The diplomat’s wife who ran a fair-trade Benguet coffee brand

By Andre Christopher H. Alampay

FIDES HERRERA-LIM felt a butterfly perching on her shoulder, an omen her coffee growers assured her was auspicious.

“Those are your ancestors,” a member of her all-women indigenous growing crew said.

The incident sealed her commitment to developing the market for Benguet coffee, via her Apo ni Bayosa brand.

She got her start running a coffee shop in Baguio, then had to pivot to running an informal bean-gifting network while living in Denmark, where her diplomat husband Leo was posted as ambassador.

Business partner Stella Longa Sutton recounts the time she learned the cafe was closing from Ms. Herrera-Lim.

She said, “There’s no one to run it but I feel so bad for the farmers.” Determined to keep at least the bean side of the business going, Ms. Herrera-Lim told her: “I need somebody to pack and to sell the beans.”

The marketing aspect of the business started out as Ms. Herrera-Lim promoting Philippine coffee to other diplomats in her husband’s circles.

“Every time (Fides) called she would say ‘Ambassador so-and-so has ordered 10 kilos of this, can you pack it?’ That’s how it started. (She) kept introducing it to various ambassadors,” Ms. Longa Sutton said.

Its roots as a popular gift making the diplomatic rounds eventually led to a product line known as Ambassador’s Choice.

Apo ni Bayosa is fair trade in the sense that Ms. Herrera-Lim buys beans directly from farmers, who set their own prices.

“They tell me how much; I don’t haggle with them. I accept their price … We want them to get a fair price because it’s a very good product,” Ms. Herrera-Lim said.

With Mr. Herrera-Lim now working in Manila as undersecretary for Migration Affairs, Ms. Herrera-Lim found the opportunity to launch Apo ni Bayosa in Rockwell, Makati on Oct. 25, with ambassadors from Nordic countries in attendance.

Ms. Longa Sutton said sales of the beans will be online, with an initial foothold in Metro Manila and other urban areas.

The pitch is not much different from the days when the beans were a hot item on the diplomatic gifting circuit — to build an appreciation for Benguet coffee while supporting farmers.