Launch of ARAKU's NANOLOT coffee in Bengaluru
Following her participation in the Hyderabad photo festival, Muriel Pénicaud traveled to Bengaluru for the opening of the sixth ARAKU Coffee café. There she met up again with the farmers she had photographed last January during the harvest in the Araku Valley. She accompanied them on their first visit to the Bengaluru café and photographed them as they discovered, for the first time, what happens to their beans after harvest: the processing stages, the extraction methods, and how their coffee is prepared and served. For many of them, it was the first time they had seen a coffee machine and tasted their own production in the form of espresso.
The farmers had never seen a coffee machine before. Discovering the value placed on their coffee was a powerful experience, generating a deep sense of pride and belonging.
ARAKU Coffee, created by the Naandi Foundation, a nonprofit organization working with farming communities in Andhra Pradesh, opened its first café in Paris in 2017, before expanding to Europe, the United States, Japan, and India. With this new opening, the brand now has three locations in Paris and three in India.
The evening also saw the launch of the very first NANOLOT coffee, which was awarded Superior Quality status with a score of 87/100 on the Specialty Coffee Association scale, based on criteria such as aroma, taste, and balance. With only 84 packages produced, it broke the $100/kg barrier for Indian Arabica for the first time, with 72 units sold in less than an hour when it went online.
Muriel Pénicaud was accompanied by Marc Lamy, Consul General of France in Bangalore, and Hilary McGeachy, Consul General of Australia. France's presence at this event has special significance: it was in France that ARAKU Coffee made its debut as a retail brand in March 2017.
This evening celebrated the excellence of Indian coffee and recognized the expertise of coffee growers. This project illustrates ARAKU's commitment to promoting the work of producers and creating a direct link between consumers and those who grow these exceptional coffees.