Brazilian Weather Reports

Mostly dry weather and warming up temperatures in coffee regions, which brings back the heat in the afternoons. The weather changes in the ending of Wednesday and along of Thursday, when a new cold front arrives first Parana and then moves into Sao Paulo and the southern part of Minas Gerais. A blocking pattern prevents the rapid advance of cold front and thus the weather will still unstable in the producing areas to at least the next Sunday. Also for this blocking pattern, the mass of polar air that accompanies a cold front is restricted only to the south of the country without coming to the coffee-producing regions.

A mostly dry weather, without significant cold is expected to the last days of July.

India International Coffee Festival 2009: 7 to 9 October 2009 Bangalore

The IICF is going to be held this year 7 to 9 October in Bangalore. From all reports this is a very important event for the Indian Coffee industry with very good attendance expected from planters, traders, exporters, local roasters etc. Ecom Gill has bought a stall to show case Ecom with particular focus on our Sustainable Agri-Services project that we have been running since last year to get planters certified in both Rainforest Alliance and Utz Certified.

First we are more than happy to host any collegues or interested clients who would be interested in joining us in Bangalore for the conference and combining with a trip to the coffee growing regions and our mill. I apologise for the late announcement and understand it may be difficult at such short notice but I hope there might be some who are able to join us.

More importantly – the organising committee has asked us if we have someone within the Ecom Group who could attend to give a talk on Sustainability in Coffee – they are looking for someone with particular experience on the production side that includes certification and all that it entails with best practices. Please send me some potential candidates for this role as soon as possible. This would be a very good opportunity for us to promote Ecom as a serious company involved in Sustainability.

Operator of 56 Dunkin’ Donuts Files for Bankruptcy

Mon Jul 06 17:30:08 UTC 2009
By Tom Hals

WILMINGTON, Del., July 6 (Reuters) – An operator of 56 Dunkin’ Donuts locations filed for bankruptcy on Monday, the latest in a growing list of franchise operators to seek court protection due to a steep drop-off in sales.

Kainos Partners Holding Company LLC of Greer, South Carolina, operates the donut-and-coffee franchises in New York, South Carolina and Nevada, with eight more under construction, according to court documents. It employs 700.

The company said the recession has put its customers under extreme financial stress while food costs have risen.

Kainos Partners joins a growing list of struggling operators of Dunkin’ Donuts, which has 15,000 locations worldwide. Last month, the operator of several Nashville-area Dunkin’ Donuts and the largest Dunkin’ Donuts franchise operator on the west coast of Florida both filed for bankruptcy.

Dunkin’ Donuts is a subsidiary of Dunkin’ Brands Inc, which is owned by Bain Capital, The Carlyle Group and Thomas H. Lee Partners.

Kainos Partners also said it discovered that its chief financial officer had engaged in $420,000 worth of financial transactions involving company assets for his personal use. The executive was fired in February.

Like the Nashville-area franchise operator, Kainos said its largest creditor is CIT Group Inc <CIT.N>, which is owed about $25 million. Under the planned reorganization, CIT will reduce the amount it is owed in return for a 72.5 percent stake in the reorganized company.

Kainos Partners, Dunkin’ Donuts and CIT Group did not immediately return calls seeking comment.

The case is In re: Kainos Partners Holding Co LLC, U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the district of Delaware, No. 09-12292. (Reporting by Tom Hals; Additional reporting by Chelsea Emery; Editing by Richard Chang)