Happy B Corp Month! Every March Nossa Familia joins our global community of businesses to celebrate and share with you what it means to be a Certified B Corporation.

In 2016 Nossa Familia Coffee became Oregon’s first certified B Corp coffee roaster to show our commitment to putting people and the planet before profit. We are proud to be one of thousands of Certified B Corps meeting high standards of verified social and environmental performance. We're united around the idea of redefining success in business: that companies should be purpose-driven and create benefit for all stakeholders, not just shareholders.

What does being a B Corp look like at Nossa Familia? At Nossa Familia we walk the talk by bringing you exceptional coffee stemming from continually striving to foster community, ensuring social responsibility and minimizing our environmental impact through the full cycle of coffee. This tradition started long before we became a B Corp. Nossa Familia - ‘our family’ in Portuguese - has been growing coffee in the highlands of Brazil since the 1890s. From our family’s resilient coffee tradition, we've learned to practice true sustainability – caring for our plants, soil, air, water, community, and ourselves within every aspect of what we do.

2023 marks Nossa Familia’s 7th year as a certified B Corp company. As we’ve evolved as an organization, we’ve come to look forward to March as time to reflect on the previous year and celebrate the ways we've used coffee as a force for good – for people, community, and the planet.

2022 IMPACT HIGHLIGHTS

Progress we made in 2022 that we’re particularly proud of includes:

Giving Back to Community

PHOTO: THE YOUNG ENTREPRENEURS OF SAN MIGUEL ESCOBAR
PHOTO CREDIT: DE LA GENTE

We’re proud to use our coffee as a platform to give back to the community. Since our inception in 2004 we’ve contributed over $210,000 in cash and over $300,000 in-kind to nonprofits and charitable causes supporting communities, youth, and the environment.

In 2022, through the Nossa Familia Giveback Program we funded $1,375 in microloans to small businesses in coffee growing countries and contributed over $24,350 in financial and in-kind coffee donations to nonprofits working to alleviate poverty and improve the livelihood of people locally and in coffee growing countries.

Together we make a difference!

Here's how your purchases of Nossa Familia coffee gave back in 2022:

Working Toward a Diverse, Equitable, Inclusive Culture

DEI Training: Over the course of two months in the spring of 2022, all members of the Leadership team participated in an in-depth 5 part DEI training series, put on by Prosper Portland.

Offering New Flex Holidays: Nossa Familia acknowledges that, for many of our employees, there may be important holidays they wish to celebrate that aren’t typically observed as part of the federal public holiday schedule. To give our staff the opportunity to celebrate days that may have an important personal meaning to them, we instituted 2 paid Flex Holidays each year. All full and part-time staff are given paid time off to observe any important day related to their ethnicity, heritage, or religious belief. Examples of these days include, but are not limited to: Martin Luther King Jr. Day, Juneteenth, The International Day of Commemoration, National Freedom Day, The Day of Silence, Krishna Janmashtami, Human Rights Day, any day of observance and/or commemoration for an underrepresented group, and any important day for an ethnicity, heritage, or religious belief.

Supporting Portland-based nonprofit Brown Hope and the Black Resilience Fund in honor of Juneteenth, donating 19% of cafe sales from 6/18-6/20. The fund, a program of nonprofit Brown Hope, is dedicated to fostering healing and resilience by providing immediate and direct financial assistance to Black Portlanders.

IMAGE CREDIT: BROWN HOPE / BLACK RESILIENCE FUND

Continuing our Guest Roaster series to amplify Black-owned coffee companies with Inglewood, California’s first Black Woman-owned coffee roaster, Sip & Sonder, featured at our cafes. During the month-long feature Nossa Familia sold Sip & Sonder’s single-origin Rwandan coffee by the bag and served their light roast on drip at our cafes. Sip & Sonder’s founder Shanita Nicholas made our Guest Roast collaboration one of our most impactful by personally visiting our roastery and Central Eastside Cafe for a tour and a special, in-person and Instagram Live coffee talk with Nossa Familia’s founder. Shanita, together with co-owner Amanda-Jane Thomas discussed the barriers they’ve experienced in the coffee world and their vision of creating a space where "coffee, community and culture truly connect."

Nossa Familia's Guest Series reflects our core value of 'Always Be Making Friends' (ABMF) and commitment to being allies to our Black community. In May of 2020 we decided to dedicate all future guest features to Black-owned coffee businesses to support their work and promote racial justice, equity, and community strength.

Revitalizing our Coffee Origin Trips

A big highlight of 2022 was announcing the return of our annual origin trip to Guatemala after a two-year hiatus due to the pandemic. Nossa Familia started sourcing coffee from Guatemala in 2015 and since that time, we’ve made it a priority to fully fund trips for three to five of our team members to travel to the origin to see where the coffee they work with each day is produced, meet the people who make it, and experience the beauty of the country where our coffee is grown. We also welcome our wholesale partners and customers to join us on these trips. Fostering meaningful connections between everyone involved in the full cycle of our coffee is a major component of fulfilling our purpose as a B Corp – creating positive relationships locally and globally.

Fostering meaningful connections between everyone involved in the full cycle of our coffee is a major component of fulfilling our purpose as a B Corp – creating positive relationships locally and globally.

IMPACT: Over the years, meeting face-to-face with our long-time coffee partners has strengthened our direct trade relationships, and cultivated friendships, trust, and mutual understanding. This has helped us work closely with coffee farmers to set sustainable prices that allow the farmers and their communities to thrive; honor our farmers by learning their stories and sharing them responsibly; and bring exceptional, quality coffee to our customers.

Improving our Carbon Foot Print

Furthering our pledge as one of 1,100+ B Corp Businesses to commit to Net Zero by 2030, in 2022 we made investments in new projects to improve our operational energy and emissions output.

Saving Energy: We installed energy-efficient LED lighting to reduce our lighting energy output by 62%. This was a $6,135 project to improve lighting and reduce energy use in our 16,000 Square Foot roastery space. We expect to save 4,636 kwh per year in energy, which equates to a 62% reduction.

Reducing Our Delivery Emissions: In the spring of 2022, Nossa Familia rolled out an all-electric, zero-emissions delivery fleet fully charged by the 100% renewable energy we purchase for our roastery. We estimate that having a fully electric delivery fleet will save 650 gals of diesel per year, reducing our emissions by 14,500 lbs of C02.

This project was completed in July of 2022 and was the second of two energy efficienct, LED lighting projects overseen by Pacific Energy Concepts (PEC). By the end of this year, our investment in these two energy efficient LED lighting projects will have saved 23.8 tons of C02, equivalent of powering 2.7 homes for 1 year.

WORK IN PROGRESS

Net Zero by 2030 Pledge: Furthering our pledge as one of 1,100+ B Corp Businesses to commit to Net Zero by 2030.

Portland Means Progress Work: Continuing our company's advancement of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion initiatives and our participation in Prosper Portland's Portland Means Progress city-wide program designed to create a more inclusive economy in Portland.

Recertifying as a B Corp: We are currently in the process of completing our second recertification as a B Corp. B Corporations are required to recertify every three years to ensure high standards of social and environmental performance are not only continuing to be met but are raised. Going through the rigorous process of recertifying allows us the opportunity to assess our impact on our workers, community, customers, and the environment; look for areas of improvement, and further our journey to continually improve.

Our ongoing commitments as a certified B Corp include:

Purchasing Direct Trade Coffee at a fair market price that ensures our family and origin partners can continue to grow coffee for generations to come
Purchasing 100% renewable energy at all Nossa Familia facilities
Reducing roasting energy & emissions by up to 80% using Loring machines
Implementing extensive Zero Waste initiatives in our roastery & cafés
Having a local and sustainable purchasing policy to guide procurement
Offering paid volunteer & pro-bono time for employees to engage with community organizations
Donating at least 1% of annual gross profits to nonprofit organizations
Progress over perfection - continually striving to improve in all areas of the company