Cafe Duran -- Isthmus Industry

The coffee produced in Panama is internationally known for its high quality, and bulk coffee offerings from the Republic bring high prices in the United States and European markets. For more than half a century, Panamanians, North Americans, and others living on the Isthmus have savored the taste of the beverage acclaimed by Duran as its "delicious black nectar." Duran is the Republic's largest coffee roasting house.  In 1962 alone, Cafe Duran purchased almost a million dollars worth of the best grade coffee grown in the interior of Panama. and purchases of coffee beans are not the contribution of the Duran firm to the national economy. The company has 49 full-time employees and an annual payroll of more than $110,000. An employees' cooperation also operates a bank as an incentive for savings and to facilitate loans at low interest rates.

The Duran company was established April 26, 1907, by Esteban Duran Amat, who came to Panama from Spain in the early years of the Republic. The Duran name is well known in the Canal Zone aside from coffee. Paul Duran, Sr., is a graduate of Balboa High School (Class of 1925). Lorenzo Romagosa Duran followed in his footsteps in 1941, Paul Duran, Jr., in 1955, and Ricardo Duran in 1958. Paul Duran, Jr. later was graduated from Annapolis, in 1960. In its more than half a century of operations, Cafe Duran has expanded substantially. It now operates branch houses in David, Boquete, Aguadulce, and Colon, and agencies in other important points of the Republic. Offering consumers coffee of the highest quality has been Cafe Duran's constant concern since its establishment. to this end, today it keeps on hand large stocks of coffee beans in order to maintain the uniformity of its product's quality the year around. To maintain this uniform high quality, which has been the trade mark of Duran's coffee for more than 50 years, Cafe Duran operates a roasting plant on the Trans-Isthmian Highway which boasts the best equipment of its kind in Central America, from machines that select the most perfect beans to those which present the finished product. These enable Cafe Duran to provide packaging which not only conserves the product, but seals it against alterations. The company this year marked its anniversary by inaugurating a bonus plan among employees based on length of service.

Excerpted from the Panama Canal Review...October 1963
Presented by CZBrats
November 8, 1998