Welcome to Finca Las Mercedes El Salvador

About Finca Las Mercedes El Salvador

Who We Are

Mr. Adrian Ortiz, a Spanish immigrant, married Miss Mercedes Rivera and settled down in Santiago de María, In the Usulután department of El Salvador. They started growing coffee in Las Mercedes in the year of 1886. Mr. Adrian passed away in 1898 and until 1941 the farm was managed by Mrs. Mercedes Ortiz.

In 1941, the year that Mrs. Mercedes passed away, the farm is handed over to Mr. Adrian Ortiz Jr. until the year of 1976.

The farm has been owned by five generations of the Ortiz Family and has had a lot of up and downs, especially during the civil war of the 1980´s, time during which this region suffered greatly.

Even though we had all this difficulty we managed to preserve the farm in a healthy state. In 2001 an earthquake affected the farm, destroying homes and buildings in the community as well as our clay patios and other farm infrastructure. That year Mr. Roberto Ortiz decided to bring Las Mercedes back to its glory days.

In the following years the wet mill and the water tanks were rebuilt, and a continuing expansion of the infrastructure of the farm was undertaken.  A bigger tank called “EL BIG” was built, as well as new clay patios and new ceramic tile ditches. New roads were built for better access to the different parts of the farm.  A certification process of the farm was made, and from 2001 to 2017 we had the Rainforest Alliance certification not only for the farm but also for the mill. And while we have since then not renewed the certification, we have continued the practices and our compromise for an environmentally amiable coffee.

In 2006, we started to cup our coffee and we proved that what people said about the coffee of eastern El Salvador wasn’t true. They said that the best coffee was in the west and that the eastern coffee wasn’t as good, but surprise, surprise, we won FISRT PLACE CUP OF EXCELLENCE 2006 with a PRESIDENTIAL AWARD of 94 points, and then won SIXTH PLACE CUP OF EXCELLENCE 2009 with 89.4 points, proving that we not only had a good coffee but also one of the best coffees of El Salvador.