Meet the maker
Original Beans
About Original Beans
Original Beans was founded in 2008 by Philipp Kauffmann, a conservationist, entrepreneur, and former WWF advisor. Inspired by the belief that businesses should regenerate the resources they use, Philipp left his role at the United Nations in New York to build a chocolate company with a different purpose. Headquartered in Amsterdam, Original Beans is dedicated to restoring the ecosystems and communities affected by conventional cocoa production. Regeneration is at the heart of everything the company does, from sourcing rare, organic cacao to producing chocolate that delivers exceptional flavour while creating measurable environmental and social impact.
Under Philipp’s leadership, Original Beans has pioneered initiatives to protect rainforests, conserve endangered species, and ensure farmers earn between 3.4 and 5.2 times a living income. The company has also established the world’s first climate-positive chocolate supply chain.Being climate-positive means that Original Beans’ organic agroforestry systems absorb more CO₂ than is emitted throughout the entire chocolate production process without relying on carbon offsets or including additional tree-planting in its calculations. Beyond this, the company’s One4One Trees programme grows or protects a tree for every chocolate bar sold.
Every bar of Original Beans chocolate supports a more regenerative, equitable, and climate-positive future for both people and the planet.
How they became makers…
An economist by training, Philipp spent several years at the UN financing biodiversity enterprises such as eco-tourism, forestry and coffee co-operatives, before leaving the organisation in 2008 because “it didn’t feel effective enough”. Looking for new opportunities, Kauffmann spoke to a friend and marketer who alerted him to the possibilities in chocolate.
Original Beans’ Sourcing
Beans are sourced from the finest and rarest cacaos around the world. From Peru to Ecuador, their traceability is second to none, with each chocolate carrying a QR Code leading you to their impact tracker page. There you’ll find information on how much rainforest has been preserved, and how many seedlings have been grown in local nurseries, showing you just where your contribution makes a difference.
But just how good is the chocolate? Well, some of the world’s best 50 chefs work with Original Beans chocolate. Both the beans and the bars are the proud bearers of a plethora of awards. Indeed, they have preserved rare, regional heirloom cacao varieties, some of which were nearing extinction and are harvested only by this organisation.
Beneath Machu Picchu, the mountaintop citadel of the ancient Incan civilization, grows the heirloom Chuncho cocoa pod. Some of these trees are nearly 200 years old, sprouting ever upwards at altitudes unheard of for cocoa. According to Evert Thomas, genetic biologist, “Chuncho cacao presents an unmatched explosion of genetic and organoleptic diversity.” This bean could well be the aromatically richest in the world. Unlike many foreign hybrids, the result of cross-pollinating different cacao trees, Original Beans use pure Chuncho. Their 100% Cusco Chuncho bar is a rarity and a half – never before has Chuncho been used in pure selection. Special nurseries are needed to propagate and raise this intense variety. The ancient Incas, whose remains are home to this extraordinary phenomenon, believed that such cacao was powerful enough to enable man’s flight to the heavens. Cocoa Runners recommend trying a bite for yourself in order to test their hypothesis.
Deep within the dry desert valleys of Piura, northern Peru, grows the extremely rare Piura Blanco, or Piura Porcelana bean, once thought to be extinct until Original Beans Cacao Conservation Leader Jan rediscovered it. The region is known for its white cacao, yet this bean is as colourful as it is flavourful. When Jan first visited the area, he was amazed to see local families fermenting their remarkable beans themselves – right in front of their homes, using traditional craft techniques. The farmers take as much pride in their cocoa-growing skills as they do in the extraordinary variety of birds and butterflies they live alongside. The exceptional quality of Piura Blanco cacao, paired with the region’s immense biodiversity, helped inspire the One4One Trees initiative, which, since 2016, has led to the planting and preservation of almost three million trees across the Piura region. Today, Original Beans’ cacao forests in Piura cover more than 52 hectares, where 61 farmers are trained in agroforestry and regenerative practices. Original Beans’ investment in the area has radically altered the lives of these Peruvian communities. Families have moved from cultivating rice to diverse cacao-agroforestry, improving their livelihoods by now harvesting one of the most-awarded cacao strains worldwide.
The Beni, of the southwestern Amazon basin, Bolivia, is an archipelago of over 38 forest islands known as ‘chocolades’ – chocolate islands. Here, seasons vacillate between droughts and floods, but if anything stays constant, it is the quality of the cacao Beniano. This is the only place where 100% wild cacao grows. For centuries, indigenous collectors have sustainably harvested the rarest of rare Beniano – it is this culture of responsibility and pride that Original Beans strives to preserve.
Amongst other highlights is the ultra-rare Virunga Amelonado bean in the Democratic Republic of Congo, whereby the buying of each bar goes towards initiatives countering deforestation in the beautiful and nature-rich Virunga region. Original Beans has teamed up with Femmes de Virunga, in 2016 the world’s first an all-female cooperative, empowering women with literacy courses and infrastructure. In the Virunga region, since the start of the programme, more than one million trees have been planted in a united effort to save the Congo’s forest from complete destruction.
This is but a snapshot into the projects run by Original Beans to find the finest cacao and to help empower the local communities that build the foundation for it.
Each year, Original Beans publishes its Foodprint, sharing information about social and environmental impact, trees grown and preserved, as well as quality assessments. Find the full report and more information about Original Beans here.
And check out this interview Spencer did with Philipp about Femme de Virunga:
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