Ernesto Dias, a spry 99-year-old, goes out every day to walk the grounds of his family’s coffee plantation located in the lush highlands of Brazil. Although his son Joaquim now runs the farm, he still likes to oversee everything. Ernesto and his wife, Augusta, who will also be 100 next year, are an integral part of the family’s coffee- growing business, which was first established in the 1890s by Ernesto’s father, Lindolpho, and his three uncles.

“It’s been a long tradition in my family,” says Cristina Dias as she pulls out a glossy coffee-table book filled with stunning images of her family’s farm in Brazil that show how they harvest the coffee. She smiles and points to a photo of Ernesto, her grandfather, then flips through the pages, explaining each step of the coffee bean growing and drying process. Part way through, she pauses and offers a cup of coffee — “espresso or pour-over?”

Each option has a specific process, which Dias takes very seriously because she insists on serving the perfect cup of coffee to anyone who buys Mogiana Coffee beans, her Burnaby-based business, aptly named after the valley in Brazil where her family grows the beans. Dias’s passion for exceptional coffee and sound business practices are deeply rooted in family and tradition.

For four generations, the Dias family has been committed to producing the highest quality Arabica coffee beans while embracing the core values that were first established by Dias’s great-grandfather and his brothers.

“We’ve learned from our family to practise true sustainability, the ability to sustain our plants, soil, air, water, community and ourselves,” Dias says.

Dias, whose parents are not farmers, grew up in Rio de Janeiro, but spent her summer holidays at the farm playing with her cousins as well as many of the workers’ children. “It’s a special place,” she says, “and I love it there.”

Cristina Dias, top right, visits her family’s 400-acre coffee farm in Brazil, where she spent summers as a child. Today, she brings the farm-to-cup journey and her family’s legacy full circle, roasting Mogiana Coffee in Burnaby. Her uncle, Joaquim Dias, bottom left, leads the day-to-day operations on the farm, where every coffee cherry is handpicked — a commitment to quality and tradition passed down since the 1890s.

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The family’s farm, which is about 400 acres, is quite a large operation, according to Dias. “I believe that last year they [produced] about 3,000 bags. Each bag contains 60 kilograms or 132 pounds.” This translates to about 180,000 kilograms, or 396,000 pounds per year, of the Bourbon varietal, one of the most special varieties of Arabica beans. Every step of the process, including planting, harvesting and drying, is done by hand, which makes it a “truly handcrafted, single-origin coffee.” Even more remarkable is that the trees, which are harvested once a year, only yield about one pound of roasted coffee per tree.

But beyond producing exceptional coffee and embracing renewable energy practices, the farm is also a completely sustainable community, home to 47 families, some of whom have been working there for three generations.

“This is the part that we are very proud of at the farm — the social and environmental initiatives,” Dias says. As well as offering housing for the families who work on the farm, there are health clinics, social and sporting activities and an on-site school for kindergarten to grade 12 students.

“We had a smaller school that was built around 1910,” Dias says. “It was basically a room with two desks. Then we built a second school that was a bit bigger. But then my uncle, who was working at the farm at the time, noticed a lot of kids in the area were not getting an education. They weren’t going to the city. So, they got together with the mayor and donated a spot of land to the city, and the city built a municipal school on our farm. Children from our farm and neighbouring farms and villages go to this school. At one point we had 700 children studying there. And the kids get a free meal when they are in school.” Although some children stay to work on the farm with their families, it’s completely by choice. Many go on to university or take jobs in the city.

Another important part of the farm is that 20 per cent of the land is designated as natural forest. “My grandfather made them build a hiking trail in the middle of one of the forests,” Dias says. “And it’s so beautiful. You see things that you want to see, and things you don’t want to see — like monkeys and snakes.”

Her great-uncle (affectionately known as uncle Xixo) also established a bird sanctuary on their land. According to Dias, “He started working with a conservation body in Brazil, rescuing birds that had been kidnapped from the wild to be sold. They get injured and then cannot be placed back in the wild.” Her uncle has since passed, but his granddaughter, Leticia, took it over and has opened it to the public. It’s now home to a large number of species from all over the world, including the first blue parrot that reproduced in captivity.

Even though Dias has been living in British Columbia for 30 years, she takes great pride in her family’s business. So much so, that in 2008 she decided to open her own coffee business in Metro Vancouver. “My family always just had the agricultural part,” says Dias. “They grow coffee and they sell green coffee. They never roasted coffee, until a cousin of mine in the late ’90s, early 2000s, started roasting.” And then on one of her many trips to Brazil, Dias spoke with her cousin and learned that he was doing very well, which got her thinking, “People in Vancouver love coffee, maybe I could bring some here?”

Dias did indeed bring some of her cousin’s coffee back to Vancouver and sold it to friends and family. At the time, she was working at the Listel Hotel, but she eventually quit to launch Mogiana Coffee and has not looked back. Along with her partner, Carlos Bertin, she also created Mundo Novo as a separate roasting company, in the same facility in Burnaby.

Currently, Dias imports approximately 80,000 pounds of coffee beans every year from the family farm. Roasted in small batches for quality and consistency, 80 per cent of that coffee is sold as Mogiana Coffee online, through local retail outlets and food service clients, while the rest is roasted for private labels customers.

“We are extremely lucky that we have this direct connection with the family farm,” Dias says. But, like most coffee businesses, climate disasters in Brazil affect the price of coffee globally as it is one of the largest producers of coffee.

“In 2022, we had a really bad frost followed by a drought and we lost 30 per cent of our crop, but some families lost everything,” Dias says. “This year, there was a huge drought and coffee prices skyrocketed. We brought in a container in early 2024. And, we just brought in another container and it cost us 30 per cent more. The next one that is coming is 18 per cent more.”

But, even with the increased prices, Dias considers herself fortunate because of her connection with the family farm that is well situated and committed to eco-friendly and sustainable business practices.

Following in her family’s footsteps as a fourth-generation coffee entrepreneur, Dias is passionate about offering high-quality coffee beans while being mindful of her community and environmental and economic impact. Through Mogiana and Mundo Novo, she and Bertin are proud that they are close (90 per cent) to becoming a zero-waste roasting facility. More important, Dias is committed to working with local community agencies to address food insecurity and diverting food waste while also partnering with educational institutions to educate the next generation of leaders by sharing the principles of ethical coffee sourcing, growing and trading. She would also love to see more coffee-related events in Vancouver (such as Beanstock Coffee Festival) and perhaps even a local coffee association.

“There is so much more to coffee than most people realize,” Dias says as she prepares what she considers the perfect cup of espresso. She carefully weighs the coffee beans before grinding them, and then runs the water through the machine twice before adding the precisely tampered ground coffee. She watches proudly as the coffee pours into the cup, creating a dark creamy froth (crema) on top. Similar to her grandfather (who now has a medium roast named after him) and great-grandfather, she cares deeply about every aspect of her business… down to the last drop.

Mogiana Coffee
7037 Antrim Ave., Bay A, Burnaby, B.C.
mogianacoffee.com | 604.272.1132 | @mogianacoffee