Royal Kona is a cooperative of more than 500 local growers, some with as little as one acre planted in coffee. The bellows of the donkeys could be heard echoing through the mountains as they hauled the heavy loads of coffee up and down the mountainside. In honor of these hard-working donkeys, we named our coffee company. The coffee industry started in Hawaii when the Rev. Samuel Ruggles brought some trees, which originally came from Brazil, from Oahu in 1828. Planted near Kona, the coffee trees originally were used as garden ornamentals, but did so well in the volcanic soil that they became fixtures.
Hawaiian coffee is the species arabica, which is comparable to fine, mild Central American coffees.
The flavor is described as heavy and flinty, with strong acidity and full body and aroma. Much coffee, especially household instants, comes from robusta trees, a species that also grows in tropical climates and is more vigorous than arabica. Robusta coffee has a coarser flavor, so it's less prized than the ultra-smooth arabica. Ask the locals and they'll laugh and tell you that it's because the trees live in Hawaii, where everything is expensive. Coffee plants have low yield.