Coffee Buyer Leaves Perks of Home Behind

Most frequent business travelers get off their planes and hop cabs to their hotels, but Mary Townsend dons a backpack and often heads out to work in a four-wheel-drive vehicle, small plane or helicopter.

Townsend, a vice president in charge of buying green coffee beans for the fast-growing Starbucks coffee company chain, travels to remote regions in the world in search of raw coffee under some of the most rigorous conditions imaginable for business.

“I always travel with a candle and a flashlight in my bag,” said Townsend, who has been with Seattle-based Starbucks for three years but has logged 26 years in the coffee business. She has learned that hotels don’t always have electricity where she travels. Sometimes they don’t even have water.

She spends three months of the year traveling abroad, primarily in the coffee-producing regions of Central and South America, Africa, Indonesia and the Caribbean islands. She spends another three months traveling in the U.S.

Before she buys beans, she usually goes directly to the growers’ fields to see how the crop is being harvested and processed.

“The coffee tastes different in each region,” she said. And the processing also affects the taste, so it’s important for her to get to the point of the coffee’s origin before she’ll make a buy.

She has to have sturdy hiking gear for her coffee safaris, often in mountainous regions in subtropical climates, she said.

She fits everything into one backpack and one small bag and keeps her pack, which also contains an emergency change of clothes, with her, avoiding checked baggage.

“Most of these places are quite far away and have pretty primitive conditions,” she said. Their electricity may be provided by generators that get turned off at night or by hydroelectric power. If there’s been a drought that month, there might not be much light.

Technological accessories aren’t much good under those conditions.

“I don’t usually bring my laptop with me,” she said. “My experience has been that electrical power surges can damage the computer.”

At the same time, she has to bring professional clothes for making deals with coffee exporters or government officials, usually in larger cities.

“You have to bring with you your patience and your sense of humor,” she said. The things to leave at home are your expectations about the way things “ought to be.”

That especially includes schedules. “People in other countries don’t live the same way we live in terms of their relationship to time,” she said. You have to allow yourself to slow down and be very flexible.

“A lot of people try to schedule themselves as if they were in New York or Chicago, with a meeting at 10 a.m., noon and 1 p.m.,” she said. “But that’s impossible. Sometimes you don’t even know what day you’ll be able to get there. Flights get canceled, roads get closed.”

Leaving your expectations behind also opens you to experiencing other cultures. “I make it a point to leave my judgments about what’s right or what’s best in terms of culture and level of income or level of education,” she said. “I don’t bring that with me.”

“Open-mindedness is a tremendous asset.”

Indeed, she has had to be open-minded on more than one occasion. Once, she was invited to lunch in a village home in Bogota, Colombia, which is considered an honor. “They brought out this little, tiny creature on a plate,” she said. Her hosts told her the meal was a locally grown specialty. “It didn’t have much taste,” she said. Later, on a tour of the host’s farm, she realized what she had eaten was a guinea pig.

Open-mindedness also works both ways. Because she frequently deals with exporters by fax, many don’t realize that Townsend is a woman until she gets off the plane. “When people first meet me, they’re quite surprised,” she said. “Sometimes their mouths drop open.”

Her advice to travelers who are doing business in developing countries is to get information directly from the people you are doing business with or from colleagues who have been there. Travel organizations sometimes neglect to mention important information, such as whether there is electricity at your hotel, she said.

And always have a backup plan. “You may show up someplace with reservations and a confirmation number and there’s no room and nowhere else to go,” she said. “Be prepared for anything.”

In Ethiopia recently she loaded her backpack with water and endured good-natured ribbing from her colleagues about the added weight. When they reached their destination, however, there was no water.

“They laughed,” she said. “But then they had to beg me for water.”

Townsend also takes a first-aid kit, including anti-malaria drugs, anti-diarrhea medication and her own needles (available by prescription) in case she needs a shot abroad. She advises travelers to always get all the recommended shots. “The truth of the matter is these diseases are out there, and it’s important to be prepared for an outbreak.”

“Heed the warnings you get from local people--they’re the people who know what’s what.”

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Although her frequent travel has made her efficient in packing and knowledgeable about world cultures, the one thing it hasn’t taught her is a foolproof solution for beating jet lag.

In Africa, there’s an 11-hour time difference. In Indonesia, it’s 15 hours. Sometimes the plane rides to get where she’s going take 17 to 24 hours.

“One would think one would get accustomed to jet lag, but it’s a bit of a fact of life,” she said. “I try to get on their time schedule as quickly as possible.”

Otherwise, she follows traditional recommendations regarding jet lag--eating lightly and avoiding alcohol in flight.

Sometimes, however, there’s nothing to do but tough it out. “Mostly you just have to be tired,” she said. “And drink a lot of coffee.”

Carol Smith is a freelance writer based in Pasadena. If you have experiences to share or suggestions for Executive Travel, please write: Executive Travel Editor, Business Editorial, Los Angeles Times, Times Mirror Square, Los Angeles, CA 90053, fax (213) 237-7837 or e-mail to business@latimes.com