When Roberto Bendaña met Paul Rieger, the two Aggies immediately hit it off. As they became friends, Rieger was intrigued to learn about Bendaña’s roots growing up on his family’s coffee plantations just outside of Matagalpa, Nicaragua. Their friendship eventually led to a business partnership — a coffee-based business with beans exported from the Bendaña farm. “My dream — our dream as a family — was to be able to sell our coffee retail in the U.S,” Bendaña says. The Texas A&M University graduate always thought that it would be a worthy goal to find a way to tie the Aggie spirit into his family's coffee business.
Coffee Farm
Bendaña’s one stipulation was that Rieger visit the family farm, over 500 acres filled with coffee plants. He immediately booked a flight to Nicaragua that same week so he could meet Bendaña’s mother and see the coffee operation for himself. “It is close to impossible to be in the coffee business without a very thorough understanding of the fundamental process of how coffee is produced. Sitting with Roberto and listening to him talk about their farms made my urge even greater to see the operations in person,” Rieger says.
Rieger embarked on his journey to the Nicaraguan farm with Bendaña’s brother, Paco, who served as his escort. Walking through the tropical rain forest region, 4,000 feet above elevation, Rieger was able to take in the thousands of plants shaded by towering eucalyptus trees. “The trip was an eye opener on many fronts,” he says. “I came away with a new respect for the workers, kids in tow, who hand pick these beans daily.” He tells of how the workers fill their sacks with the red seeds, called cherries, from the coffee trees, and then carefully measure out their harvest for daily wages. He says he watched in awe as they proudly measured how many cherries they had picked for the day. Once bagged, these cherries head to the wet mill where they are de-pulped and prepared for the trip to the dry mill. “The dry mill further prepares the coffee bean for its worldwide journey,” Rieger says. “Seeing this preparation first-hand gives one a greater understanding of all that goes into a cup of coffee. Each sip I take reminds me of all that goes into the production.”
Bendaña History
What was to become a coffee empire began shortly before Bendaña’s birth, when his parents, Frank and Teresa Bendaña, inherited two farms from her father. As a graduate from an agricultural school in Honduras, Frank Bendaña was knowledgeable about farming, but felt he needed more education in order to be able to properly harvest coffee beans and went back to school to study soils at the University of Florida. With his expertise in soil p.H., combined with
the proper amount of rain and temperate climate, he was able to engineer the ideal conditions for cultivating coffee crops.
Political unrest in Nicaragua, however, forced the Bendaña family to abandon the farm in the 1980s. They came to the Rio Grande Valley, and after completing high school, Roberto Bendaña attended Texas A&M University. When the political climate swung back in their favor, the Bendañas returned to Nicaragua.
Roberto Bendaña eventually became a part of the administrative cabinet under Enrique Bolanos, who served as the President of Nicaragua from 2002 to 2007. When the former dictator Daniel Ortega rose to power once again in 2007, Roberto Bendaña was disturbed by the fraudulent elections.
“I became very vocal, denouncing the dictatorship to the point where he put me in house arrest. He used the judicial system to persecute me,” Roberto Bendaña says. “He accused me of organized crime, so it was not a small misdemeanor.”
He had to make a choice.
“It was either going to jail and becoming part of the system where I could bribe the system to get out, or escape. So I found my way to escape,” Roberto Bendaña says. “I came back to College Station because of the spirit, my heart. My second home after Nicaragua was Texas.”
After his father’s death in 2007, Roberto Bendaña’s mother took over the farm’s coffee operations, whose beans are exported to Japan and the U.S. Teresa Bendaña continues to run the farm’s administrative side even now, at 85 years old. “I never thought that at my age, I would be doing this and enjoy it.” Teresa Bendaña said during a recent visit to Bryan College Station. “When you start working with coffee, you love coffee,” she says. “There are so many aspects of coffee, and I keep learning every day.”
Aggieland Coffee
Roberto Bendaña with help from Rieger and another Aggie, Paul Marvin, CEO of Downtown IT in Bryan, fathered the Aggieland Coffee brand in 2018. The coffee is sold online through their website and around the Brazos Valley. In addition to coffee beans, Aggieland Coffee has added Keurig cups to their product line-up.
Because of their deep connection to their alma mater, the team decided their coffee flavors would all be Texas- or Aggie-themed, such as Bottle Cap Alley, Texas Two-Step, and Reveille.
However, they are making an exception. Aggieland Coffee’s newest coffee flavor will be named after Teresa Bendaña and called Doña Tere. It will be released this fall.
“In Central American and other Latin countries, most of the brands are named after the male figure, after the father,” Roberto Bendaña says. “We thought it would be a great idea to honor my mom.”
Aggieland Coffee beans or K-Cups are available at:
Aggielandcoffee.com
Brazos Valley Farmer’s Market
500 N Main St, Bryan
Brookshire Brothers
455 George Bush Dr W, College Station
Corner of Time
118 N Bryan Ave, Bryan
J&L Boutique
750 William D. Fitch Pkwy STE 110, College Station
The String & Horn Shop
119 N Main St, Bryan
Whoop Stop
2802 TX-21, Paige
