Our Story

An entrepreneur with heart

Terra Coffee & Tea was founded in 1978 by Carlo Granito, a passionate humanitarian and entrepreneur.

Inspired by his father who flourished as an importer of fine Italian foods and conveyed the values of hard work and love of quality products, Carlo was determined to conduct his business with honesty when he began visiting and building relationships with coffee growers at the young age of 23. 

Handcrafted with passion

Carlo began to import and experiment with different varieties of green coffee beans, all the while inspired and determined to roast each of them to their highest potential.

Over the next four decades of sourcing, roasting and cupping, he developed his own specialty roasting technique; TAG (Torrefazione Artigianale Granito). This technique consists of drawing the complexities of a coffee’s origin by ensuring complete caramelization of the natural sugars contained in the beans. Requiring extreme precision and intuition, it takes years of roasting experience to achieve this end result.

 

Driven by his spirit for adventure, Carlo equally expanded his knowledge of specialty teas and soon after launched ARIEL Tea, offering an extensive selection of creative blends and superior quality single-origin whole leaf teas. 

Today, his offer also includes a wide selection of handcrafted Hot Chocolates, Organic Sugars and Cocoa. 

Carlo's Humane Approach

Concerned for the well-being of growers and their families as well as people in need in his own community, Carlo created the Humaniterra Foundation, which since its date of conception has allowed him to donate over 230 000.00$ from his proceeds to local and foreign non-profit humanitarian organizations. In addition, he joined forces with UTZ Certified (now known as Rainforest Alliance), an independent party that ensures that buyers meet the needs of growers and growers maintain sustainable agricultural practices.

"In 1999, I visited our Cuban coffee supplier's plantation for the very first time. He and his family invited me to their home for dinner. They killed the only pig they had in order to greet me with a feast. I was so touched by their gesture because these people were not very fortunate and yet they offered me their greatest gift. This is just one of the many reasons why I believe it is crucial we offer responsible coffees, meaning that we properly pay all growers for the high quality green coffee beans they produce for us and also, support them in running their business and taking care of their employees and the environment."

Today, a family business

Along with her husband John, Carlo's youngest daughter Aimée plans to one day take over the family business.

"I have so many great memories of Terra. From climbing up mountains of green coffee bags in the warehouse as kids, to tasting and even serving my very first cup of coffee! Working here has always been a pleasure. Not only do I get to catch up on lost time with my dad who spent countless days and nights at the office when we were little, but I also get to be a part of an honest company whose main objective is to make people happy."

Learn more about our team and our craft.