Est. 1938 · Chikmagalur

Eighty-eight years, four generations, one roastery.

Sri Papanna Setty, founder of Panduranga Coffee Works

What began as a small coffee enterprise in the coffee land of Chikmagalur is now South India's best-known filter coffee house — still family-run, still on M G Road, still roasting every bean it sells.

What began as a small enterprise in Chikmagalur is now South India's best-known filter coffee house — still family-run, still on M G Road.

1938
Papanna Setty begins Papanna Setty begins
1970
German machines arrive German machines
4th
Generation at the helm Generation
6
Countries served Countries
01

The founder

Sri Papanna Setty, 1938 Sri Papanna Setty, 1938

The seeds were sown in 1938, when our founder started a small-scale coffee enterprise in Chikmagalur. His perseverance and foresight laid a foundation sturdy enough for the generations that followed to build on.

The baton passed to his successors, Sri K.P Panduranga Setty and Sri K.P Sathyanarayana Setty, who gave the coffee drinkers of southern India the taste and aroma the brand is still known for.

A small coffee enterprise in Chikmagalur, and a foundation sturdy enough for three generations to build on.

02

The pioneer

Charcoal heat, then electric, then German steel. Charcoal, then electric, then German steel.

Sri K.P Sathyanarayana Setty devoted himself to perfecting the blend — a matchless flavour profile, held consistent batch after batch. He began with charcoal-roasted coffee and electric roasters, manufacturing coffee powder at small scale for a growing community of drinkers.

In 1970 he brought German machines into the process, and that decision is the reason Panduranga still roasts and grinds the way it does today.

Sathyanarayana Setty perfected the blend, then brought German machines in during 1970 — the reason the cup still tastes the same.

Panduranga Coffee manufacturing unit
03

The successors

The family running it now. The family running it now.

His sons Venkatesh, Sridhar and Deepak, and grandson Karthik, run the business day to day — and have taken it deeper into the trade than any generation before: cultivation, production, transport, and the sale of every bag to the person who drinks it.

Venkatesh, Sridhar and Deepak, with grandson Karthik — from cultivation to the bag in your hand.

The Panduranga family today
04

Panduranga today

India's only filter coffee brand roasting on 100% German machines. India's only filter coffee brand on 100% German machines.

Coffee comes off high-altitude plantations around Chikmagalur, the birthplace of coffee in India. Roasting, blending, cupping and packaging all happen in our own manufacturing unit — nothing is outsourced, and nothing leaves before it is sealed.

Roasting, blending, cupping and packaging, all in our own unit in Chikmagalur.

  • Roasting
  • Blending
  • Cupping
  • Packaging
South Indian filter coffee
05

The shop

One of the largest coffee shops in Chikmagalur, in the middle of town.

Travellers find it before locals have to point them there. It is where the blends are still weighed out by hand, and where the coffee you order online is roasted.

Panduranga Coffee store in Chikmagalur
Panduranga Coffee store at night

Going global

The same decoction, now in six countries.

  • USA
  • UK
  • Canada
  • Australia
  • Singapore
  • UAE

More are on the way, so that a Panduranga drinker anywhere can have the coffee they grew up on.

Taste eighty-eight years of practice.

Start with Grand Aroma — the blend the family drinks at the counter.

Shop the coffee