Sweet & Coffee

Overview

Sweet & Coffee is Ecuador's flagship specialty cafe chain, founded in 1997 in Guayaquil by Richard Peet and Soledad Hanna — then dating, now married with three children — when Hanna's homemade desserts for Peet inspired their first store at Mall del Sol. The company expanded to Quito in the early 2000s, opened the country's first dedicated coffee training center ('Universidad del Café') in 2008, and as of 2021 operated 106 locations with over 1,000 employees, all serving 100% Ecuadorian-grown coffee.

Known for

• Ecuador's first specialty coffee-and-dessert chain
• 100% Ecuadorian-grown coffee
• Universidad del Café (founded 2008) — Ecuador's first dedicated coffee training center
• Three formats: standalone, food-court, mall island
• 'Deja Tu Marca' donates ¢0.10 per cup to FASINARM (children with intellectual disabilities)

Why it matters

Sweet & Coffee is essentially the Ecuadorian Starbucks slot — and pre-dates Starbucks' eventual non-arrival in Ecuador. It demonstrated that a national specialty chain rooted in a producing country could scale on domestic coffee alone, and remains the dominant cafe brand in a market where international chains have not penetrated.

Production

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head roaster

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roaster machine

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cupping frequency

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roastery location

Guayaquil, Ecuador

espresso equipment

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annual volume tonnes

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Café

Av. Carlos Julio Arosemena Km1, Guayaquil (HQ)

Recognitions

• Marketing Hall of Fame Ecuador (2011)

Sources

• https://www.sweetandcoffee.com.ec/acerca-de-nosotros/
• https://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sweet_&_Coffee
• https://franquiciaecuador.com/franquicias-sweet-coffee/
• https://www.eluniverso.com/guayaquil/2017/10/19/nota/6437635/20-anos-dulce-cafe/
• https://vudupublicidad.com/2024/02/21/evolucion-de-sweet-and-coffee/