The Sisterhood, and the Farm Behind It

September 26, 2026 3 min read

The Sisterhood is our coffee for the families. It comes from one estate in the Costa Rican highlands, a place that looks after its own people the way we hope to look after ours. Here is where it is grown, how it is chosen, and where the giving goes.

A single estate

The Sisterhood comes from one farm, not a blend of many. La Minita has grown coffee in the Los Santos highlands of Costa Rica since the late 1960s, and it was among the first coffees anywhere to be sold as a single estate. One farm, one origin, traceable from the tree to the bag.

The estate runs to twelve hundred acres, with eight hundred in production and about 680 of that in coffee. Two hundred acres are natural forest that will never be planted, kept as they are on purpose. The coffee grows on west-facing slopes between roughly 3,700 and 5,000 feet, cooled by the two rivers that border the land.

How the coffee is grown

The farming is patient, and most of it is done by hand. They weed with machetes rather than herbicides, three passes a year across every acre. They use no insecticides. Fertilizer is held to the minimum the yearly soil tests call for. The trees grow under shade, and only ripe cherries are taken, which means each tree is picked as many as five times in a season. It is slower and more careful than most farms manage. It shows in the cup.

The part that matters to us

Here is why this farm and not another. La Minita is built around the families who work it. Full-time workers have housing on the estate for themselves and their families. There is a savings plan the farm matches, an at-cost store, sports teams for the children, and a clinic on site with a doctor and a dentist for the workers and their families.

Why here

The Sisterhood honors the families of the fallen. It felt right that it be grown by a farm that puts its own families first. That is the whole reason it comes from here.

How it is chosen

La Minita is among the most exacting single-estate coffees in the world. Of every hundred pounds of cherry that enter the mill, only about twenty-three come out as La Minita. The rest is separated into lower grades. What reaches you is the top of a very careful selection.

23 of 100 pounds of cherry become La Minita. The rest is separated into lower grades.

The Sisterhood

The Sisterhood is for the spouses, the children, and the parents. The ones who carry the loss and keep going. We do not treat that lightly, and we do not dress it up. Families of the fallen

Where the giving goes

We give 10 percent of every Sisterhood bag to the SEAL Family Foundation, every month.

Where does The Sisterhood come from?

A single estate, La Minita, in the Los Santos highlands of Costa Rica. One farm, one origin, traceable from tree to bag.

Is The Sisterhood a single origin coffee?

Yes. It comes from one estate rather than a blend of many farms, grown between roughly 3,700 and 5,000 feet and picked by hand.

How does the giving work?

We give 10 percent of every Sisterhood bag to the SEAL Family Foundation, every month.

Who is The Sisterhood for?

It honors the families of the fallen, the spouses, children, and parents who carry the loss.