How Black Kahawa Coffee is uniting the people of Columbus

Douglas Buckley (left) is on Lunji Estate in Mbeya, Tanzania with longtime friend Paul Maier (right), lead agronomist of Lunji Estate. Credit: Nicky Lloyd

For many sleep-deprived college students, coffee is bliss, but where that cup of coffee comes from is often forgotten.

Columbus-based Black Kahawa Coffee hopes to advocate coffee as a means of bringing people together, company founder Douglas Buckley said. Black Kahawa Coffee, an importer and roaster of coffee from East Africa, was first established in 2019, Buckley said after he returned home from his 11-year stay in Tanzania. 

“We should say ‘Wow, coffee’s from Africa, that’s amazing, this coffee is delicious, and let’s realize that there are people from so many different backgrounds that love this and that this is a thing that reminds us of our common humanity,’” Buckley said. 

Through a church organization called Vineyard Columbus, Buckley said he and his family left for Tanzania in 2008 with his personal passion for coffee at the front of his mind.

“When I went there, I brought my hobby of coffee roasting because I knew they grew coffee, and we were doing a lot of entrepreneurial work, looking to create jobs and different things,” Buckley said. “I started teaching women how to roast coffee, and that ended up turning into a cafe that we ran kind of in conjunction with the church community, which we ran for about six years.”

Upon his return to the U.S. in 2019, Buckley said he was introduced to Luis Santillan — staff member of Central Vineyard —  through a mutual friend in their church community. 

After volunteering for some Black Kahawa Coffee events, Santillan said Buckley’s Tanzanian coffee background motivated him to become an employee for the company, especially since Santillan emigrated from Mexico around the same time Buckley was returning from East Africa.

“We’re both coming out from a different country into Columbus and having the idea that we can bring so much more from these other cultures that might not have as much as the culture in the United States has, I thought about how we can be a connecting bridge between just a genuinely good product and the people here,” Santillan said.

Although Black Kahawa Coffee has no in-person shops, Santillan said its coffee beans are sold at several locations around Columbus, such as Weiland’s Market and The Hills Market Downtown. The company also provides the Ohio State-renowned Crimson Cup with coffee from Tanzania. 

“It’s just been such a cool experience to see a business growing so rapidly — so unexpectedly — and just without having a storefront or without just really having, like, an actual physical presence somewhere, it’s still somehow growing,” Santillan said.

Buckley said his inspiration for Black Kahawa Coffee came from his calling to bring people together across lines of difference, and he felt coffee’s East African origin story was a great context for doing that.

“I kind of grew up, as a lot of Americans do, thinking that coffee was, like, a South American, Brazilian kind of thing,” Buckley said. “Myself being an African American, I was inspired, surprised, excited that coffee originated in Africa. I was like, ‘This is a story that I feel needs to be told more,’” Buckley said.

Black Kahawa Coffee’s goals for the future include expanding roasting capacity to provide coffee for more businesses, becoming an exclusive coffee selection in Columbus-area restaurants and expanding the provision of green coffee to roasters, Santillan said. Santillan and Buckley said they are preparing to look for more part-time employees due to the company’s growth.

“We recognize some of the disparities that are evident in the world. Like, I look at Columbus’ coffee roasters; there’s more than 30. I only know of two that are led by African Americans,” Buckley said. “That’s, you know, a very small percentage. That’s not to, you know, tear anyone down or criticize anyone, I just find it ironic. It’s ironic that this is a commodity that comes from Africa, and this is the case, right?”

More information about Black Kahawa Coffee can be found on its website, as well as raffle information.