Cornelio Villalobos

Houston, TX (USA)
Role(s):
Founder/Owner/Principal

Cafe Pluma S.A. de C.V.

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Location: Houston
Industry: Wholesale
Year Founded: 2008
Number Employees: 1-10 people
Business Stage: Growth (profitable)
Entity Type: Incorporated Outside United States
Description: Living in Houston in 2006, prior to my retirement, while on a trip to Oaxaca, Mexico, I discovered Café Pluma. It is a regional specialty coffee that grows in Oaxaca, considered by experts as one of the best coffees in the world. When I retired to Oaxaca in 2007 I began learning everything about coffee and exporting. In 2008 I organized a Mexican corporation, Café Pluma S.A. de C.V.; and began due diligence to position my company to export coffee to the US. My objective was to control the production for availability and quality, thus assuring my success. I moved to Pluma Hidalgo, Oax. It is a little mountain town where Café Pluma originated 140 years ago. During the 4 years of living there, I became an expert in coffee farming, processing, exporting & marketing. In 2012, the Oaxaca State Government hired me as a consultant to supervise an Appellation of “Controlled Point of Origin” (CPO) certification of Café Pluma. This process is approved by the Mexican Federal Government like a name patent. The process has taken 3 1/2 years for approval of the certification. The approval will be finalized in September 2015. This milestone completes my initial objective. Our goal and new objective is to export the entire production of Café Pluma for marketing. My corporation has exclusive right to market this coffee, which insures our success, as we will not have any competition. Café Pluma will achieve world recognition as the best coffee in the world, which translates to higher profits. Our first opportunity is the 2015-2016 harvest season that extends from November 2015 to April 2016. Our business model calls to raise $1,000,000 dollars to purchase 3.5 tons of coffee. The coffee will be exported to Houston Texas for processing, packaging and marketing. Our main focus will be to develop sales via e-commerce (direct to the consumer) in The United States, Canada, and Mexico. 2016-2017 will be our second year, and plan to expand our markets to Europe with an estimated 500% growth. The third year of operations 2017-2018 we will expand to the Middle & Far East plus all other global markets. Our production capacity and potential market can grow to 50,000 tons of coffee per year. We hope to reach this milestone in 5 to 10 years.