Bean Voyage at the Specialty Coffee Expo 2025: Community, Collaboration & Stories in Bloom
In April 2025, the entire core Bean Voyage team attended the Specialty Coffee Association’s Expo - commonly known as SCA Expo - in Houston, Texas, an event that brought together more than 600 booths and people from various coffee-producing countries.
This was our first time attending the SCA Expo together as a team. With it being a special opportunity, we began preparing far in advance. One of the first steps was to clearly define our goals—what we wanted to achieve with our presence at the event.
From there, we identified two main objectives:
Strengthen relationships and bring in new partners, sponsors, and participants for our initiatives, especially in preparation for the Women Powered Coffee Summit.
Build Bean Voyage’s thought-leadership in the coffee industry and connect with partners to expand our work’s potential in Costa Rica, Mexico, Honduras, and Colombia.
With those goals in mind, we began planning what we could do and who we could collaborate with. In a few weeks, we started building out a plan with confirmed participation in panels, brewing sessions with coffees from producers in our network, and meetings with potential partners. And as part of our outreach plan for 2025, we decided to also host the Women Powered Coffee Stories in Houston, following the one that we had just hosted in London in partnership with Falcon Specialty.
The first day of the SCA kicked of with Women Powered Coffee Stories hosted in partnership with Three Keys Coffee, where we were joined by women leaders in the industry who generate impact from their respective roles: Lani Kingston, Delfina Porras, Rachel Keen, Ingrid Gasser, Seidy Selivanow, Aissa Diallo and Valentina Duque. Many of them had joined us at the 2024 Women Powered Coffee Summit in Mexico, and that night they shared their journeys, what coffee means to them, and the importance of their communities. We welcomed around 30 people and closed with a small auction sponsored by Latinas for Coffee featuring photographs of coffee farms.
(L-R) Stephanie of Swelter Coffee (Chicago) with Delfina and Eduardo of Alto el Vapor (Dota, Costa Rica)
We had a great turnout at the Women Powered Coffee Stories Event!
The following day on Friday, Naty— our program lead in Honduras —represented us on the panel Promoting Wealth for Women: the Macro Impact of Microfinance, which focused on discussing microfinance and its impact on women-centered projects. Other panelists included Roberta Lauretti-Bernhard (Food Enterprise Solutions/Grow to Market), Ruth Ann Church (Artisan Coffee Imports), and Sara Yirga Woldegerima (YA Coffee Roasters). Each of them shared their experiences, lessons, and challenges related to financing for women producers. Naty highlighted our learning from Seed Funds and Farmer School programs and advocated for the importance of direct cash transfer beyond the provision of training for growers to implement their learning.
After the panel, we hosted several brewing sessions where we prepared coffees from Costa Rica and Mexico while connecting with new people and reconnecting with those already familiar with our work. We spent time at the Algrano’s booth—WPCS partners since the first year in Costa Rica—and the bext360 booth, long-time supporters of Bean Voyage.
Nati during her participation on the Panel: Promoting Wealth for Women
Itzel during her participation on the panel: From the Ground Up
On Saturday morning, the team participated in two simultaneous activities. On one side, Itz—our program lead in Mexico—participated in the panel From the Ground Up: Experiences from a Community-Led Development Incubator in Coffee-Producing Regions, organized by The Chain Collaborative. She shared her experience as an alumna of the financing program, spoke about her project, her work with the group, the lessons learned, and the impact of the funding.
Meanwhile, the rest of the team was at the Mazzer booth preparing coffee and promoting the upcoming Women Powered Coffee Summit. In the afternoon, we held another brewing session at the Urnex booth. We also met with partners and visited potential projects for future collaborations. Our mission was to secure some “soft yeses” that we could turn into strong yeses after the event.
Finally, on Sunday, we hosted our last brewing session at the Beyond Specialty México booth, along with some one-on-one meetings.
Our Highlights
Here are some of the most meaningful moments we took with us:
Participating in panels was an excellent way to showcase our work and meet organizations and individuals who may become partners. These spaces were full of learning for the team, and an opportunity to meet others who are interested in similar work.
Women Powered Coffee Stories was the perfect way to kick off our time at SCA. It felt like a gathering among friends—a reunion, and a space to reconnect and celebrate each other’s stories.
The brewing sessions provided great visibility for our work and allowed us to reconnect with long-time partners and engage with new people. These moments really highlight the value of working together.
Connecting with so many people who already knew about our work, or who were interested in participating in the Women Powered Coffee Summit, was deeply motivating.
Reuniting with friends in the industry always renews our energy.
Although we worked intensely throughout the three days, on Saturday we shared a team dinner—Korean barbecue, laughter, and lots of camaraderie. On Sunday, we said goodbye with a bit of sadness but also with gratitude and joy for all we had experienced.
Our core team with Marcelline, speaker at WPCS 2024
Nati and Abhi interviewing Tricia from Spirit Tea
Reunited with our long-time friends at SCA was a big highlight!
Reflections
As a team, we always take time to reflect on these events. When we returned, we shared what this experience meant to us; the words that came up were: community, inspiration, laughter, reunion, and blooming.
Seeing a group of more than 30 people gathered in the opening session felt like meeting up with old friends. Most had attended the Summit, and seeing them there listening to stories felt like a warm embrace. Hearing these women share with honesty and vulnerability reminded us that intentionally building community is always worthwhile—that safe and inclusive spaces are essential for a more sustainable and equitable industry, and that there is a growing network of people actively working toward that change.
The panels not only allowed us to share our work and learn about other organizations; they also invited us to reflect on the persistent challenges in the industry, the real needs of coffee producers, the importance of community-centered work, and, above all, that although the challenges are significant, so is the hope.
The brewing sessions reminded us that preparing coffee for others opens doors to honest conversations and creates opportunities for more people to engage with what we do.
Although we didn’t have much time to talk to everyone we saw, it was incredibly energizing to encounter so many familiar faces, share smiles in the hallways, and listen to stories.
It reminded us that there are so many people working in the coffee industry and that our work has had an impact not only in the countries where we operate but also in spaces and sectors we never imagined. As a team, we feel immensely grateful and proud to know that Bean Voyage has positioned itself as a reference point. This fills us with energy to continue working as always—with care, intention, and commitment to building community and safe, inclusive spaces wherever we go.
This blog was originally written in Spanish by María José “Majo” Monge, and translated to English.
