of course tequila! she stopped to spend a few weeks with our great friends and supply partners Grupo Terruño Nayarita (GTNay). Offering her a short internship into the quality and production side of the industry, Georgia took the opportunity to learn more about the green bean trade…. from the exporters side!

While most of Mexico’s coffee production is concentrated to the south central and southern regions of the country, our friends at GTNay are located in the state of Nayarit, the most North Western area for coffee production. The region has been growing coffee for over 150 years, but as the more popular growing states of Chiapas, Veracruz, Puebla and Oaxaca expanded and commercialised their production, Nayarit’s reputation and volume shrank in comparison. That’s not to say that the coffee produced here isn’t amazing, in fact the small scale and cooperative style production means that every coffee is hand-picked and processed with care.
 
GTNay started in 2015 with a clear goal: to help smallholder coffee producers in Nayarit bring their coffee to the international market. While their setup may look familiar at first glance—small producers working under a shared banner—GTNay flips the typical cooperative model on its head.

In most traditional coops, members deliver their coffee to a centralised organisation managed by a board, which handles everything from processing to sales. GTNay, on the other hand, operates as a holding company. It doesn’t own processing facilities or dictate operations. Instead, it manages commercialisation, certification, and export logistics on behalf of its shareholders—who are themselves registered coffee-producing ‘societies’ or ‘cooperatives’.
Each of these societies runs independently, with its own governance, legal structure, and policies. They range in size from just 5 to 60 members. What binds them together is that they all own a stake in GTNay, helping keep the system transparent and corruption-free. These societies are democratic, and their producer-members are the ones driving decisions at the ground level.
 
In addition to the societies, there is an independent organisation – Café Sustentable de México (CMS) – made up of agronomists and quality experts who serve as an administrative hub and establish the quality standards for the farmers within the societies. The team at CMS act as a majority stakeholder in the GTNay network and their farming and production processes form guidelines that the societies use to maintain or even increase coffee quality and productivity.

Georgia spent most of her time with the tightknit CMS team in their office in Tepic, the capital of Nayarit. Here she spent time learning how green bean grading for export is undertaken and calibrating with the quality team around the cupping table. The CMS team collect samples from each of the societies to check the grade before GTNay purchases the coffee. When the batch is sampled directly from the producer, it has simply been dried, de-hulled (not screened or sorted) and full of defects. The quality team is responsible for analysing the sample to identify the number and type of defective beans, as well as calculating the percentage of beans above screen size 16, to determine whether the lot meets the grading requirements for export at the dry mill. It’s a time-consuming job, and as picking and production was in full swing at that time of visiting, the QC room was piling high with samples. The quality team were adept at spotting not only typical SCA green defects, but also defects we are not so familiar with such as ‘malformed’ beans – caused by malnutrition of the coffee tree during growth phase.

Armed with information about the green bean including its flavour profile (provided by the quality team), the agronomist at CMS would make regular visits out to the societies members. Targeting areas where malnutrition or other issues such as insect damage were found. The agronomist would study the trees and soil and make recommendations on fertilisers or pruning based on the quality of coffee being sampled.

Cupping and green bean grading with the Café Sustentable de México

In between cupping and grading sessions, Georgia visited many of the societies with the agronomist. Each society was different in its size, structure and geographical location. But all followed the strict methods for cherry receival set out by the CMS team. Freshly hand-picked coffee cherry is weighed and a sample from each farmer lot is ‘floated’ to check for under and over ripe fruit. This is the start of the quality process, and producers are paid premiums for better quality of fruit – especially lots with uniform deep crimson colouring!

Receiving, weighing and floating the cherries

The last society that Georgia visited was that of La Yerba, about half an hours drive outside of Tepic, and home to many of the women farmers famous for the Café De Mujer program coffee. To be accepted into the Café De Mujer program, a woman must meet several specific criteria. She must be a female coffee producer who owns her own plot of land with coffee trees, and is responsible for delivering high-quality cherry. She must understand the measurements of her coffee plot and be actively involved in essential farm activities such as picking and pruning. While she can hire help, she must manage the farm herself. New members are eligible to join the Mujeres program after a three-year probation period. The guiding philosophy of the group is not rooted in feminism, but in the belief that women should prove themselves through hard work. Premiums over and above that of their regular coffee is paid to the women in the program, an incentive to encourage more female producers to not only join the program but to maintain the family farm and inspire their younger generations to get involved in coffee farming.

Currently, there are 12 women in the La Yerba society, all producing natural process coffee for the Café De Mujer program. Georgia had the opportunity to speak with Señora Anacleta, the first woman producer in this society, who helped lay the foundation for what it is today. She was a strong but caring woman, with a little red lipstick, and a lot of dirt under her nails! The perfect leader for a new generation of coffee farmers.

Señora Anacleta - The first woman producer in the Café De Mujer program 

When it comes to growing conditions, Nayarit generally has a climate that suits coffee well. The dry season usually runs from late December to April, which is ideal for harvesting and drying the beans. During the cherry growth phase, there's typically enough rain to support healthy development. But climate patterns have been shifting in recent times. Over the past five years, the dry season has started later, and rains have been arriving earlier—sometimes as soon as February. That disrupted rhythm has affected harvest timing, though in the last two years it’s started to shift back, with harvests once again beginning in January.

Unfortunately, this year, both yield and quality are down significantly in the region. Unseasonal rains last year disrupted the flowering cycle, leading to a lower and more inconsistent harvest. On top of that, many farms in the region are dealing with soil depletion, which can impact cup quality and lead to a higher number of malformed beans.

Despite these challenges, good agricultural practices—supported by the CMS agronomist—have helped mitigate some risks. Farmers have been more diligent about completing harvests thoroughly, making sure to pick overripe and underripe cherries to reduce the chance of coffee borer infestations for example.Through proactive agricultural practices and community collaboration, the region continues to show resilience in the face of climate uncertainty.
 
Georgia’s time with GTNay and Café Sustentable de México offered a rare and valuable perspective into the complexities of coffee production from the exporter’s side— something most people in the specialty coffee trade don’t often experience firsthand. Her immersion in Nayarit’s tightly woven network of independent societies, agronomists, and quality specialists, highlighted not only the challenges the region faces—from climate unpredictability to soil depletion—but also the resilience and dedication of its producers. Programs like Café De Mujer demonstrate how thoughtful structure, community-led decision making, and targeted support can create real opportunities—especially for women farmers striving to sustain their land and legacy. Georgia returned with a deepened understanding, appreciation, and respect for the work that goes into every green bean before it even reaches the roastery—reminding us all that coffee is truly a collaborative journey, from farm to cup.

Georgia helping pick the cherries during harvest with the Café De Mujer members.