Nacional Arriba is one of the oldest cacao lineages on record, with roots in Ecuadorian culture that stretch back over 5,000 years. The name “Arriba,” meaning “up,” comes from the colonial-era cacao trade, when beans were floated down the Guayas River from farms upriver. At Victoria, trees are selected from an established Arriba Nacional seed bank and studied through a full blooming cycle: water, nutrition, sun exposure, harvest timing, all tracked to reproduce the variety's ancestral traits, tree by tree, through natural selection. It takes about five years for a single tree to fully bloom. Few farms can guarantee 100% Nacional Arriba. Victoria can.
Single-Origin · Guayas, Ecuador
Meet Hacienda Victoria
The single-estate farm behind every bar of Creo chocolate.
Every Creo bar starts long before it reaches our kitchen, on a single-estate farm in Cerecita, Guayas, near Ecuador's Pacific coast. Hacienda Victoria has grown Cacao Nacional Arriba, one of the world's rarest heirloom cacao varieties, since 2011. It's the source of every bean in every bar we make, and the reason our chocolate tastes like nowhere else.
01
Cacao Nacional Arriba
02
Sun-Dried, Hand-Turned
Once harvested, the beans are fermented and laid out across Victoria's tendales to dry in the coastal sun, turned by hand until they're ready. Their artisanal fermentation process is tuned to draw out a wide range of flavor, from a nutty, balanced cup with low acidity, to one that's flowery, bold, and bitter. That range gives us a lot to work with back in our chocolate lab, and it's a big part of why single-origin Nacional Arriba is worth the extra care.
“It takes about five years for a single tree to fully bloom.”
Hacienda Victoria
03
Selected By Hand
Because Victoria is a single estate, every bag we receive traces back to the same hills, the same trees, and the same hands. Beans are sorted and hand-checked before they're bagged. It's the kind of quality control that keeps flavor consistent from one harvest to the next, and one bar to the next.
04
The People Behind the Beans
Hacienda Victoria has had less than 1% staff turnover since it was established in 2011. Team members receive biweekly medical visits, live in housing certified by the Rainforest Alliance, with three warm meals a day, meet quarterly with a finance specialist, and can apply for a scholarship program to grow their career within cacao. It's a standard of care we're glad to have upstream of every bar.
05
From Their Hands to Ours
Fermented, dried, sorted, and bagged in Guayaquil, the beans make their way from Hacienda Victoria to our chocolate lab in Portland, where the rest of the story gets written. Single-origin sourcing means we always know exactly whose hands the beans passed through before ours.
Growing Responsibly
Native Birds
Victoria partners with Fundación Jambelí as a foster and breeding hub for birds native to the region, with a particular focus on the endangered Guayacán Verde.
Reforestation
Over a quarter of Victoria's land is held in native trees, with an active program to plant more each year and grow a biodiverse home for local wildlife.
Responsible Growing
A resourceful irrigation system and responsible soil management protect the land the cacao depends on, and the community around it.
Community
Alongside Fundación Unidos por la Educación, Victoria helped build an elementary school for the nearby community of Bajada de Progreso.
Taste Where It Starts
Every Creo bar carries a little of Hacienda Victoria in it: the soil, the fermentation, the people who tend it season after season.