News

Tim Hortons introduces sustainable coffee platform

May 15, 2013

Tim Hortons today announced its inaugural Partnership Blend coffee, the company's first coffee product sourced solely from the work of its Coffee Partnership, which has been in place for more than eight years. The Tim Hortons Coffee Partnership's mission is to improve the lives of coffee farmers in Guatemala, Honduras, Brazil and Colombia by empowering them with business skills.

Within its eight years, Tim Hortons has provided the program with technical and educational support and an investment of approximately $7 million.

The new Tim Hortons Partnership Blend coffee has a medium body, balanced with subtle yet complex notes of cocoa and nuttiness.

The Partnership Blend comes in a ground coffee format, sold in a 343 gram bag and available now at participating Tim Hortons restaurants across Canada. It retails for $7.69, with $1 from every purchase going back to support the Tim Hortons Coffee Partnership.

"Through our Partnership projects, we have been working directly with farmers in the regions where we source our coffee to help them improve farming practices, produce higher volumes and better quality coffee while respecting the environment. We have seen our approach become critically important to small-scale farmers in Latin America, especially as they have been facing changing growing conditions over the past years," said Bill Moir, chief brand and marketing officer, Tim Hortons.

The Partnership works with the Hanns R. Neumann Foundation out of Germany, a nonprofit organization committed to sustainable development that runs grassroots projects with small-scale coffee farmers all over the world. To date, the Partnership has worked with more than 3,400 farmers. The farmers are not beholden to supply their coffee to Tim Hortons, Moir said. It is a free-market system, which distinguishes it from many other coffee certification models.

Read more about sustainability initiatives.