Acacia Hills

Leon’s grandparents moved from Greece to Tanzania in the early 1900s and began what is now the family legacy of working in coffee. He came up amidst parents and grandparents growing coffee on low-altitude land before he took intrigue with specialty coffee in the 2000s and began searching for something at a higher altitude better suited to producing higher quality coffee. In 2007 the journey of Acacia Hills started with Leon rebuilding a dilapidated farm and planting SL28, Gesha, and Pacamara. In the time since, Acacia Hills has won private auctions in Tanzania with its gesha lots, making Leon one of the forerunners for bringing about higher quality and rare varietals to the country.

Tanzania has an important chapter in the story of gesha. After its discovery in Ethiopia, gesha was taken to the Lyamangu Coffee Research Station in Tanzania, where the plants were successfully cultivated and subsequently distributed throughout Central America. Despite the fact that Tanzania played a pivotal role in the now global cultivation of gesha, its prominence in Tanzania remains very low.