Agro-Tourism

Hello and good day!

Before COVID hit, we used to take visitors out to campo to visit cacao farms and check out our operation just about every year. It was something that we very much enjoyed.

And it was something that our cacao farm friends loved as well. Many times, they have expressed to us how much they enjoy meeting people from other countries.

Under normal circumstances, folks out there in the district of Huarango wouldn't have many opportunities to meet people from other parts of the world.

The district of Huarango is not a place tourists would ever go. Imagine making plans to visit extremely remote farming communities in the United States.

It simply isn't something that most people do. If you are on vacation, you probably want to do something a little more glamorous.But even if you did find yourself with the desire to visit the most remote farms in the United States, it still wouldn't be comparable to trying to visit the district of Huarango.

At least in most of the United States, there is decent infrastructure, paved roads, bridges, etc. This not the case with remote corners of Peru. It is a much more rugged experience trying to get to remote corners there.

Anyhow, it has been a long time since we've taken a group down. During COVID, everything was shut down and traveling was too difficult.

And then for the last couple of years, we've been focused heavily on pivoting our business away from wholesaling to ecommerce and brick and mortar retailing.

My brother Brian has still been going to Peru frequently to manage our operation, but we haven't been able to take any visitors. Well, we're starting to warm up to the idea of taking folks out to campo again.

Brian has a group of visitors from Japan and France coming down this May.

We still do some wholesaling to companies in those countries, and they have been campaigning for a long time to come visit. It all finally came together. This will be our first visitors group in 4 years.

Beyond bringing this group down, the local cacao farmers co-op is trying to pool their money to build a hotel.

Also, Brian's brother-in-law runs a tour guide business. He takes people to Cusco and to the innumerable other beautiful and historically fascinating places to visit in Peru. Beto, Brian's brother-in-law, has expressed interest in helping put together a tour to the district of Huarango for serious chocoholics who want to go see firsthand where chocolate starts.

It would be an adventure tour for sure.

The mosquitos are ruthless out there and it is blazing hot. The roads are sketchy, and the rain doesn't care if somebody is out there on vacation or not. There would be a lot of hiking around. It would be very physical.

But in exchange for that, you'd get to see some of the most beautiful farming country you've ever seen. And you'd get to meet some of the most hospitable and charming families you've ever come across.

While Brian is down there in May, he is going to continue to push the ball forward on this idea.

Maybe within the next year or so, we'll be able to make the announcement that we are taking some of our wonderful chocolate customers here in the United States to Peru to visit our cacao buying and processing operation.

That would be a dream come true.

And since a lot of our dreams have already come true, there is no reason why this one couldn't as well.It just takes focused work and time, like anything else.

Anyhow, this is something we are going to spend time working on over the next several months and I will keep you up to date on our progress, in case you are interested in taking the trip down!

Thank you so much for your time today.

I hope that you have a truly blessed day!

Adam

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