Costa Rican SME Paya Coffee wins the recognized sofiTM Specialty Food Association Award

• This is the first time that a Costa Rican company has won this award.
• The “New Product” award in the “Coffee and Chocolate” category was won by the company.

San José, May 12, 2021. The flavor and aroma of Costa Rican coffee achieves a new conquest at a global level when a national company wins the renowned sofiTM Award, from the Specialty Food Association of the United States. It is Paya Coffee, an SME formed by three people that processes coffee from micro-beneficiaries of the mountains of Heredia and the foothills of the Chirripó hill.

The sofiTM Awards recognize the best and most innovative specialty food products. The award is given in 49 food and beverage categories on a gold and silver scale; and this 2021 they added the “New Product” award to recognize an extraordinary product that was launched between March 1 and October 1, 2020. Paya Coffee’s Dark Roast won the “New Product” in the “Coffee and Chocolate” category.

“For us, winning the sofiTM Award for our Dark Roast represents a great recognition by the industry of our commitment to having a high-quality product with an excellent taste and aroma. It’s quite an honor! And for Costa Rica, we definitely believe it helps to reinforce the fact that it is a country that produces the highest quality coffee and means that people not only see it, but recognize the great effort of the country to offer the best possible. The sofiTM Awards are the highest point of approval and we are super proud to say that our coffee took the New Product award for coffee this year”, stated Paya Coffee’s Director of Operations, Santiago Vidal.

For this 2021, more than 1,500 products were submitted in the 49 categories, which were evaluated by an anonymous jury in charge of sampling taste, appearance, texture, aromas, quality of ingredients and innovation. To participate, applicants must be members of the Specialty Food Association and the product must undergo a previous evaluation by Rutgers University in New York, for qualification and approval for the next step.

Pedro Beirute, General Manager of the Foreign Trade Agency of Costa Rica, stated that this award from Paya Coffee is an enormous recognition for the company, for the coffee sector and for Costa Rica in general. “Many congratulations to Paya Coffee for this important award. This award positions Costa Rica and the company at another level in international markets, since the quality that has always characterized Costa Rican coffee is being recognized worldwide. We are a small country and perhaps we cannot compete by volume, but we definitely compete with very powerful qualities such as quality and differentiation”.

About Paya Coffee

“There are many coffee brands in the world, but in the case of ours, from the beginning we focused on offering a product with excellent quality, such as specialty coffees, which combine elements that help it stand out among all the others. Our intention is that people normalize the consumption of a good cup of coffee on a regular basis and not just as a sporadic treat”, this is how Santiago Vidal describes the value proposal of Paya Coffee.

This brand was born in March 2020 by the Venezuelan brothers Santiago and Esteban Vidal, who took advantage of two competitive advantages to develop the business: their family’s coffee experience in Venezuela and the quality of Costa Rican coffee.

Nearly 80% of the coffee they process is produced above 1,600 meters above sea level, which ensures that their product is unique and of high quality.

Currently, they export to the United States and, hand in hand with the Foreign Trade Agency of Costa Rica, they are working hard to consolidate in that market and then expand to other markets such as Europe and Australia. And the good news is that in Costa Rica you can also taste this award-winning product, as it is available for purchase on the website www.paya-coffee.com. In its path towards internationalization, Paya Coffee has always been supported by the Foreign Trade Agency of Costa Rica. “With the Foreign Trade Agency of Costa Rica we started from scratch, they practically guided us through every step to be able to export, from our first clients on Amazon, to joining the Specialty Food Association, where we have made contact with important companies to sell our product in the U.S.,” concluded the Ope