Coffee With A Mission

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publication date: Sep 27, 2007
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author/source: Roswell Beacon

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By Jonathan Copsey / STAFF

Some of the best coffee in the world is supplied by a North Fulton company. It is a flavorful gourmet coffee and sure to warm your soul with each sip.

Mission Grounds Coffee is a non-profit company staffed by volunteers and organized by a local man, Boake Moore. Its goal is to help impoverished children throughout the world by donating all profits made from the sale of its coffee to various projects such as building orphanages in Venezuela and Russia and schools in China, and buying school books for children in Atlanta.

Begun a year and a half ago, Mission Grounds came out of a mission trip Moore made to Costa Rica.

“I bought coffee for my sponsors,” explained Moore, “[I] sent the coffee out and then everybody e-mailed me back, ‘Hey this is great coffee, can you get more of it?’”

Then everything just clicked. It seemed so simple to use coffee as a means to help children. Soon the idea became a reality.

The type of coffee used by Mission Grounds is called Tarrazu, which is graded into five categories, one through five, with five being the best quality but limited in quantity. Only grade five coffee is used by Mission Grounds. Because of the small amount grown, the major coffee chains cannot use grade five and have to settle for the lesser grades, of which there is much more.

“They buy level three and level 4 and I’m just buying the top level.” The top quality coffee is not in a quantity that will supply the chains and they are forced to buy a lesser quality to keep their coffee consistent.

Moore came back to America and started selling the coffee to members of his church, Mount Pisgah, with the proceeds supporting a few charities that he knew of. Despite being an instant success, sales lagged because people kept coming up to Moore saying “Oh, I bought my coffee from Kroger.” This led to the push to sell Mission Grounds at local Kroger stores, who were less than eager to sell the coffee.

“They didn’t want to mess with a limited deal. All the store shelves are purchased by the large Folgers of the world and the grocery store wants to deal with retailoers who can stock 300 stores.”

After much effort, Moore was finally able to contact a vice president who offered the use of three Krogers on a trial basis.

“We’re now in 25 Krogers,” laughed Moore, whose ultimate goal is to expand to every Kroger in Georgia.

Recently, Mission Grounds adopted the “Jars of Clay” homeless shelter in Atlanta, an emergency shelter for children. So far, food, clothing and a support program as well as shoes, sporting goods, a fridge and freezer and 200 backpacks full of school supplies have come through Mission Grounds’ help.

On October 6 a large remodeling project will be taking place at Jars of Clay thanks to Mission Grounds.

“It’s allowed me to help more and more kids,” Moore remarked on the progress made, noting that volunteers are always needed, not just in Roswell, but throughout the area.

“It’s really tight now finding volunteers who are willing to help. I’m going to Cumming and Acworth next and I’ve just now found volunteers who can handle it.”

Moore is confident that the quality and mission of his coffee will bring volunteers and customers in.

“People are very loyal to their coffee but if they try ours [they will find] it’s a great coffee. I tried it and have to agree its a great coffee. And to think Im helping children with every great sip."