‘Ohana Harbor is the label on quality Kona coffee beans that can be purchased online. But the name is just as much a state of mind.
“I have to laugh when people say, ‘ ‘Ohana Harbor — I’ve been there,’ ” Ronna Schreiner said. “Because it doesn’t exist.”
Schreiner runs the coffee business with her husband, Steve, and their daughter, Stephanie Schreiner-Sagle. The name is a combination of a Hawaiian word, “‘Ohana,” which means “family,” and the second word of their hometown, Gig Harbor.
The family office is local, but their three farms in Kona are on the Big Island of Hawaii, earning them the right to use the privileged Kona name.
“The coffee has to be grown in a certain area that falls within the Kona coffee belt to be called Kona coffee,” Schreiner-Sagle said. “It’s like liquid gold. It has a distinct taste, and nothing else tastes like it.”
“Since we got into the business, we can really tell the difference between Kona and other coffees,” Ronna Schreiner said. “It’s like wine tasting. If you taste it right next to another type of coffee, you really get a sense of the quality.
“Kona does not have a harsh, bitter aftertaste. You don’t have to add cream or sugar with Kona. It has such a smooth, nutty taste.”
Schreiner-Sagle said Hawaii is the only place in the United States that grows coffee.
“They grow it in other parts of the island besides Kona, but the soil composition is not as good, and it doesn’t taste the same,” she said.
The family’s business isn’t large enough to sell in grocery stores, but they are the official coffee supplier for the Tacoma Rainiers, the Triple-A affiliate of Major League Baseball’s Seattle Mariners.
The company also is the official sponsor of this year’s Whidbey Island Race Week — the largest regatta in the Pacific Northwest — which takes place July 12-17.
Right now, the beans from Kona are being roasted in Puyallup, but the family eventually wants to start their own mill so they can roast the beans themselves.
“Roasting it ourselves would give us complete control of the roasting process,” Schreiner-Sagle said. “We’re not trying to be a Starbucks. We just want to make a good old-fashioned brewed cup of coffee.”
Steve Schreiner, a former businessman, learned about a coffee farm opportunity while he vacationed on the Big Island with his family. A close friend of the family who also grew coffee told them everything he knew about the business.
The family purchased their first farm in 2005 and, by 2006, they had three farms. One had a thriving following under the name “Redbird Kona Coffee,” so the family kept that name and continued to package those beans under that label.
Redbird has won the “Cream of the Crop” Kona coffee cupping competition each year since 2004.
The business was not that much of a far cry for Steve Schreiner, who grew up on a farm.
“I’m happier sitting behind a tractor than I am sitting behind a desk,” he said. “What I like about Hawaii is that they have a totally different way of life. You’re not bombarded by the commercial messages you get here, and you begin to reassess things. I really like the laid-back pace — the work gets done.”
Quality Kona-grown coffee can be ordered online at www.ohanaharborcoffee.com.
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