Reclaiming “justice” for Vietnamese Robusta coffee beans

Sahra Nguyen, founder of Nguyen Coffee Supply: Demanding "justice" for Vietnamese Robusta coffee beans

Nguyen Coffee Supply is the first brand in the US specializing in selling products from specialty Robusta coffee beans of Vietnam. Not just a simple business, founder Sahra Nguyen wants to spread Vietnamese coffee culture around the world .

Sahra Nguyen, founder of Nguyen Coffee Supply.

Heavy heart for Vietnam's Robusta beans

Since 2022, Nguyen Coffee Supply’s specialty coffee products and cold brew canned coffee from Robusta beans have appeared in more than 550 stores of the high-end retail chain Whole Foods in the US. This is an important shift for the brand, reflecting the change in consumer thinking of American customers when it comes to Vietnamese coffee.

“My dream is to build the world’s largest coffee company from Vietnamese Robusta beans,” founder Sahra Nguyen shared.

Founded in 2018, Nguyen Coffee Supply is the first artisan coffee maker in the US to use Robusta beans sourced 100% in Vietnam. Even in the brand name, the founder, born in 1986, uses his last name Nguyen to increase representation and visibility for the Vietnamese community.

Sahra recalls that in 2016, when Vietnamese iced milk coffee became increasingly popular in New York, she thought of Japanese green tea or pearl milk tea, Asian drinks that had created a consumer trend in the US. She believed that Vietnamese iced milk coffee would become the next trend.

However, every time she bought iced milk coffee, Sahra noticed that the beans used were not Vietnamese coffee beans, but Ethiopian or Colombian coffee beans. The more Sahra learned, the more she realized that American consumers also had a need to interact with Vietnamese culture, but in the US market, it was impossible to find good quality Vietnamese coffee beans. Large coffee companies such as Blue Bottle, Stumptown, La Colombe... or the Whole Foods retail chain did not have any trace of Vietnamese Robusta beans.

“How strange,” Sahra said to herself.

My dream is to build the world's largest coffee company from Vietnamese Robusta beans.

- Sahra Nguyen

She searched online and learned that Vietnam is the second largest coffee producer in the world and the largest Robusta grower in the world. The moment she discovered this truth, Sahra felt “enlightened”. Vietnam is a big part of the international coffee experience, but consumers don’t know it. Even within the coffee industry, Robusta beans don’t get the same attention as Arabica beans from Africa or South America.

“I want to show the world that Vietnamese coffee is as good as coffee from other places,” Sahra said about the reason for founding Nguyen Coffee Supply.

Importing coffee beans from farmers in Da Lat and Son La , Nguyen Coffee Supply roasts and grinds them, then sells them in the US market. Sahra said that it is not that Americans prefer Arabica beans, but that previously, American customers were only provided with Arabica coffee products. After a period of exposure to coffee provided by Nguyen Coffee Supply, more and more Americans love Robusta beans, because of their smooth, silky, rich taste like dark chocolate, which goes well with sugar and milk.

Coffee beans of the future

Nguyen Coffee Supply is currently importing both Robusta and Arabica beans from Vietnam to diversify its products, but the spearhead is still Robusta beans. Compared to Arabica beans, Robusta beans have twice the amount of caffeine, twice as many antioxidants, 60% less sugar and 60% less fat than Arabica coffee.

“This is not to say that one coffee bean is better than another, because coffee beans do not live in hierarchies and we do not promote a hierarchical culture in coffee. Instead, we are pointing out the fact that all customers deserve more diversity in products and product quality,” Sahra emphasized.

In the context of increasingly complex climate change, Sahra Nguyen expressed her belief that Robusta coffee beans are the beans of the future, possessing resilient vitality. Although no bean is completely immune to climate change, research shows that Robusta beans can withstand higher temperatures better than Arabica beans. Robusta beans can also be grown at different altitudes, while Arabica beans must be grown at very high places. Because Robusta beans contain twice the amount of caffeine as Arabica beans, that amount of caffeine becomes a natural pest repellent, ensuring farmers get more coffee beans.

“For all these reasons, we truly believe that Robusta beans will play an important role in the future of the coffee industry,” said Sahra Nguyen.

Over the past 6 years, Sahra and Nguyen Coffee Supply have been persistently promoting Vietnamese coffee as well as filter coffee culture to friends around the world. Things are gradually getting brighter. Sahra and the story of Vietnamese Robusta coffee beans have attracted the attention of international media. The 8x founder was also honored by Imbibe Magazine as one of 75 people changing the way Americans eat in 2021.

The success of Nguyen Coffee Supply has also inspired many large local coffee businesses to gradually change their thinking. In January 2023, Blue Bottle launched its first blended coffee product with Vietnamese Robusta beans in more than two decades of operation. For Sahra Nguyen, the founder is not worried about competition, but on the contrary, she expressed her wish that more businesses would join in to improve the position of the Vietnamese coffee industry.

“In business, competition is good, because competition promotes innovation. More businesses and more generations need to join this playground, increasing the coverage of Vietnamese coffee in the US, I cannot do it alone,” said the founder of Nguyen Coffee Supply.

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