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Kua writes a Letter To Coffee Drinkers once a month. Topics range from daily goings on, to updates on Kua’s strategy, to recipes for coffee biscuits. The content below was the Letter To Coffee Drinkers for January 2022.
Dear Kua Coffee drinkers,
I am writing from my family home in Tasmania. My school here was a Quaker school and at that school the students would meet once a week to sit in silence for an hour. Often the meeting had a theme. We would be asked to reflect on that theme while we sat in silence, and if we had a thought (an unlikely prospect at that age), we could speak it into the silence. The hope was that others might benefit from your thought and reflect on it. No need for an answer.
Well, the theme of today's letter is 'it's complicated'. It is an appropriate theme considering current events. Reflect on the thoughts below if you wish, compost or recycle them otherwise.
A song to start: Listen to Clipo Clipo - Jess Sah Bi & Peter One. A song is perhaps one of the few things that can take something complicated, cut to the heart and make it simple. I wish I could do that with the current Covid situation: Do I go visit my friend I haven't seen for 2 years? Do I hug them? Gosh I'd love to hug them. Probably shouldn't - by my estimates there is a 37% chance I may get Covid, a 54% chance I may give it to them, and if so there is 84% chance I pass it onto my family who are 99% at risk. Perhaps skip the hug but enjoy the song. (Ps: This song is incidentally on the Kua CLASSIC - Curated by the Kua Team playlist on Spotify.)
Kua is considering taking on investment. There seems to be some interest out amongst the investment community for supporting enterprises like ours. This is a wonderful thing, and we believe it will help us reach our goals for scale and impact. But .... it's complicated. Darcy, head of strategy at Kua, will be writing next month's letter and I hope he writes about the world of investment.
Long Petal of The Sea by Isabelle Allende. A good book. One moment stands out: It's the end of the Spanish Civil War and there is a refugee crisis - a classic, it's complicated situation. Pablo Neruda, the great Chilean poet, takes action with a beautiful and simple solution. Pablo and Delia del Carril commandeer a large ship, take it to France, interview 2200 refugees and sail them back to Chile. Neruda is careful not to select people with 'useful' occupations (as the Chilean Government grudgingly agreed to). His interview criteria seems to be focused on general energy and lust for life - selecting people of all types - thinkers, farmers, musicians. By all accounts these people were an absolute credit to the Chilean nation. I promise myself: next time when I raise my hands and sigh 'it's complicated' I will think of this beautiful moment in history.
From Bri (Kua's Head of Impact) on the Kua #Slack (business messaging platform) channel. A complex opportunity:
'Coffee is so problematic: waste, supply chains, smallholder livelihoods, community resilience, consumerism, colonialism, capitalism etc. etc. If someone can solve coffee, they can solve the world. This inspires us (and what inspires us will likely inspire investors and customers).'
The morning coffee. A rare and simple ritual. At Kua we feel very happy to be the facilitators of such a tranquil moment. If there is ever anything we can do to make it better, please get in touch.
If you are new to Kua at home, welcome and enjoy the coffee! To all our loyal subscribers, thank you for the support and thank you for reading, we’ll be writing again next month.
Happy days,
Digby and the Kua team
Reply: home@kuacoffee.co