Help Botánica recover after devastating break-in!

Hello! We (Tessa, Nora and Carolina) are raising funds to support our incredible friend and teammate at TCC, Camila Khalifé, so that her small business can recover from a recent break-in!

Camila started her coffee shop and quality lab, Botánica, in her home city of Quito, Ecuador, 9 years ago. She sought to both create a space where anyone could enjoy and learn about specialty coffee and also support Ecuadorian producers in navigating the industry. During this time, they built an amazing community space with some of the best brunch in Quito, a range of quality and barista skills courses, and free quality advisory services for producers. Camila and her business partners Juliana and Beta make everyone feel at home in Botánica.

Sadly, on April 19th, there was a break-in at Botanica and they lost valuable equipment. After all their years of hard work, in the early morning, someone took all of the coffee, cash and merchandise they had in-store, and their biggest loss, their sample roaster. After 9 years, Camila and Beta made the difficult decision that it was time to close the café, both out of fear for their staff's safety and due to the financial impact of the break-in.

However, Camila and Beta have not lost hope that Botánica can still reinvent itself, recover and thrive, but they need our help! They'd like to reopen and focus exclusively on Botánica's work as a coffee lab and training school. There are not many labs like them in Quito, and they provide an important space for people in Ecuador to grow in their careers in coffee. The piece of their work that is closest to their hearts and most unique, is their collaboration with producers. They offer producers training around coffee quality so they can cup their own coffees. Botánica also analyzes producers' samples and provides honest, neutral, third-party feedback. Both of these services help producers negotiate fair prices for their coffee.

The three of us are lucky to work alongside Camila every day at The Chain Collaborative and know how passionate she is about creating a more just value chain. Please consider making a donation of any size (really! Any amount makes a difference) so that Camila and Beta can replace their stolen equipment, cover the costs of reopening and continue their work at Botanica.