JHONATAN BAÑUELOS

I am Jhonatan Bañuelos, founder of Ombligo de Luna and the one in charge of bringing you the delicious coffee that the producers of the Rincón Toningo cooperative grow with so much effort and love, as well as the person in charge of carrying out the development projects in the producer community.

My grandfather Martin was a farmer, he worked with coffee for most of his life, however, he never had the opportunity to own land for its cultivation. Like my father in his childhood, they were both coffee pickers in a small town in the coffee growing mountains of Veracruz, called Tomatlan My father, Tobias, decided to look for new opportunities and was able to study to become a teacher, far away from the town and while studying, he met my mother, Hermi, while they were both preparing to become teachers, they fell in love, and soon after they married and started a family with three children. My older brother, Joseph and my younger sister Zaira Ketzalli.

Coffee came into my life from my father and grandfather, however, it was later, while I was studying at the university in Mexico City, that I came into the world of coffee. While we were studying, my brother and I started a small roastery in Mexico City, where we personally roasted coffee from Veracruz and sold it to some coffee shops. Later, in 2016, I had the opportunity to study in Münster, Germany, and I was fortunate to learn and get to know the German coffee market. I learned about the importance of sustainability and transparency in the consumption of goods and always wanted to implement them as the basis for development and well-being, beyond being used as a complement in some business model. So it was that after 3 years and after concluding my studies, I returned to Mexico to implement what I had learned with what I already knew about coffee, this conjunction was the main base of Ombligo de Luna, which was developing for many years, always adding new things as I was learning. It was during the Pandemic, in 2020, when I had the necessary time to put on paper all the ideas and experiences I had learned. I got to know the Rincón Toningo community and the cooperative that works the specialty coffee located there. Little by little I began to integrate myself into the community and with the producers, so that I could then begin to work with them together to achieve the commercialization of their coffee and implement development and welfare projects, directly on their farms.

I am very pleased that you take the time to get to know the companies in detail, but much more importantly, the people who worked on each step of the journey that your coffee has taken, from the time it was a flower in the coffee tree, until it is roasted and ready for you to enjoy. From the bottom of my heart, thank you very much.