The brief.
Specialty coffee commands a premium when buyers can trust its story — where it grew, how it was processed, who was paid. For farms operating in Zones of High Conflict, that trust is hardest to establish and worth the most.
Legacy Group needed three things for its coffee operations: a growth strategy for the farms' market position, ecological processes worth marketing, and proof — a way to make the supply chain verifiable rather than merely asserted.
The approach.
- Marketing growth strategy built around what the farms could credibly claim: origin, ecology, and community impact — not commodity positioning. The substance was real: formal employment for 100% of the workforce, reforestation and watershed restoration, a hub-and-spoke program buying cherries from neighboring smallholders at a premium, and support for Madres de Cabeza de Hogar, the local organization of single mothers heading households in Salgar.
- Ecological process improvements on the farms, aligning day-to-day operations with the sustainability story buyers were being told.
- Blockchain supply-chain traceability — implementing on-chain tracking so every claim about origin and handling could be verified downstream.
The three moved together by design: the strategy created demand for proof, the ecology gave the proof substance, and the traceability made it checkable.
The results.
- +7% coffee yield following the ecological process improvements.
- Increased trust across 5 departments and 4 farms in Zones of High Conflict — among growers, operators, and buyers alike.
- A working traceability implementation using blockchain solutions across the supply chain.
Why it mattered.
Trust infrastructure, before it had that name. Years before building Veraniwa, this was the same thesis in the ground: systems that make trust verifiable change what communities can build. In post-conflict coffee country, a checkable supply chain isn't a tech demo — it's market access.
The operation kept growing. Legacy Group's coffee ambitions became Green Coffee Company — 2,306 acres across farms in Antioquia, and today Colombia's largest coffee producer.