Evans: Kahawa Studio = #KahawaMtaani

Evans is a 33-year-old father of two boys, ages 4 and 1. He lives in Dar with his wife and a business partner of two years, but they have been together for more than seven years.

I met Evans in September 2021, drawn by tweets about cosy coffee shops graced with many plants. I’m always looking for new coffee spots, and what took me there was first the plants and then the coffee. Bringing plants into a coffee shop makes it more inviting, at least for me. And so there I was.

First Impressions
One Saturday morning, I visited this coffee shop in Kinondoni, just behind the Morocco bus station. The coffee shop has a wall of plants, and I immediately fell in love with it.

I was the only customer that Saturday morning, so I met Evans. He seemed surprised to see me, so I told him how I found his coffee shop. That had him smiling. We spoke about plants and coffee for a bit before I ordered my strong cappuccino with no sugar. It was a perfectly brewed coffee! So I kept going back for the plants and the coffee.

The Beginning

Evans tells me that he was born into coffee. Being the second-born in his family, he had to go live with his grandparents on his mom’s side, where they grew coffee.

“When I went to live with my grandparents, there were many grandchildren. We were the ones responsible for everything that had to do with coffee. Every year, a new grandchild would come, and we would do the same thing repeatedly,” Evans said as he laughed.

Evans learned everything about coffee from his grandfather and uncles, who lived with them. “We were always home during the coffee seasons because that’s when we would be off school for long holidays. So we would work on the farms from picking the cherries to packing them and transporting them to the Cooperation where my grandfather would wait for some time to get his money – which we never saw,” he said, and we laughed.

Evans, just like me, started roasting coffee at a young age when he lived with his grandparents. One would roast the coffee beans as you do groundnuts, and then you would grind them at the maize mill.

From Tourism to Coffee

After school, Evans decided to move back to town – that is, Moshi Town – leaving his grandparents’ coffee farms to try and make something for himself, as many of us do after graduating.

Moshi is a tourist region. While in town, Evans got himself into the tourism business. “While in the tourism business, I was a day trip tour guide. I would take tourists from town to different villages with coffee farms; other times, I would take them to Materuni waterfalls or underground caves such as the Chagga cave and other tourist places,” he told me.

He chuckled, adding that the most frequented tourist spots for his day trips were at his grandparents’, where they had coffee farms he could easily access.

“After a tour at my grandparents’ coffee farms, we would end the tour by visiting the Chagga Museum, where my guests would get to hear more about coffee from the experts at the Museum than I knew.

These tours at the museum made me more curious about coffee, and I was old enough to understand things about coffee. From the history, cooperations, and the process to how one exports coffee to where the market is,” he said with a light in his eyes and passion.

“It is from these museum lessons that I knew that ‘kahawa ndio mchongo’ – coffee is where it is at,” he added.

Evans says he used to get his customers from the streets, so his business wasn’t going well because it wasn’t easy for the tourists to trust him. This was when he decided to get a job at a coffee shop where many tourists frequented. In his new job, he met many new people, and even when he met them in the streets, he would remind them where they had met, and it would be easy for them to agree to go on a tour with him. (It is hard to ignore a Chagga business mindset here.)

Working at a coffee shop, Evans started to learn about coffee on a different level—making one for the end user. He started learning to taste coffee professionally, from medium to dark roast to light to strong.

“I was working at Kilimanjaro Coffee Lounge where we had baristas from the US – Barista Boot Camp under Mike Phillips, who were volunteering to train new baristas, and I was one of the trainees. Mike was doing this to get more baristas out there after he won the barista of the year championship in 2010.”

Following the training, Evans’s curiosity about coffee deepened. He started reading more books about coffee and enrolled in online courses, both free and paid. Evans hasn’t undergone any professional training, but he has accumulated knowledge from online courses and books that he continues to share with other upcoming baristas and coffee enthusiasts.

Since then, Evans has worked as a barista at Kilimanjaro Coffee Lounge for two years and at Mount Meru Hotel in Arusha. Then, he moved to Dar Es Salaam and started working at Woodberry Cafe, where he worked for five years.

Kahawa Studio Was Conceived at Woodberry

“I like working with a small company that I can grow with, which is why I worked with Woodberry for that long as the head barista. Kerry, the first owner of Woodberry, was an open-minded person who gave me a chance to make mistakes, learn from them, and grow with the business,” Evans said, feeling nostalgic about his time at Woodberry.

A working environment can make or break you, whether in business or corporate. Evans’s experience at Woodberry, where there was a sharing and learning culture, inspired him enough to think about one day owning his coffee shop.

“When I started working at Woodberry, we started small and added the needed equipment. I learned a lot about the business and production sides of things, which pushed me to believe that I could one day do this for myself,” he said, a smile not leaving his face.

Kerry Left and Kahawa Studio Was Born

Soon after Kerry left Woodberry, Kahawa Studio was born. While still at Woodberry, Evans met a new boss, Mariam. Mariam picked up where Kerry left off, pushing Evans harder to start his own business. Seeing that Mariam owns three companies and they are all doing amazingly, Evans took it as a sign.

Like Isaya’s story, Evans also paid rent for his space for a year without the equipment to start running his business.

“When I started, I didn’t even have this veranda. I paid rent for the first year without doing anything at all. Then, I had to pay rent for the second year. I would come in with one can of paint, paint some parts, and come another day to work on wiring with support from my friend. Then, I started planting all these plants. So, I did everything from scratch,” Evans told me as we laughed heartily.

He continued telling me that his coffee shop is a work in progress. He is still doing the same thing, buying one thing at a time—he will buy a chair today and add a pillow next week. This is quite inspiring—taking one day at a time to work on something you believe in, no matter how long it takes. This is what I call passion.

Kahawa Studio is for people, people kitaani. It is located where it is to serve the locals. In other words, Kahawa Studio = Kahawa Mtaani. Evans decided to bring coffee to the people.

“Some people can never afford to taste specialty coffee because of where coffee shops are located. Kahawa Studio is here to bring specialty coffee to the people. We have amazing coffee in Tanzania, but most can never say they have tasted great coffee. This is why our cup of coffee starts at 4k, so the locals can afford it. I know this is still expensive, but we can’t go below that because we won’t manage the running costs,” Evans told me.

Continuing, he said, “My touristic mindset is not completely gone. Kahawa Studio is an adventure for tourists. When they come here for a cup of coffee, they see a pupil passing by and some kids running around giggling. Another second, a boda passes by and says hi to me, and we laugh. A Mangi shop is opposite us; you can run by and get karanga. This is what Kahawa Studio is all about, for the people.”

When you get a cup of coffee here, you can tell that many thoughts and efforts went into brewing that cup. Perfecting this art takes time. It took Evans 12 years of learning to become the barista he is now. Owning Kahawa Studio with his wife still allows him to keep learning and growing as an artist.

“For me, brewing coffee is an art. Having my coffee shop allows me to try new things and see what works and doesn’t. I make mistakes as I go. Art gives me the freedom to grow. This is why you can make your cup of coffee at Kahawa Studio. I love giving my customers this experience because coffee is an experience; it is a culture,” Evans told me.

Yes, I made my cappuccino cup, and no, it didn’t taste as good as it should have. It tasted more like milk than coffee because, guess what, I’m no barista. This experience made me respect baristas even more.

The Support System

I wanted to know how he does it all because, in addition to having this place, he also works full-time as a barista somewhere else.

“My wife. She is my life and my business partner. I trained her to become a barista to support each other while I’m elsewhere to raise more money for our business. Honestly, I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t have my wife’s full support. She is always here when I’m not, and I’m always here when she is not. We also have three employees who are here when both of us are not, and they have been such great support, too,” he said.

Is It Working?

I was curious if he was achieving his goal of bringing coffee to the people. Are these people that he came for ready for him?

“I came here to build a community. And I can see this place’s impact on the community. Not everyone can afford to go to Masaki to work at a coffee shop where they will need to buy food from the same place, but here, you can come to get coffee, dash to Morocco to get your lunch and have it while you work without being bothered. I have had people come in and ask questions about coffee, and we happily discuss it over a cup of coffee. You see them coming back next time, asking about coffee beans and buying some,” he told me.

He added that his favourite experience is getting feedback from his customers, whether it’s about the coffee he made or just about his cafe and all he does.

Evans is creating something extraordinary about the community here. Coffee shops were initially started to unite the community, where people could connect and talk about life. I love that I can see someone passionately bringing this culture to life.

Evans’s efforts are contributing to more people consuming the coffee we produce. According to the Tanzania Coffee Board, annual per capita coffee consumption is estimated at 0.06 kg, and only 7% of Tanzania’s production is consumed domestically. It is high time we also build a coffee culture by reducing coffee prices.

Bright Future?
Just like everyone else, Evans hopes for a bright future. In a future where more people will know about coffee and enjoy affordable quality coffee, he has set himself to contribute to those making that a reality.

“I hope for a day when people will afford high-quality coffee because more companies such as Sugar and Milk will collaborate with coffee shop owners to bring that dream to reality. We have good coffee; why can’t we let people enjoy that by investing in the industry? There is no way I can do this alone. People need people to move a step farther,” Evans said.

Evans’ ambition for broader collaboration within the coffee industry to make high-quality coffee more accessible is visionary and necessary.

Kahawa Studio is more than coffee. It is a place where art is made, something nice is cooked, and baristas are empowered to love their jobs and build a community of coffee lovers.

It is a place for coffee, and plant lovers like myself will have a good time.

As I was leaving, Evans told me, “I love coffee. Coffee is my life. I’m here because coffee is. Life happens, and coffee helps. Coffee raised me, and coffee will raise my kids.”

Other Services by Kahawa Studio

• Coffee consultation
• Buying and selling coffee machines + Coffee machine technicians
• Barista training and placement
• Sourcing coffee for other cafes

Evans’s Favorite Books

• The Coffee Dictionary by Maxwell Colonna-Dashwood
• The World Atlas of Coffee by James Hoffmann

Thank you for reading. Until next time,

Jane 🙂