Mike Mwenedata’s big idea started small, in a coffee shop with free Wi-Fi where he watched customer after customer fork over $4 for a cup of joe.
Mwenedata didn’t drink coffee, and neither do farmers in his home country of Rwanda, where their precious hand-picked beans are the country’s third-largest export. That $4, he thought, could feed a Rwandan family for a day.
Today Mwenedata not only drinks coffee, but imports Rwandan coffee beans, runs a wholesale business, and operates two coffee shops in Portland and South Portland. Rwanda Bean donates half its profits to assist the families who work on Rwanda’s many small coffee farms. Mwenedata’s determination, along with support from his customers and investors, now provide 850 farmers annual health insurance – at $5 per person – through its 50% For Farmers Program.
“It’s a funny story but it’s true,” the entrepreneur says with his ever-present smile. “I never had a cup of coffee before I got here.” Mwenedata arrived in 2009, a 24-year-old who had never been to the United States and knew no one. He spoke five languages and had a college degree in math and statistics, but one thing blocked his path to a professional job: limited English. He scratched by with part-time jobs, volunteered at Mercy Hospital, and found joy in the smiles of people he helped.
Mwenedata began English language classes at the University of Southern Maine and advanced to MBA studies. His big idea lingered, though, and in one upper-level business class at USM he used his imaginary coffee business as a model for his studies. Both Mwenedata and his professor knew he was on to something.
Coffee from Rwanda was an untapped resource here, and Mwenedata said he was motivated by his desire to help rebuild the country that just commemorated 25 years since a genocide left more than a million people dead. The small African country is a third the size of Maine but has nine times the population.
Mwenedata took his idea to every business pitch contest he could find. In 2014, he won the first-place award at Maine Startup & Create Week and support to launch his idea. He laughs as he recalls the scramble, with limited funds, to have just five pounds of his untested product shipped to Maine for tasting.
Now a U.S. citizen, Mwenedata feels the weight of Rwandans who work hard to harvest coffee for Maine. “Kids can’t go to school, women are working carrying babies on their back. They don’t have cars to transport so they carry things on their head. That’s why my logo is this,” he says – his tee shirt features the silhouette of a woman balancing a large load on her head.
Every day, Mwenedata looks to the smiling faces of farmers and their families who greet customers from large photos in his store. Scores of text messages from his farming friends in Rwanda light up his phone screen in an hour’s time. He hopes Rwanda Bean’s philanthropy will help build a school there next spring.
“When you do something that you are passionate about, you get inspiration,” says Mwenedata. “I always want to stay true to my founding ideas. That’s what keeps me pushing.”
Mike Mwenedata/Photo Yoon S. Byun
