The Alvares family has been growing coffee in El Salvador for over 100 years and across four generations. Their award-winning farms are located on the lush green hills of Santa Ana, in the west of the country, whose rich volcanic soils and mild climate provide ideal conditions for growing coffee. The beans which together make up El Borbollon come from two small neighboring farms – La Reforma and Santa Maria. They are hand-picked and collected in traditional hand woven baskets from December until March by pickers who have been specially trained to select only the best and fully-mature coffee cherries.

Finca La Reforma and Finca Santa Maria were established by Rafael Alvarez Lalinde in 1892 on the rich, humid slopes of the Santa Ana Volcano. The Alvarez Diaz brothers are the fourth generation to farm coffee in this exceptional region. Both farms to this day are planted solely with red bourbon variety coffee trees, demonstrating the family’s commitment to quality even in the face of El Salvador’s recent struggles with coffee leaf rust, to which Bourbon trees are particularly susceptible.

The excellent growing conditions and the commitment to sustainable growing practices has helped the family to harvest some of the best coffee from this elite region El Salvador.

El Borbollon is managed by Eduardo Alvarez, whose father ( also Eduardo ) bequeathed to him a passion for growing coffee and inspired him to always strive for the highest quality. In fact, Eduardo’s hard work and advocacy has enabled many of the farms he works to place in Cup of Excellence competitions. Of the 15 high altitude farms with which El Borbollon works, 10 have won places in Cup of Excellence competitions. 4 of these, including La Reforma, have won the COE Presidental Award for achieving scores in excess of 90 points.

The Alvarez Family’s farms and mill offers considerable social support to local communities and have recently been working to help tackle child malnutrition in rural communities. The family is also committed to developing sustainable practices in order to protect and preserve the natural environment.