Fresh Cup Magazine | April 2019

Contents A P R I L 2 0 1 9 | VO L . 2 8 . N O. 4 | F R E S H C U P M AG A Z I N E

Departments

12

14

20

62

PISTACCHIELLO COFFEE

CHAD TREWICK & PETER W. ROBERTS

BETTER-FOREARTH LATTES

Drink of the Month

DESPISTADOS: A CAFÉ WITH A STRONG SENSE OF PLACE

Do You Know?

The Last Plastic Straw

By Alessandro Pucci

Café Crossroads

By Caitlin Peterkin

By Robin Roenker

Features

By Stephanie Parker

26

36

Current innovations at origin range from monitoring sugar levels in harvested cherries to using encrypted technology for transparent traceability verification.

The most popular coffees are infused with good-for-you ingredients.

Innovations at Origin

All About Infusions

By Jodi Helmer

By Rachel Northrop

42

52

Paving the Way Forward

Trading

By Anastasia Prikhodko

By Perry Czopp

Coffee Activism, Part Two

Costa Rica: Part Four

EDITOR’S LETTER, PAGE 9 | CONTRIBUTORS, PAGE 10 COUNTER INTELLIGENCE, PAGE 58 | CALENDAR, PAGE 60 | AD INDEX, PAGE 66

On the Cover: Sasha Jade, founder of Fat Poppy Coffee Roasters in Sydney, Australia. Photo by Philippa Touma 8 ] APRIL 2019 » freshcup.com

FRESH CUP MAGAZINE FRESH CUP PUBLISHING Publisher and President JAN WEIGEL jan@freshcup.com

“You can’t close the door to what might be possible.”

—Rodrigo Sanchez, Aromas del Sur Ltda

EDITORIAL Editor CAITLIN PETERKIN editor@freshcup.com

I

Associate Editor JORDAN JOHNSON freshed@freshcup.com ART Art Director CYNTHIA MEADORS cynthia@freshcup.com

theme, “Coffee in Crisis: A Call and Response,” is of utmost importance to the longevity of specialty coffee. As coffee prices still hover well below the cost of living in producing countries, let alone provide enough to cover production costs, it is vital to our industry

FRESH CUP FOUNDER WARD BARBEE 1938-2006

to not only recognize this crisis, but to facilitate discussion, collabo-

EDITORIAL ADVISORY BOARD PHILLIP DI BELLA

BRAD PRICE

Di Bella Group

Phillips Syrups & Sauces

BRUCE RICHARDSON Elmwood Inn Fine Teas

MANISH SHAH

BRUCE MILLETTO

Maya Tea Co.

Bellissimo Coffee Advisors

ANUPA MUELLER

LARRY WINKLER

Eco-Prima

impressive barista skills, and, of course, passion for specialty

Star that sets the course for the industry year after year. This year’s

Accounting Manager DIANE HOWARD diane@freshcup.com

CHUCK JONES

Fest show, where innovative products, inspired discussions,

Boston for Specialty Coffee Expo and Re:co Symposium, our North

ACCOUNTING

Jones Coffee Roasters

industry, journeying to New York City for my very first Coffee

Part two comes this month, when the Fresh Cup team heads to

Ad Coordinator DIANE HOWARD adtraffic@freshcup.com

DAVID GRISWOLD

recently completed part one of my rite of passage into the

beverages were proudly on display.

ADVERTISING Sales JAN WEIGEL sales@freshcup.com

Sustainable Harvest Coffee Importers

EDITOR’S LETTER

Torani

ration, research, and potential solutions.

Fittingly, this issue features a recent conversation with two folks who are at the frontlines of the conversation surrounding cost of production: Chad Trewick and Peter W. Roberts, who spearhead the Specialty Coffee Transaction Guide project out of Emory University (p. 20).

We also travel to several origin countries to learn their trading

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FRESH CUP OFFICE:

secrets (p. 52), gain insight on how farmers are pioneering practices to keep up with the demands of the industry (p. 26), and see how a young entrepreneur built a business that reflects the culture of his region (p. 14).

And as the industry continues to adapt and evolve, it is important to shine a light on organizations around the world dedicated to empowering womxn and marginalized communities in coffee (p. 42).

Innovation is necessary to the advancement of any industry. The more I’m immersed in the world of coffee and tea, the more I find it to be filled with visionary leaders and intrepid dreamers, all working towards a brighter future.

2627 NE MLK Jr. Blvd., Suite 203, Portland, OR 97212 PHONE: 503/236-2587 | FAX: 503/236-3165 FRESH CUP MAILING ADDRESS: PO BOX 14827, Portland, OR 97293 FRESH CUP PROUDLY SPONSORS NONPROFITS

CAITLIN PETERKIN, EDITOR

editor@freshcup.com FR E SH CU P.COM FRESH CUP MAGAZINE [ 9

Our Contributors Perry Czopp is a coffee professional from Phoenix, Arizona, now sourcing and exporting coffees from Costa Rica.

His passion for learning and sharing knowledge has translated into an affinity for writing specifically about Costa Rican coffee (“Costa Rica—Part Four: Trading,” p.52), with plans to play a large role in the coffee exchange between Costa Rica and the rest of the world.

Based in Miami, Florida, Rachel Northrop is content manager for Ally Coffee and the author of When Coffee Speaks: Stories From and Of Latin American Coffeepeople. In this issue of Fresh Cup, Northrop writes about how coffee producers are pioneering ideas borrowed from other industries, in “Innovations at Origin” (p. 26).

Stephanie Parker is a freelance journalist based in Switzerland.

Her writing has been published in Civil Eats, Earth Island Journal, and Modern Farmer, among others. In this issue, she profiles a young entrepreneur’s café in El Salvador (Café Crossroads, p. 14). Find her on Twitter at @sparkersays.

Lexington, Kentuckybased freelance writer Robin Roenker has extensive experience reporting on business trends, from cybersecurity to real estate, personal finance, and green living. For Fresh Cup, she covers sustainable and eco-friendly trends in cafés and the coffee industry in The Last Plastic Straw, on p. 62.

10 ] APRIL 2019 » freshcup.com

Jodi Helmer is a North Carolina-based freelance writer covering the intersection between food and business. This month, she explores the rise of beverages infused with good-foryou ingredients—see p. 36.

Cheyanne Paredes is a Portland-based photographer who enjoys capturing the coffee industry from bean to cup. Her work is influenced by her experience in the coffee industry, as well as her trips to coffee origin, as seen in “Costa Rica—Part Four: Trading,” p. 52.

Anastasia Prikhodko is a freelance journalist based in Sydney, Australia. Previously, she spent two years abroad living in Amsterdam and enjoying the coffee scene across Europe, Russia, and Korea. She writes mainly about coffee, the travel trade sector, social issues, gender, and, at times, dabbles in a bit of sports writing. Read Part 2 of her “Coffee Activism” series, featuring organizations and movements around the globe empowering marginalized communities in the coffee industry, on p. 42.

CORRECTION In “Coffee Activism: Part 1” of our March issue, Fresh Cup misspelled the name of Thor Himle, co-founder of Portland Coffee Social Club. We sincerely apologize for the error.

Drink of the Month

Pistacchiello Coffee CREATED BY ALESSANDRO PUCCI Instagram: @alessandropucci of Pasticceria Cioccorocolato in Pisa, Italy

INGREDIENTS: Pistachio Cream Espresso Milk Foam Crushed Pistachios

PROCEDURE: • Pour pistachio cream into the bottom and on the lip of the espresso cup.

• Sprinkle crushed pistachios onto the lip of the cup.

• Add a shot of espresso (Italian blend).

• Pour in the foam of milk to top off the cup.

• Decorate the top with parallel lines of pistachio cream and sweep a toothpick through the center.

T

his special espresso was created for Pasticceria Cioccorocolato, integrating the shop’s two top products: handmade pistachio cream and espresso. Both are characteristic elements of Italian tradition.

The intention was to change the classic way of having a coffee, to make it a visceral experience involving all senses. The final product takes into account not only the taste, but also the look.

12 ] APRIL 2019 » freshcup.com

The base is an Italian blend, which provides a strong, tasty espresso flavored with bitter Robusta, while the milk foam, enriched with the taste and the color of pistachio cream, gives extra body to the aroma. A crunchy touch is given by crushed pistachios.

And so, we obtain a sweet, balanced coffee that looks beautiful and delicious enough, that your customers will devour with their eyes first. Our customers always say they have to take a picture to enjoy the full experience.

ILLUSTRATION BY JORDAN JOHNSON @DRAWNHUNGRY

Café Crossroads

Despistados:

A café with a strong sense of place Story and photos by Stephanie Parker

14 ] APRIL 2019 » freshcup.com

LA PALMA, EL SALVADOR: Adobe exterior and entrance to the café (left). A chalk drawing with a quote by Frida Kahlo (below) loosely translates to, “Where you can not love, do not stay.”

A

t first glance, the small white adobe building could just be any old residence.

Above the entryway, the word “CAFÉ” is small and unimposing, while in curved letters, the name “Despistados” is almost covered with the picturesque vines that creep just below the wavy tin roof. On the ironwork on the wooden door is a small sign with a drawing of a coffee cup that says abierto—“open.”

FRESH CUP MAGAZINE [ 15

Café Crossroads

Despistados is a café located in La Palma, El Salvador, a small artsy town just a few minutes’ drive from the Honduran border. Inside, it is warm and cozy, with fewer than 10 tables, plus a small lounge in the back with a couch, a guitar, and a large chalk mural on a black wall where customers can sign their names and write messages. Most of the furniture is made of wood, while the floors are made of local stone.

MAKE YOUR MARK: The large chalk mural in the back of the café invites customers to write messages.

22-two-year-old owner Alejandro García Aguillón wants the one-and-a-halfyear-old café to use local and regional elements.

“We have a Latin American concept,” he says.

As places modernize, they often take down adobe houses and replace them with cement ones, so Aguillón wanted to make sure the café was in a traditional adobe structure. He found the perfect location in an abandoned house.

The café also pays homage to Latin American cultural figures. A small cartoon drawing of Frida Kahlo hangs framed on the wall, and a large wood carving of the word “MACONDO” hangs in the kitchen area. (Macondo is the fictional town in Colombian author’s Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s classic, One Hundred Years of Solitude.)

Aguillón credits the opening of Despistados to a program called Generaciones, which helps young people in the Trifinio region, encompassing parts of El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras, learn about the coffee industry. Thanks to climate change and low coffee prices, many young people do not want to stay in the coffee industry, even though it historically plays an important part of both the region’s economy and culture. The Generaciones program, part of the Hans R. Neumann Stiftung Foundation’s work on coffee and climate change, aims to keep young people in the area and in coffee.

That doesn’t necessarily mean that these young people will become growers: the program offers training in other areas of the coffee industry, from cupping and machine repair to distribution and, in the case of Aguillón, opening a small coffee business.

“The program taught me to believe in my capabilities,” he says.

Most of the participants in Generaciones come from families involved in the coffee industry; often, they are the children of growers. Aguillón was an outlier; he was not involved in coffee before beginning the program. In fact,

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Café Crossroads

OWNER ALEJANDRO GARCÍA AGUILLÓN pulls a shot of espresso on the café’s espresso machine.

THE CAFÉ: (clockwise from left) A reading nook in the corner with benches made of wooden pallets; the seating area with a few tables and stools that look like coffee beans; the café menu; apple pie and an Americano, both made

by Aguillion’s girlfriend and collaborator, Maria Feliciana Figueroa.

18 ] APRIL 2019 » freshcup.com

before participating in Generaciones, he had thought about opening an extreme sports center.

In the Generaciones program, Aguillón learned leadership and entrepreneurial skills, as well as specifics about the business of coffee. As part of the program, Aguillón even had the opportunity to visit Paraguay to share his experiences with the youth there. He also went to Italy last year for a Lavazza conference.

After completing the program, Aguillón won seed money to start the café from CONAMYPE, El Salvador’s National Commission of Small and Micro Business. They gave him $3,000, which he used to renovate the space and buy equipment.

“We started with a small machine that you’d use at home” he says, referring to a now-defunct drip coffee maker that would look more suitable on a kitchen counter. “It died, but it helped us a lot.”

As the business grew, he was able to invest in a Nuova Simonelli espresso maker.

The café now boasts a full coffee menu, with all the staples like espressos, cappuccinos, and lattes, using a mix of beans: some local, such as the Pacamara variety, and some imported from Brazil. They also offer licuados de frutas (fruit smoothies) and frozen coffee drinks. And because El Salvador uses the United States dollar as its currency, the prices on the menu are strikingly low to a tourist’s eye: an espresso will set you back $0.75, while the most expensive coffee drink, a mocha, is $1.25. A panini sandwich goes for $2.00.

Along with sandwiches, wraps, and nachos, Despistados offers homemade pastries like apple pie, cheesecake, and tres leches cake, baked by Aguillón’s girlfriend and collaborator, Maria Feliciana Figueroa.

Figueroa is also responsible for much of the café’s design aesthetic, which includes wooden pallets used for benches, stool tops carved to look like coffee beans, pillows and cushions made out of repurposed coffee sacks, and art and quotes lining the adobe walls. She also creates bracelets and earrings out of coffee beans and beads, which they sell at the café as well.

Now that Despistados is established and doing well, Aguillón is focused on expansion. He recently won seed money to start a mobile coffee business, which is now in progress. And looking forward, he hopes to open more cafés in small towns using parts of each place’s unique local culture.

While the familiar definition of despistados translates to “clueless” or “distracted,” Aguillón sees it as a word for those who are a little lost or unique. He says he chose the name to represent being off the beaten path, or a little different.

“Being different is a quality of ours,” says Aguillón. FC

FRESH CUP MAGAZINE [ 19

Do You Know?

Chad Trewick & Peter W. Roberts: Guiding the Conversation on the Coffee Price Crisis

By Caitlin Peterkin

I

t should come as no surprise that the future of specialty coffee is uncertain, one of the largest threats being the cost of production. After the C market price of coffee dropped below $1.00 USD/lb. last August—the lowest in 12 years—the industry woke up to the fact that if coffee producers continue to suffer from low-revenue farming operations, the supply chain cannot sustain the ever-increasing demand for specialty

coffee. In response, the Specialty Coffee Association launched its Coffee Price Crisis Response Initiative in December to understand and address long-term cyclical pricing decline.

First-of-its-kind research is also being conducted: The Specialty Coffee Transaction Guide is a pilot collaboration between researchers at Transparent Trade Coffee (TTC), housed at Emory University, and an expanding roster of data donors—producers, exporters,

importers, roasters, and other support organizations—who provide detailed contract data covering specialty coffee transactions from recent harvests.

Using this anonymized data, the Guide serves as a report on the distributions of recent Free on Board (FOB) prices— prices paid for coffees delivered and placed onto the ship at their port of origin—for green specialty coffees.

Since releasing their initial findings in December, project leaders Chad Trewick, of Reciprocafé, LLC, and Peter W. Roberts, professor of organization and management at Emory and academic director of Social Enterprise at Goizueta, have seen a surge of interest and praise from the community. “[The Guide] has been met with such great excitement and enthusiasm and willingness to collaborate and contribute,” says Trewick. “We feel that immediately this resonated with people in a way that I think exceeded our expectations.”

Trewick and Roberts recently took the time to speak to Fresh Cup before they traveled to Guatemala for a workshop with stakeholders there to further their work at origin.

This interview has been edited for clarity.

Let’s chat about how this whole project got started.

CHAD TREWICK

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Chad Trewick: To give you a sense of how this started, my background in the industry is for 20 years I was the ‘Coffee Guy’ in charge of coffee at Caribou Coffee. Throughout that role, it evolved, but for the last 10 years the biggest priority for me was transforming our 25-millionpound supply to Rainforest Alliance certification as a way not only of introducing some ethical and environmentally prioritizing practices, but also as a way to be able to pay a premium.

PHOTO COURTESY OF CHAD TREWICK

Every year I would travel to these communities and I would see that while I was fine, and my salary was up, and my hotel cost more and my plane ticket cost more, I was paying the same amount or less for coffee….I started to see how these behaviors that I personally was remunerated for were having this impact in the communities that we depended on. Once I saw it, I couldn’t unsee it.

I was [a facilitator for a panel discussion relating to the cost of production] at SCA Expo in 2017, and one of the gentlemen who was working on the Transparent Trade Coffee project, which is also housed at Emory University, came up to me afterwards and said, ‘I think you should look at this project we’re doing.’

I looked at it—what they have is a system where brands donate information related to their green coffee price paid and their retail price in the store.

TTC then reports what percentage of their retail price stayed in the country where coffee was produced, an RTO (return to origin) percentage. I thought, ‘Wow, this is really a cool thing, I love that these brands are proudly and happily volunteering this information.’

But I started to think, ‘I want more, I want this to be bigger, I want this to be broader. I want to represent a bigger part of our industry.’

And so I approached Peter and said, ‘What if we started to talk about people being able to donate anonymously so that their data would be aggregated and anonymized in a way that nobody would be able to see whose was whose?’

We would have to follow good research protocols, statistically valid rules about how many people can be onboarded at once, for example, so that no one player influences the Guide over another.

It became a safer platform for people to donate the data to, so that we could then create this Guide. And I think because of my industry contacts and relationships and the ability that I have to go to these brands and say, ‘Hey, there’s this cool project, the outcome

PHOTO COURTESY OF PETER W. ROBERTS

PETER W. ROBERTS

is going to be a guide that should be an alternative to the commodity market price reference that we all hate using, let’s figure this out.’

Peter Roberts: It’s important to signal the catalyzing role that Chad played.

For a while there, when people were looking at the Transparency Trade Coffee, we were sort of chipping away, pulling out information where we could, and we always wanted it to go faster. There was always this piece of, ‘How could we get more and better information?’

I used to say, ‘Wouldn’t it be cool if you got the importers to give the data—but who would?’ It was that early conversation with Chad, he said, ‘I don’t know Peter, there’s a different logic here’— folks working the channels had similar concerns about

the lack of robust market foundation.

Concern was growing about the coffees you wanted to buy were going to disappear because we don’t know how to pay for what they’re worth.

When we launched, I was still skeptical [until I realized] there was a swath of players in the market that are prepared to get at and prepared to do something about it. I still think the work that we do on the TTC side—putting prices out in front of customers and making that visible—was extremely important. But it’s like we just revealed a little more of the iceberg— and there’s lots of work to do.

Why do you think the Guide has seen such a positive reception?

CT: One of the things that’s really important about the Guide is that it’s

FRESH CUP MAGAZINE [ 21

Do You Know?

Are you expanding your research into more countries, like Asia and Africa?

CT: One of the priorities we have is to ensure greater geographical representation globally, not only of coffee producing countries but of coffee consuming countries. So for consuming countries, we’re really trying to get some data from Australia, New Zealand, Asia. For producing, I think there’s no data about Asia countries in the guide right now, there’s very little data about Africa.

We are definitely intentionally recruiting data to make the tool more robust in that sense, because we want it to be valid and relevant for not just United States buyers of Central America and South America coffee. It’s really important to us that this becomes an internationally relevant tool, and it’s also providing greater insights to, if you’re a coffee selling country, which regions of the world pay the best price? We’re really looking to round out geographical representativeness of the guide with this next round of data donors.

providing information about prices not just to buyers of coffee but, very, very importantly, it’s providing pricing information to sellers of coffee who, until today, have generally been kept in the dark about how and why certain coffees are worth whatever they’re worth.

What we’ve really found interesting, in fact, during the first week that the pilot was out there, more than half of our downloads were from the countries where coffee is grown. We immediately knew not only were we creating a tool that was resonant with the market that needed some kind of pricing alternative, but with the people who were producing coffee in the countries where it’s grown to say, ‘Well, let’s figure out how much this stuff can be worth to us.’ It’s all about elevating information, providing information, and its intention is to inspire further questions, further research curiosities, further insights.

One thing we did before we really launched the guide is we got feedback

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from stakeholders in [producing countries]. The idea really is to say, ‘We don’t want to be creating a tool that has any unintended negative consequences that we haven’t thought about, so please, what might they be, what do we need to make this thing better for you as producers?’

For example, out of one of those meetings, I think it was the Colombia one, the producers in the room said, ‘Well, I can tell you right now you’re going to have to explain to us what the heck someone can do to coffee from the time it gets from our farm to an FOB price, because that price is so different from what we’re getting at the farm.’

And so right there you can see how it provides the opportunity for another research project, another thing for us to share information regarding pricing or value added by different actors in the value chain, that doesn’t exist now….

There’s a whole lot of opportunity for other research questions to be asked.

In the recent SCA webinar [on the coffee price crisis], Ric Rhinehart heavily emphasized that this is academic work and research, and Chad you spoke about your gratitude toward Peter, though an ‘outsider’ in the industry, his work is helping illuminate industry behaviors and opportunities. Is such work rare in the specialty coffee industry? Should other industries adopt similar research and practices?

CT: [I think it’s important to talk about] why don’t we see more of these academic and industry collaborations, so that someone from the outside can look objectively and from an educated perspective and start to contribute to a conversation to evolve. Because to me, I think that’s what’s happening here, and I think it’s really been powerful, from my perspective.

PHOTO BY CYNTHIA MEADORS

Do You Know?

PR: From an academic perspective… people don’t write about coffee.

They just don’t. We looked at [50 top academic business journals over the past 20 years], I don’t know the exact number, but let’s assume that’s 40

It’s all about elevating information, providing information, and its intention is to inspire further questions, further research curiosities, further insights. thousand publications. I think the number of them that had the word ‘coffee’ in the title or the abstract was 20….[There’s] just so little out there in terms of, it’s the fourth-ish most valuable commodity traded on Earth, it

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literally proliferates on the consuming side, it’s implicated in poverty around the world, [but] it’s not a sector that produced a lot of economic data.

I spent 15 years studying various aspects of the wine industry, but the nice thing about that is you take something like the [Wine] Spectator or someone like [wine critic] Robert Parker, you can get price and quality information and do some work on that.

Coffee, especially on the sale side, down at origin, it just has zero attention. I don’t think it’s exactly straight cause-and-effect, but I think that’s one of the reasons why you just don’t see a whole lot of updating. Listening to Ric talk about the problem as, ‘Green coffee prices were imprinted on the confluence of colonialism and slavery,’ which means land and labor get nothing. That’s technically deep history. But then you just really haven’t had a wellfunctioning market that has updated those things.

Right now [in] specialty coffee is like what happened in the New World of wine back in the ‘70s, when Mondavi came on board….Now all the Napas and the Sonomas and the Willamettes and the Malbecs from Argentina, all that kind of stuff has come up in the last 30 or 40 years, and parts of that market update.

Coffee has had this explosion of this kind of notion, ‘I should be able to pay you where land and labor aren’t appropriately compensated.’ I honestly believe more academics, particularly business school academics, should look at it….It’s just really hard to do quantitative analysis when there’s no data.

Not that people don’t study coffee, they do, but they study coffee like it’s a locus of poverty, so anthropologists and economic development folks spend a lot of time talking about addressing and alleviating poverty in coffee countries. But you need that other kind of business econ people who are

going to say what’s going on in terms of what’s driving better versus worse prices, and who is and is not making money. Hopefully we can stimulate that kind of work over the next four or five years as well.

The specialty coffee industry has been aware of the coffee price crisis for a while.

Why are we just now taking this action and seeing this research come to light?

CT: I think that in August we reached this psychological level of ‘sub-one dollar on the commodities market,’ and I think that while many of us know and understand very, very deeply that the coffee commodity price has been below the cost to produce for a long time, this below-a-dollar level is really something that resonated with people and got them to understand how, wow, okay we have to have a different and serious conversation now. This isn’t fixing itself, it’s not

getting better. In fact, it’s getting worse.

In 2017, a conversation was started by the World Coffee Producers Forum group in Medellín, Colombia, where they all got together and were like, ‘Alright, we’re done for here, our countries are struggling, and suffering, and yours aren’t, so what’s the deal?’

So [the International Coffee Organization] started trying to react, by being a part of the World Coffee Producers Forum, investigating a little more about the cost to produce and farmgate prices being received, and so the conversation just started to seep more into a broader cross-section of the industries.

And then the price got below a dollar and the specialty coffee industry said, ‘Alright, enough! Our own ability to exist is jeopardized by this sort of hands-off free market approach that people are taking.’

That’s really, I think, the point at which SCA decided to have a different

conversation and lead that conversation, and have it be about industry preservation and finding alternative price discovery tools, like the Guide, to serve the industry. The timing of all these horrible things sort of happened at once, and gave us the opportunity to get the attention that we wouldn’t have otherwise. FC Fresh Cup continues the conversation with Trewick and Roberts, including what’s next for the Guide, in our upcoming May issue.

For more information about the Specialty Coffee Transaction Guide, and to download a free copy, visit www.transactionguide.coffee.

To watch SCA’s “Coffee Price Crisis Webinar: Spotlight on the Specialty Coffee Transaction Guide” (available in both English and Spanish), visit www.scanews.coffee.

FRESH CUP MAGAZINE [ 25

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USING A REFRACTOMETER to test sugar levels of coffee beans at Finca Monteblanco in Colombia.

T

here is no shortage of new ideas in the coffee industry. Coffee production is the first stage in the chain but the slowest to implement changes due to the multi-year maturation time of coffee trees and the complexities of undertakings, such as building new infrastructure in remote locations. Coffee producers have always been up to the challenge, though, and current innovations at origin range from monitoring sugar levels in harvested cherries to using encrypted technology for transparent traceability verification.

PHOTO BY RACHEL NORTHROP

FRESH CUP MAGAZINE [ 27

Innovations at Origin

Cold Fermentation in Colombia It is common to equate the process and language of cupping, coffee’s sensory evaluation protocol, with that of wine, but producer Rodrigo Sanchez chose to apply the parallel to post-harvest coffee processing.

“We wanted to plant different varieties and develop profiles that were a little different by taking advantage of our ability to cup,” explains Sanchez.

Based in Pitalito, Huila, Colombia, he and his wife, Claudia Samboni, own and manage Aromas del Sur Ltda, which includes three family farms, a dry mill, and a new cupping lab. Sanchez learned to cup through a local program 17 years ago, and since then has approached coffee farming and processing with the final cup in mind.

AROMAS DEL SUR LTDA: View from Monteblanco, one of the three Sanchez family farms near Pitalito.

“While the mucilage is in contact with the coffee bean, there is a fermentation that creates alcohols. We see it like the process of fermenting wines, just above and below the equator,” he explains. “We asked ourselves, ‘How can we prolong [the time the mucilage is in] contact with bean but not have overfermentation?’”

To answer this, Sanchez began experimenting.

He knew that the more bacteria present in the cherry, the further development of flavors in the cup.

Above 23 degrees Celsius, those bacteria are inactive.

Sanchez understood that the beans needed to be kept

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cool—but how cool, and for how long? To find this out, he used what was on hand.

“We put coffee in the freezers and refrigerators of the house, but the temperature varied a lot and the beans would freeze,” he says. They found that maintaining a consistent temperature was crucial, and 10–13 degrees Celsius was optimal. “Lower, the embryo dies. Higher, the time has to be shorter and we lose the benefits of keeping the mucilage in contact with the coffee.”

COLD PROCESS: One of the refrigerators used to test the temperature range needed for cold fermentation.

On Finca Monteblanco, the farm where Aromas del Sur developed the process they would eventually dub “cold fermentation,” the ideal frame was 76 hours in the fridge.

But, the art of coffee processing involves balancing all the other variables beyond time and temperature.

The Aromas team also investigated how various levels of degrees Brix performed under cold fermentation conditions.

“We learned not to process coffee as naturals or honeys above 22 degrees Brix because then there is the risk of vinegars,” says Sanchez. “Coffees with 22 to 26 degrees go for the washed standards of processing.

Washed coffees have complexity, balance, and are good for espresso.”

By segmenting processing based on sugar content, the team finds consistent intensity of flavor notes.

Cherries with the highest degrees Brix are destined for cold fermentation, done in small batches, to capture

PHOTOS BY RACHEL NORTHROP

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Innovations at Origin

the sugar’s maximum benefits without risking overfermentation.

Sanchez’s innovation is one of process as much as processing. To observe the intersection of changing variables and record the results is the basis for all experimentation and research, but those in the business of agriculture often must be reactive to the variables of weather and disease, while any introduction of other variables takes a backseat. By first observing the sugar levels of a day’s harvest and having an option for all degrees Brix, Sanchez knows how to make the best of every cherry, whatever natural punch it packs.

While coffees prepared with cold fermentation processing—especially those of the Pink Bourbon variety, a unique type of Arabica Sanchez found on Finca Monteblanco that ripens to pink and cups like a Gesha—have earned their place in the spotlight of competition stages, the real motivation for perfecting the processing was something far

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PINK BOURBON at Finca Monteblanco.

IN THE FIELD: Rodrigo Sanchez (left) and Claudia Samboni (right) with members of their Aromas del Sur team on Finca Monteblanco.

PHOTOS BY RACHEL NORTHROP

more practical: to eliminate the environment in which defects are created.

He observed that above 23 degrees, the helpful bacteria backed off and the problems set in.

“The more degrees Brix, the more potential to develop the cup,” cautions Sanchez. “But if you’re not able to convert those sugars into flavor, then they sour to become defects.”

More than creating unique nano lots for special occasions, his motivation was to avoid the conditions that cause the most common processing defects and devalue coffee lots. Even one or two vinegary beans in a sample can dissuade a buyer. What if there was a way to reduce that risk? The cold fermentation process and the Brix-based processing decision tree at Finca Monteblanco and Aromas del Sur are evidence that, while nothing is foolproof, sometimes the practical mother-of-invention necessity also offers something worth taking center stage.

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Blockchain in Laos Laos is a landlocked country in Southeast Asia between Thailand, Cambodia, Vietnam, and China’s Yunnan province. Coffee from Laos does not typically make headlines—but all that could soon change with the establishment of cooperatives digitally governed by blockchain. New technological integrations will allow coffee to make it to market with their provenance intact, instead of being turned into coffee from a neighboring country on the way to the port.

Fi-lan’thro-pe’s coffee sourcing model is already innovative: Coffee farmers in 12 Bo, Laven, Bru, and Jeru villages in the Bolaven Plateau of Champassak province and Paksong, Dak Cheung, and Huaphanh regions are compensated for their labor, while the coffee itself, rather than being sold, is exchanged for services provided by experts and funded by the end consumer, a practice that puts value on the work people do to maintain farms and stabilize the value of farmers.

WORKING TOGETHER: Michael Wood (right) and Wöck Homdouangchit, leaders of the Jhai Coffee Farmers Cooperative, a collective of 298 Lao families from 18 villages.

“Blockchain in and of itself won’t prevent mislabeling,” says Wood. “It’s the design of the checkpoints that must be used to satisfy the requirements of the block. Blockchain that is farmer-centric is the key to [eliminating] so much corruption in the coffee sector.”

Fi-lan’thro-pe is working with Yave, makers of blockchain coffee trading technology out of Seattle, Washington.

There are many uses for a decentralized, unhackable ledger in the coffee trade, and one is to implement the technology as a system where producers themselves verify what the coffee is and where it comes from by ascribing that information from the start. The immutable nature of blockchain means

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PHOTO BY SCOTT TUPPER

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Innovations at Origin

FI-LAN’THRO-PE/JCFC WAREHOUSE in Paksong region of Laos.

BLOCKCHAIN TRACEABLE COFFEE: (clockwise from left) Freshly picked coffee cherries; communityowned processing facilities; hand-sorting in Paksong; Michael Wood and team vacuum packing and boxing microlot coffees for shipping.

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that, once entered, data cannot be edited or removed. The shared visibility of that immutable data makes a blockchain system an exciting alternative to existing transparency schemes, which rely on exporters and importers as the custodians and forwarders of information and existing traceability schemes that run parallel to the physical flow of coffee but are not attached to it.

Wood says that “the legitimacy is in the requirements of the chain itself, in what steps need to be taken and how are they satisfied. Who are the actors involved in inputting into the block?”

In Laos, “farmers are the ones who start the chain of events. From there, [coffee] is tracked whenever it’s moved.”

For this to work, other downstream actors must continue the chain of blocks by contracting and trading coffee through the blockchain platform; seeing others’ data requires a willingness to share one’s own. But for farmers in Laos, the benefits of selling coffee via contracts immortalized in the blockchain are greater than the handshake agreement that their product will be accurately represented and adequately compensated. The visible, digital, verified ledger serves as a new level of record keeping that is as transparent within the cooperative as beyond it.

“The numbers do not lie,” says Wood.

“Having [a record of] their coffee, and of many other indicators, can help farmers to track and understand their own farm and farming practices—imagine tracking farm inputs with pest/disease/ cup scores over time—to be effective in maintaining not only pride in production, but also market situational awareness, traceability and verification of pricing, and financial planning.”

Many smallholders wish to operate a cooperative, but do not know where to begin. Most of these groups have all the necessary knowledge, just no way to distribute that experience across a community.

“Blockchain, in the way that we envision it with Laos, is effectively a decision-making tool for a cooperative,” notes Wood. The indicators captured by the information farmers enter into

PHOTOS BY SCOTT TUPPER

the block, lot by lot, inform the community where to provide training and resources.

“It could create a system that helps a group better distribute its knowledge to tackle real time farming and livelihood issues,” says Wood. Fully integrating blockchain into commercialization would allow resources to be applied with laser focus, not broad strokes. “Think of a 1,000-member training on pruning in a centralized manner, which may differ in style from region to region, versus a 122 member-to-member, in-village pruning training.”

Open Sourcing In this age of accelerated ideas and frenzy over all that can be monitored and measured, the question of who owns the next great idea could be complicated.

For Sanchez, it’s simple: “You can’t close the door to what might be possible. We’ve shared with many producers and want them to also find stability in their processing.”

This is, perhaps, another great innovation in and of itself. National coffee boards have shared their genetic material with international research organizations only within the last decade, and a true noncompetitive, industry-wide sustainability effort is still assembling itself, while the mentality of protecting the secret recipe continues to pervade many parts of the coffee industry. Having a model for open source advancements—in processing or in anything else— and the humble, neighborly willingness to share is a double-edged tool the coffee industry will have to use liberally, if it is to outwit climate change and finally outgrow its history of oppression.

“The basis of coffee production in most countries is based on colonization if not outright slavery. Business techniques and methods of management have many of the same structures as those that existed then,” says Wood. “They are systems meant to favor a centralized power structure and are not empowering for the smallholder.”

Could the next big-data revolution come in blockchain traded coffee? Maybe. While we stay up late coding the future, at least we have a comforting drink.

“Again, coffee is similar to wine,” observes Sanchez, providing a third point of comparison between the two storied beverages. “It gives pleasure to special moments.”

Those moments could be better cupping results from dedicated scientific research; it could be the inauguration of a democratic cooperative in a region that has never had one before; or, it could be a conversation between friends, reminding each other that, with enough curiosity and sweat, anything is possible. FC Read Fresh Cup’s in-depth look at fermentation innovations at origin in our upcoming May issue.

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FOUR SIGMATIC’S Mushroom Coffee with cordyceps & chaga. Cordyceps have been studied for their strong antioxidant properties.

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PHOTO COURTESY OF FOUR SIGMATIC

M

ove over black coffee: Stirring cream and sugar into a piping hot house roast is so old school.

Coffee drinkers want a jolt of caffeine that offers wellness benefits—and roasters are obliging. Café menus are teeming with options for brews infused with products ranging from mushrooms and turmeric to collagen and CBD oil. The unique offerings capitalize on several 2019 coffee trends, including high-quality, gourmet coffee, unique flavors, and specialty beverages, according to the Coffee AM Trend Report.

Whether roasters create house recipes or offer the ingredients as add-in options, all infused coffees provide the same boost to the bottom line. These four coffee infusions are proving popular.

Collagen The material that connects tissue and bones is chock-full of protein; stirring the powder into coffee provides a major protein boost, and it’s reported to have health benefits such as improving skin and nails, easing arthritis pain, and promoting wound healing.

Bulletproof Coffee added collagen lattes the menus at its cafés in California and Washington in 2015, and two years later launched a ready-to-drink version: a cold brew with collagen, which has 15 grams of the protein-rich infusion.

Creating the flavorful, zero-sugar beverage required years of experimentation. Karen Huh, vice president of brand and product strategy, explains that once the recipe for collagen coffee served in the cafés was perfected, the brand spent another two years working to commercialize the ready-to-drink formulation.

“Our consumers are seeking ways to reduce sugar and add protein to their diet, so adding collagen to Bulletproof Coffee was a logical addition to the lineup,” says Huh. “Plus, [collagen] is a versatile, flavorless powder that mixes easily into any hot or cold liquid without changing the flavor.”

Adding collagen to the butter-based brew amps up the protein content even more, making it a popular option

COLLAGEN: Swell Coffee Co.’s Jeanie Bean Collagen Coffee.

for coffee fanatics who follow the ketogenic diet.

The return on investment is strong: Nutrition Business Journal reports that consumers spent $122 million on collagen products last year—a 30 percent increase from 2017—and are projected to spend $140 million in 2019.

Collagen-infused coffee will be part of that investment.

At Bulletproof Cafés, a collagen upgrade adds $1 to the price of a coffee, increasing the price to $6.75 for a 16-ounce cup of infused coffee.

Swell Coffee Co., based out of San Diego, also offers collagen coffee; their Jeanie Bean Collagen Coffee is a traditional roast infused with 10 grams of collagen protein that retails for $18 per 12-ounce bag.

a result, sales of conventional coffee beans were stale.

The Denver-based roaster introduced four blends of CBD-infused coffee in 2016: Focus contains 30 mg of CBD, Restore has 120 mg, Elevate contains 240 mg, and Escape, a decaf blend, has 60 mg. Sales of the infused beans, which retail for $20 to $55 per 12-ounce bag, increased tenfold.

Adding the controversial ingredient to coffee can prove problematic, however.

CBD sales are permitted in 47 states (it remains illegal in Idaho, Nebraska, and South Dakota), but even in the states where the compound is legal, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration considers the interstate commerce of CBD products, including coffee, to be illegal.

In 2018, Lamplighter Coffee Roasters in Richmond, Virginia, introduced their Daydreamer Latte, made with CBD and adaptogens such as maca, but later removed it due to ambiguities about state laws regulating the hemp-derived oil.

CBD Oil High Times magazine might have called CBD coffee “the dumbest of all coffee trends,” but coffee lovers disagree. Coffee infused with cannabidiol or CBD is popping up in coffee shops nationwide.

CBD contains no tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), the active ingredient in cannabis, so CBD-infused coffee will not provide a caffeine buzz and marijuana high.

Instead, the hemp-derived compound is hailed for its health benefits, which are reported to include alleviating anxiety, easing insomnia, reducing inflammation, and minimizing epileptic seizures.

Hemp Business Journal predicts that the market for CBD products, including coffee, will top $2.1 billion in 2020. For roasters, the infused beans and brews can have a significant impact on the bottom line.

Andrew Aamot, president and CEO of Sträva Craft Coffee, struggled to stand out in a crowded market and, as

PHOTOS: (TOP, CENTER) INSTAGRAM @SWELLCOFFEECO; (RIGHT) INSTAGRAM @LAMPLIGHTERCOFFEE

CBD: Daydreamer Latte from Lamplighter Coffee Roasters.

Aamot hopes that the demand for CBD coffee will continue growing as coffee drinkers embrace the health benefits and roasters recognize the revenue potential, noting, “We’re in the early stages of adoption and consumers are just starting to embrace CBD coffee but it isn’t a gimmick or a fad. This is a product that has real benefits and it’s a great cup of coffee.”

Adaptogens So long, kale: Lattes are the new superfoods. Infusions of adaptogenic herbs

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All About Infusions

such as turmeric, maca, ginseng, tulsi, and ashwagandha turn regular lattes into nutritional powerhouses.

Adaptogens are plant-based ingredients believed to help restore the balance of immune, endocrine, and nervous systems and help your body adapt to daily stresses. In 2017, Huffington Post called them “the hottest new health and wellness trend.”

The trend appears to have staying power.

Data from the American Botanical Council found that sales of ashwagandha, the most popular adaptogen, were 25 percent higher in 2017 than the previous year, while the 2016 Google Food Trends report named turmeric a “rising star”; the orange spice, hailed for its anti-inflammatory benefits, has become a mainstay on café menus.

California-based Project Juice added five difADAPTOGENS: Project ferent adaptogen lattes to its menu in 2017. The Juice (above) and Golden Immunity Adaptogen Latte is made with Bluestone Lane (below) ingredients such as turmeric, ginger, cinnamon, both serve a variety of adapotgen-infused lattes. and several species of medicinal mushrooms while matcha, ginger, rhodiola, and guarana are the main ingredients in the Matcha Energy Adaptogen Latte. Each one is priced at $6.

At Bluestone Lane cafés throughout California, New York, and Washington, D.C., baristas make Golden Lattes from turmeric powder, cinnamon, ginger, and black pepper, a combination of ingredients believed to reduce inflammation, steamed with almond milk.

Jai Lott, senior director of special projects for Bluestone Lane, credits a shift in the coffee world toward more health-conscious beverages for the interest in adaptogen lattes. Since the Golden Latte was introduced in 2016, its popularity has grown every year.

“Consumers are looking for a drink that provides a natural energy boost that is also rich in health benefits,” says Lott. “We also cannot deny the influence of Instagram and social media on its popularity…If your wellness drink is also Instagrammable—you’ve got a two for two.”

Mushrooms Coffee and mushrooms might seem like an odd blend of ingredients, but mushroom coffee is dominating café menus. Although no data on the sales of mushroom coffee is currently available, Grand View Research estimates that the market for mushroom-based products will exceed $50 billion by 2022.

Often called chaga or fungus coffee, mushroom coffee is made from adding the powdered fungus to ground coffee beans; milk and sweetener are often added to enhance the flavor.

The blends are made with medicinal mushrooms, which are purported to have major health benefits such as improving digestion, boosting FOUR SIGMATIC’S Mushroom Matcha Drink the immune system, and alleviating high blood Mix includes ceremonial pressure and cholesterol. Although medicinal grade match, astragalus, mushrooms are adaptogens, mushroom coffee is lion’s mane mushrooms, often marketed as a separate product. and ginger.

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PHOTOS (FROM TOP): INSTAGRAM: @PROJECTJUICE, @BLUESTONELANE; COURTESY OF FOUR SIGMATIC

All About Infusions

Finnish roasters Four Sigmatic introduced their mushroom coffee, tea, and cocoa in 2012, using mushrooms that are liquefied, dried, and turned into a powder. The beverages are made with mushroom varieties like chaga, maitake, and cordyceps, which are supposed to help with focus, concentration, energy levels, creativity, and memory. Four Sigmatic also touts their alkaline-forming chaga mushroom extract soothes coffee’s acidity and provides a smoother taste.

At their Venice, California, location, the Shroom Room, Four Sigmatic serves mushroom-infused coffee, tea, and cocoa. Their products are also available for purchase; a 12-ounce bag of mushroom coffee mix retails for $24.

While each of these ingredients can stand alone in a cup of coffee, some cafés are taking a “more is better” approach to offering infusions, mixing multiple trends in one mug.

Cascara Energy on the Rise

C

ascara is still a relatively new introduction to the United States. In recent years, research has confirmed the powerful health benefits of coffee fruit (cascara),

and food manufacturers have begun taking notice, finding new ways to include this antioxidant-rich super fruit into drinks and supplements.

Although cascara comes from the coffee plant, it tastes nothing like coffee. Its versatility adds a new dimension to energy, which has been captured by Lotus Energy Drinks for its 10 Year Anniversary Edition.

Lotus Cascara Energy combines natural, organic energy with the nutritional powerhouse of coffee fruit through a patented extraction/stabilization process, designed to preserve the amazing health benefits of the coffee cherry and deliver maximized levels of all-natural, never roasted coffee polyphenols that may well relate to its ability to raise the production of a powerful growth hormone, brainderived neurotrophic factor (BDNF).

“We reunite coffee fruit (cascara) with natural caffeine from green coffee beans in a natural plant-based energy super fusion that is 30 percent stronger than

CURCUMA: Cold brew with cashew milk and maca (left), and the CBD Hemp Matcha Latte with hemp milk, lucuma, and CBD.

In Austin, Texas, Curcuma has a menu full of interesting infusion mashups: the CBD Matcha Latte ($9) includes CBD and lucuma; the Matcha Glow Latte ($7) is made with collagen, tocos, and cinnamon; and the hemp milk and ashwagandha are the main ingredients in the Yaupon Hemp Latte ($6).

Meanwhile, Matchaful in New York crafts innovative beverages like Cacao Dream, with matcha and chaga, and an Autumn Spice Matcha MATCHAFUL: Immunity- that includes adaptogens boosting Yuzu Tonic. like cordyceps, and offers CBD and collagen as add-ins (for an additional fee).

And out of Longmont, Colorado, Native Jack sells canned cold brews that are infused with collagen, CBD, hemp seed oil, and other health compounds.

As Huh notes, “Innovation starts with the customer.”

So follow trends, listen to customers, and create flavorful new infusions that boost brand loyalty— and the bottom line. FC

our original Lotus formula and mesmerizes the taste buds!” says Scott Strader, CEO/founder of Lotus.

Energy drinks have become ever popular in coffee shops and drive-thru espresso stands, generating as much as 50 percent of sales, especially among Generation Z (those 20 years old and younger), who are looking for alternative ways to get caffeinated.

This allows the specialty coffee market to expand its core audience with an energizing new way to enjoy another efficacious part of the coffee plant without the health concerns of mainstream energy drinks or their ingredients.

“Lotus Cascara Energy adds an exciting new piece to the specialty coffee experience,” says David Morris, CEO/founder of Dillanos Coffee Roasters.

“Finally, an energy drink derived from the coffee plant our industry can really embrace!”

Brian Jurus, president at Fulcrum Coffee, adds, “Consumers are looking for flavorful ways to meet their caffeine/energy needs and love that Lotus Cascara mixes with all the flavored syrups coffee outlets already carry to make energy spritzers!”

MORE INFO >> www.lotusenergydrinks.com Content Sponsored by Lotus Energy Drinks

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PHOTOS (FROM TOP): INSTAGRAM: @EATCURCUMA, @MATCHAFUL

S

tarting off as a grassroots movement in the U.S., the current wave of coffee activism has become a global movement binding the industry together. In the wake of #MeToo, stories from professionals in the coffee industry have been surfacing and made alight to push against sexual assault, intimidation, and harassment. And like with any movement demanding change, the more involved, the better the chances of disrupting the status quo. This is Part Two of Coffee Activism.

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AUSTRALIA’S SAME CUP founders Demelza Jones (left) and Shirin Demirdag (right).

PHOTO COURTESY OF DEMELZA JONES

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Coffee Activism, Part Two

Movement for Change The coffee industry in the U.K. is one that is established, respected, and professional—but it is also one that has for some time excluded women, people of color, LGBQTI+, and non-binary folks. To challenge this, The Kore Directive, a London-based non-profit organization, was founded to aid women in coffee. The organization celebrated its soft launch on November 15, 2018, at Volcano Coffee Works (VCW) in Brixton.

THE KORE DIRECTIVE founder Sierra Burgess-Yeo.

“Our soft launch was a blast—it was incredible to see people coming together and to have a largely womxn-centric atmosphere at the venue,” says Kore founder Sierra Burgess-Yeo, who is also a barista and manager at the Department of Coffee and Social Affairs’ Facebook Headquarters. “I think most people felt it most keenly through the cupping and the networking, and that it was a natural, neutral space for all of us to get to know one another.”

Kore was formed from Yeo feeling “angry and upset” about the state of the industry and wanting to “make sure these feelings had some positive impact.”

The organization is split into two aspects, one of which is a monthly social event where coffee professionals come together and network, regardless of their gender. Panel discussions or guest speakers are also featured at these events to talk about a range of different topics concerning women in the industry.

The other aspect is the practical workshops, where a small group of women are taught various skills. Yeo explains this aspect was inspired by the Specialty Coffee Association, since many of their courses are

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PHOTO BY ELIZABETH HOTSON

“quite inaccessible and expensive—we wanted to provide an alternative.”

The first event to take place was a no-waste latte art competition held at VCW in conjunction with Oatly on January 10, with other forthcoming events centered on discussions about coffee and mental health, and how female competitors prepare for coffee competitions.

Yeo adds that although discussions about gender equality in coffee are starting to take place and people are having more informed conversations, the industry in the U.K. is very much in the early stages.

“It comes down to cultural difference and down to the fact that we just don’t talk about it as much,” she says. “It is quite systemic and quite insidious; there aren’t many open conversations. As far as I know, this is the first of its kind [in the U.K.], which is really quite shocking.”

“We want the Kore to be stable, routed, and organically grown,” adds Yeo. “We want this to be around over the long term and hopefully, this is something that we will be able to give back to the community.”

Power & Influence While Kore was starting to challenge traditions in the U.K., another organization, based in Australia, was forming. SAME CUP celebrated its official launch on November 16, 2018, in Sydney.

The organization strives to improve the success, empowerment, and visibility of women and the LGBTQI+ folk in the Australian specialty coffee scene.

Led by Demelza Jones, former account manager for Five Senses Coffee’s New South Wales team, SAME CUP encompasses events, competitions, spaces, and parties that inspire success through networking, education, and personal development.

“The launch party was as much about celebrating the coming together of a supportive coffee community as

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Coffee Activism, Part Two

it was about giving ourselves space to really hone in on what we want SAME CUP to become in the future,” says Jones.

The night consisted of networking, discussions, and an “Iron Chef”-inspired signature beverage throwdown, to which Jones says, “the competitors all had a great time exploring the possible flavor combinations and methods in a competitive environment that was far less stuffy than the normal comp scene.”

Panelists Georgina Lumb, Jessica Gough, Aislinn Cullen, Michelle Johnson, and Priscilla Fisher discussed aspects of training, entrepreneurship, café ownership, green bean buying, social commentary, and roasting.

“We had amazing feedback from the panel discussion featuring some of the most incredible women in coffee,” says Jones. “Attendees commented that they felt inspired, encouraged, and motivated after hearing experiences that reflected their own.”

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SAME CUP LAUNCH PARTY: (from left) Shirin Demirdag, Jessica Gough, Georgina Lumb, Priscilla Fisher, Aislinn Cullen, Michelle Johnson, and Demelza Jones.

During the event, Jones set up an interview room where attendees were encouraged to share, on camera, their experiences in the coffee industry.

When looking back at the interview footage, a few common underlying themes began to appear.

“Nearly every woman mentioned ‘being taken seriously’ as a struggle while

others also identified ageism and blatant sexism as their experiences,” she says.

There were personal stories about hardship and how much some “had to fight to find opportunities to break into entry-level coffee roles either as a person of color or a trans-woman,” says Jones.

At the end of the night, it was evident SAME CUP is needed.

PHOTO COURTESY OF DEMELZA JONES

Jones describes SAME CUP as a “future-oriented organization,” where the aim is to look forward with “positivity, by necessity.”

“We are now, more than ever, committed to the goal of bringing diversity to positions of power and influence in the industry,” she continues. “That is the future we want and already we are hearing echoes throughout the community about this shared vision.”

Jones’ 10-year plan is to ensure continuous visibility, equality, and awareness by creating a SAME CUP certification so that cafés, corporations, competitions, and events are held accountable on how they run their businesses; they can then buy the certification to display their dedication to inclusivity and diversity in their work culture.

Jones also has plans for a traveling event that focuses on educating and connecting women and queer folk in rural areas through coffee.

“I want more diversity in positions of influence and power in coffee,” she says. “I want more diversity visible for everyone starting in coffee, so people can go, ‘Look at that woman in coffee, I want to be like her.’”

Leadership As soon as Sasha Jade saw Jones’ post on Facebook seeking advice on starting SAME CUP and asking the industry on whether it was needed, Jade jumped on board and became a corporate sponsor.

“Anyone promoting that it isn’t a fair game for women in coffee is great,” she says. “The more that people pop up, and the more women that jump into those positions, and are pushing those ideas, I think the better chance that change will happen faster.”

Sasha Jade, founder of Sydney’s Fat Poppy Coffee Roasters, is Australia’s very own specialty coffee veteran. She points out that the current movement

of coffee activism is a mere reflection of what’s happening across various industries because of the political climate.

“If we look across the globe, you see women everywhere rising up, protesting, marching, organizing, and trying to build power, to get [sexual harassment and intimidation] to stop,” says Jade.

“I don’t think the coffee industry is unique to that. I think because we are a heavily male-dominated industry, it makes sense that the coffee industry, maybe like Hollywood, is feeling that a lot,” she continues. “I think when you have a large proportion of men in a workplace those gender issues really perpetuate more….Over the last few years women are feeling more empowered to speak out, mostly because they realized they are not alone in their experience.”

Ultimately, women have been suffering in silence for too long, says Jade, and have been too afraid of playing the gender card.

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Coffee Activism, Part Two

“Once you play the gender card, you think everyone’s going to be like, ‘You don’t deserve to be here. You only got the job because you’re female,’” she says. “So women are overworking to prove their worth.”

Before starting her business in 2012, Jade had already been in the industry for around 10 years, working across all sectors of specialty coffee including training, teaching, roasting, buying, quality control, and spending time on a coffee plantation for two harvest seasons.

“When I went to start Fat Poppy, I had this realization that in the ten years I’ve worked in diverse roles in coffee I’ve never actually had a female boss,” she says.

She realized just how much that lack of female leadership had impacted her, and from that moment, she was determined to start Fat Poppy and put everything she’s learned across the supply chain into practice.

“I was absolutely terrified, and not terrified of the feeling of, ‘I don’t have enough coffee knowledge,’ but terrified of being like, ‘Can I actually start a business? Do females actually start a business?’” she says. “And I think particularly when I started in 2012, there wasn’t so much of, ‘Yeah, go women!’

Despite working under men who inspired, encouraged, believed in, and educated Jade, she says the one thing they couldn’t teach her was that “women could be bosses too,” she says.

“I didn’t have any hands-on experience or inspiration from any other women in my career that I could follow.”

At this point in time, Jade found herself with “a lot of confidence with coffee knowledge, but with no confidence that I, as a woman could be a female boss,” she explains. And despite the selfdoubt, Jade went for it.

“I decided I had to do this to prove to myself that I could,” she says. “[And] with the hope that in the future, simply because I am a woman in a position of leadership who started a company in coffee, that other women would follow and draw inspiration from what I did.”

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FAT POPPY COFFEE ROASTERS founder Sasha Jade.

Jade says her overarching belief is that “if you can’t see it, then you can’t believe it,” which has been her driving force for Fat Poppy.

“I think as a consequence of being in business, the women who’ve walked alongside me or who know me, have drawn inspiration, and so it’s like, ‘If she can do it then maybe I can too,’” she says.

Looking ahead, Jade is busy building a social enterprise that will offer hospitality training for refugees.

“The idea came from feeling lucky to be born in a country full of opportunities,” she says. “Even as I say, ‘Hey, I’m a woman and it’s been hard, and I have definitely had self-doubt,’ ultimately, I’m still lucky that I’m in

a country where I’m allowed to have those opportunities.”

Be Bold Floozy Coffee Roasters, based in Newcastle, Australia, started to fill a gap in coffee—a gap of visible women roasters.

“We just wanted to shake things up,” say the two Floozy founding members, Kristy Mujana, aka Kmac, and Priscilla Fisher, aka Cill. “Floozy is outwardly branding itself to be into diversity.”

Together with their passion for coffee and Kmac’s knowledge of the industry as a former café owner, Floozy’s bright pink brand was born. Its bold and loud marketing techniques and active presence across social media

PHOTO COURTESY OF FAT POPPY COFFEE ROASTERS

Coffee Activism, Part Two

made Floozy stand out and be noticed for what it was: a brand that supports women in all parts of the value chain.

“When we first started, we really expected that only women would get behind our brand,” says Cill. “We really just thought, this is so pink, and it’s so girly, and men won’t buy it, and that’s okay.”

However, that was not the case: The first 10 or so cafés to stock Floozy were all male-owned.

“They were just like, ‘Yes! This is what the industry needs,’” says Cill. “And we were really surprised, we didn’t think dudes were going to buy it.”

Since starting Floozy 18 months ago, the founders set a profoundly important intention: recognizing the inequality at the origin level.

FLOOZY FOUNDERS Priscilla Fisher, aka Cill (left), and Kristy Mujana, aka Kmac.

“It’s only since starting Floozy that we also realized how much inequality there is at origin too,” says Cill. “Initially, we came into it thinking, ‘We want female roasters to be a thing,’ and as we learned more, it became, ‘We want female single origins to be a thing.’”

Another area where Floozy wants to further support women is in competitions.

“We had our first Floozy-representing competitor competing in the National Barista Championships in Canada,” says Cill. “That’s been a goal as well, and it’s cool to be at a point now where we can support, because obviously women in competition, whether it be baristas or brewers or whatever, is so under-represented.”

The focus this year is also to expand their offerings, as for the past 18 months Kmac and Cill have been renting roasting spaces off other people—but soon, they’ll have their own roaster in Newcastle. “[The roaster] has just landed in Australia, we’ve got a loan, and it’ll [soon] get installed,” says Cill. Floozy’s new roasting space will also be utilized as a training ground for women wanting to learn to roast.

“We are at a point now, where we are in a position of power in our business,” says Cill. “I’ve just submitted my master’s, where I did some research into women and land rights in coffee producing countries, and in a few different ways we’ve built this brand up. We have this global recognition, so we are

50 ] APRIL 2019 » freshcup.com

PHOTO COURTESY OF FLOOZY COFFEE ROASTERS

in that position now where we can reach out to the younger generations that are coming through.”

Doing the Research While working on her master’s, Cill also started to do some work with the International Women’s Coffee Alliance (IWCA) to formulate gender-segregated data at origin, because at the moment, such research doesn’t exist.

“You can’t really implement any effective development policies, if you don’t know the demographics of the people you are trying to reach,” she says. “We don’t really have much of an idea of how many women are producing coffee, and what kind of land they have access to, or what they own, or their access to credit.”

IWCA, which leads women’s empowerment in the international coffee industry by supporting a global network of independent, self-organized, selfgoverning organizations, is extremely under-funded.

Therefore, Floozy has been working to organize fundraisers to help raise money, including helping to create a program for International Women’s Day on March 8, where 30+ cafés across Australia raised money for IWCA’s Research Alliance.

“We are severely under-resourced,” says Ruth Ann Church, IWCA board member and Research Alliance Chair. “So the fact that Floozy and other roasters and cafés are fundraising on our behalf, supporting research and broader goals of livelihood improvement, is tremendous.”

Through their collaboration, Floozy and IWCA are working towards a stronger future for women in coffee.

“This is finally a time where women are uniting in their stories,” says Floozy.

And as women and marginalized professionals in coffee continue to unite, the future of specialty coffee is bright.

“The more diverse voices we have, the stronger specialty coffee will be,” says Jones.

“The ball has started rolling,” adds Jade, “and there’s no stopping it.” FC FIND MORE INFORMATION ON THESE ORGANIZATIONS: Fat Poppy Coffee Roasters www.fatpoppy.coffee Floozy Coffee Roasters www.floozycoffee.com International Women’s Coffee Alliance www.womenincoffee.org The Kore Directive www.thekoredirective.com SAME CUP www.samecup.org Visit FreshCup.com for a list of more resources and organizations for coffee professionals around the world.

FRESH CUP MAGAZINE [ 51

PROCESSING FACILITY at Café Rivense del Chirripó, run by Esteban Ureña Rojas and Ricardo Andrés Ureña Rojas.

52 ] APRIL 2019 » freshcup.com

F

or the fourth and final installment of our series on Costa Rica, we will encompass all we have learned throughout the three previous pieces (Tourism, Harvest, and Processing), as well as my own four years of working with coffee in Costa Rica.

In order to trade coffee in Costa Rica, you must first have a deep understanding of its landscape. If you do not know what you are getting yourself into as a coffee trader in Costa Rica, you will most likely become disappointed.

As a matter of fact, my fiancée and I have found ourselves in the position to market coffees from Costa Rica—more specifically, from the prestigious region of Tarrazú. We are at origin acting as a filter for our roasting partners: we receive over 400 offer samples annually and select just the right one(s) for them.

It takes numerous years of accumulating knowledge, ideas, and connections to feel comfortable maneuvering around the buying and selling of green coffee. In order to add value to the supply chain and find success in coffee trading, you must be innovative, organized, efficient, and aware. Excellence in these traits can really only come from

FRESH CUP MAGAZINE [ 53

Costa Rica, Part Four

experience and knowing the coffee scene of Costa Rica inside and out.

You, the reader, are lucky enough to glimpse the secrets in this conclusive installment of the series.

Competitive When it comes to coffee trading in Costa Rica, it’s a total conundrum that I myself am still trying to wrap my head around: Here you have this minuscule producing country that produces only about one percent of the world’s coffee annually, and yet every trading company seems to be here trying to get a piece of it. There are already cooperatives and exporting companies native to Costa Rica that were created out of necessity, even before communication was so seamless. Now there are a number of external companies, which were historically import-focused, arriving to Costa Rica and, I am sure, to other notable countries as well, creating a

54 ] APRIL 2019 » freshcup.com

HARVEST at Café Rivense del Chirripó.

GREEN BEANS ready for export.

buying/exporting presence. Some attractive advantages Costa Rica offers to these organizations, in addition to its coffee, are its central location (a good base of operations for Latin/ Central America), reputation as the most stable country in the region, and thriving tourism industry.

Producers in Costa Rica are also empowered to ask for higher prices compared to their peers in neighboring countries; this is a victory for stakeholders throughout the supply chain.

As a trader, we must now communicate why it’s important to pay the higher prices requested by farmers, for a product that’s comparable in scoring and terroir characteristics to its counterparts in other countries of origin.

This phenomenon is the result of three main factors. Firstly, the cost of living, and thereafter the cost of production for a specialty coffee farm, in Costa Rica is quite high for its region. Next, labor is more expensive and there is

FRESH CUP MAGAZINE [ 55

Costa Rica, Part Four

directly, unlike many of its counterpart countries, where farmers may typically produce the fruit but sell their coffee to shared wet or dry mills to be sold to the final buyer. This also lends to a unique traceability through the farmer and their processing, all the way down to the soil.

This Year

CUPPING COSTA RICAN COFFEES at Kiosko Coffee with owner Angel Medina (left) and author Perry Czopp.

an enforced minimum wage for everyone, including the coffee pickers. Finally, the low volume of Costa Rican coffee must be compensated by higher prices.

If you are a roaster in the market to buy a coffee scoring at about 84 points and you have to choose between a Guatemalan at $2.80, an El Salvadoran at $3.05, a Colombian at $3.10, and a Costa Rican at $3.50, choosing a Costa Rican coffee comes down to more than price.

Key Factors Where does this leave Costa Rica in the picture of the world coffee market?

As a country that produces very little, has a high cost of living, and has farmers who are empowered, this forces Costa Rican farmers to focus on quality over quantity. However, it is not as easy as it sounds. For some reason, which I myself am still in the process of discerning, it is extremely difficult for farmers to create

56 ] APRIL 2019 Âť freshcup.com

a coffee scoring around 90 points or more, especially at a decent volume.

While quality continues to improve every year, the ceiling on coffee prices, even for those rare high-scoring coffees, can only go so high in a sustainable manner. As many of us may have already learned, coffee is a volumedemanding business. So, for traders focused on moving tons of coffee to their clients who are searching for competitive prices and solid qualities, Costa Rica is a tough bet in many ways.

On the other hand, what makes Costa Rica interesting to trade with for roasters and buyers is the proximity to the producer. There is a large amount of individual producers, and the number continues to grow each year. These farmers grow, wet, and dry mill their fruit from beginning to end. It is quite easy to encounter farmers in Costa Rica that are easy to reach and can sell to a roaster

Every crop year is unique, and this year 18/19 has turned out to be one of the lowest-yielding harvests in decades.

Additionally, farmers informed us that the fruit on their trees went from being green to quickly drying up. Many coffee trees were not able to mature their cherries, an issue we believe to be related to the health of their roots or lack of nutrition. Typically when this happens, quality tends to be higher due to the increased sugars in the coffee cherries and the ability to give more attention to detail by the farmers.

As far as coffee prices go, this situation forces producers to be extremely firm on their prices in order to cope with the loss in their yield. Because supply is limited and demand stays about the same or grows by a slight margin, coffees will be sold far faster this year and at a higher price. As a coffee sourcing service, we are very much looking forward to what this year in coffee will bring us. Expect Costa Rican coffee to jump off of the cupping table this year with honey processes and anaerobics becoming very popular offerings. FC

FRESH CUP MAGAZINE [ 57

Delight in the Dark Ghirardelli Chocolate Company Dark Chocolate & Cocoa Sweet Ground Powder www.ghirardelli.com Serve rich, indulgent drinks with ease when you use Ghirardelli’s new Dark Chocolate & Cocoa Sweet Ground Powder. Crafted from non-GMO cocoa, vanilla, and real chocolate, the powder adds an alluring, decadent experience to your café’s menu offerings from dark mochas to dreamy desserts.

Product is available in three-pound cans and 25-pound bulk boxes.

For more information on the products or to receive samples, call 800.877.9338 or email professionalproducts@ghirardelli.com.

Crisp, Clean Caffeine Barista Pro Shop

Dr. Smoothie Refreshers www.baristaproshop.com Give customers a whole new way to enjoy caffeinated beverages with the Refreshers line from Dr. Smoothie. Unlike traditional coffee drinks, these blends are handcrafted from fruit juice and pure cane sugar, then lightly caffeinated with green coffee bean extract. These crisp, tart, and floral un-

Counter Intelligence Fresh businesses & products

conventional coffee alternatives also offer a clean label appeal to satisfy conscientious consumers.

Made with only premium products, they contain no artificial colors, artificial flavors, or preservatives. Now available in four delicious flavors: Wildberry Hibiscus, Strawberry Acai, Watermelon Cumber Mint, and Blood Orange Coconut Mint. Find Dr. Smoothie Refreshers at Barista Pro Shop.

Out-of-this-World Coffee Zojirushi

GRAVITY POT® Beverage Dispenser SY-BA60 www.zojirushi.com/new_syba60 The award-winning 1.5-gallon GRAVITY POT® Beverage Dispenser SY-BA60 is equipped with a durable stainless steel vacuum liner that provides excellent temperature retention, and a stylish plastic body that resists dents and corrosion. Largest-in-industry 17-oz. drip tray locks in to stay secure, and is easily removable with a release lever. With a one-touch detachable serving base for convenience, the unit is NSFcertified and is compatible with ADA standards.

Hospitality’s Global Summit Host Milano Host2019 www.host.fieramilano.it Do you want to know what the next industrychanging innovation will be? Better yet, do you want to be the market leader who introduces revolutionary products or processes into your region? Host Milano is a biennial event that gathers together the world’s premier distributors, restaurateurs, coffee and tea entrepreneurs, architects, chefs, retailers, consulting firms, hoteliers, and more for an expansive four-day trade show exploring all facets of the hospitality industry. Host2019 will take place October 18–22 in Milan, Italy. Preregistration is open now.

58 ] APRIL 2019 » freshcup.com

Trade Show & Events Calendar APRIL 10-11

APRIL 11-14

APRIL 11-14

APRIL 11-14

RE:CO SPECIALTY COFFEE SYMPOSIUM

SPECIALTY COFFEE EXPO

COFFEE EXPO SEOUL

Boston, MA

WORLD BARISTA CHAMPIONSHIP

coffeeexpo.org

Boston, MA

Boston, MA recosymposium.org

Seoul South Korea

worldbarista championship.org

coffeeexposeoul.com

APRIL 14-15

APRIL 26-MAY 5

MAY 2-4

MAY 9-11

NW FOOD SHOW

KA’U COFFEE FESTIVAL

CAFE SHOW VIETNAM

EU’VEND & COFFEENA

Portland, OR

Ka’u, HI

nwfoodshow.com

kaucoffeefestival.com

Ho Chi Minh City Vietnam

Cologne Germany

cafeshow.com.vn

euvend-coffeena.com

MAY 9-13

MAY 18-21

MAY 21-22

MAY 25-27

CHINA XIAMEN INTL. TEA FAIR

NRA SHOW

PARIS COFFEE SHOW

Xiamen China

Chicago, IL

EUROPEAN COFFEE, TEA & SOFT DRINK EXPO

teafair.com.cn/en

show.restaurant.org

London United Kingdom

Paris France collectifcafe.fr

europeancoffee expo.com

MAY 31-JUNE 2

JUNE 6-8

JUNE 6-8

JUNE 11-13

COFFEE FEST

WORLD OF COFFEE

WORLD TEA EXPO

Indianapolis, IN

Berlin Germany

WORLD LATTE ART CHAMPIONSHIP Berlin Germany

worldteaexpo.com

coffeefest.com

worldofcoffee.org

worldlatteart.org

60 ] APRIL 2019 » freshcup.com

Las Vegas, NV

JUNE 17-19

JULY 25-28

AUGUST 1-3

AUGUST 25-27

LET’S TALK COFFEE

MALAYSIA COFFEE FEST

LATIN AMERICA COFFEE SUMMIT

COFFEE FEST

Rwanda

Petaling Jaya Malaysia

Mexico City Mexico

Los Angeles, CA

mycoffeefest.com.my

cumbrelatino americanadelcafe.com

AUGUST 25-27

AUGUST 29-31

AUGUST 30-SEPT. 1

SEPTEMBER 11-14

WESTERN FOODSERVICE & HOSPITALITY EXPO

EXPO CAFE MEXICO

CAFE SHOW CHINA

GOLDEN BEAN

Mexico City Mexico

Beijing China

Nashville, TN

Los Angeles, CA

tradex.mx/expocafe

cafeshow.cn/ huagang/hgcoffceen/ index.htm

SEPTEMBER 15-16

SEPTEMBER 22-23

SEPTEMBER 23-25

OCTOBER 7-10

FLORIDA RESTAURANT & LODGING SHOW

CANADIAN COFFEE & TEA SHOW

TEA & COFFEE WORLD CONFERENCE

PIR EXPO

Toronto Canada

Hong Kong

Moscow Russia

tcworldcup.com

pirexpo.com

letstalkcoffee.org

westernfoodexpo.com

Orlando, FL

coffeefest.com

goldenbean.com

flrestaurantand lodgingshow.com

coffeeteashow.ca

OCTOBER 18-22

OCTOBER 28-29

NOVEMBER 15-16

NOVEMBER 27-28

HOST MILANO

CAFFE CULTURE

COFFEE FEST

COTECA ASIA

Milan Italy

London United Kingdom

Tacoma, WA

Bangkok Thailand

host.fieramilano.it

caffecultureshow.com

coffeefest.com

coteca-asia.com

FRESH CUP MAGAZINE [ 61

The Last Plastic Straw Better-for-Earth Lattes

By Robin Roenker

62 ] APRIL 2019 » freshcup.com

PHOTOS COURTESY OF OATLY

EXTRACT COFFEE ROASTERS in Bristol held a no-waste latte art event, turning lattes into White Russians for attendees.

I

ntricate swans, flowers, hearts, and more are conjured from nothing more than a shot of espresso, steamed milk, and a barista’s skilled hand. At latte art competitions, the results can be breathtaking.

But after judging is complete in these events, the creations typically go untasted.

“They always look so lovely, and they get wasted, just thrown down the sink,” says Ian Steel, the roaster/owner behind Britain’s Atkinsons Coffee Roasters, which has locations in both Lancaster and Manchester.

Hoping to cut down on the waste, Oatly—an oat milk company originally founded in the 1990s in Sweden, but which now has an international reach— sponsored three simultaneous No-Waste Latte Art events across the United Kingdom in late January.

In addition to Atkinsons’ Manchester location, events were also held at Extract Coffee Roasters in Bristol and Kaffeine in London. After the art competition portion of the night was complete, rather than finding the drain, the lattes were mixed with vodka to make White Russian cocktails, which were passed around to attendees.

“It was very popular. We had around 16 baristas in our shop participating and about 30 or 40 people in the store watching,” says Peter Dore-Smith, Kaffeine’s founder and director, who has hosted highly regarded, four-heat, traditional latte art competitions with up to 64 competitors in his café for the past nine years.

FRESH CUP MAGAZINE [ 63

The Last Plastic Straw

“It’s very popular,” says Dore-Smith.

“In my shop, we use more oat milk than skim milk. It’s our biggest alternative milk. Everybody wants it.”

The surge in demand can be tracked to “more engaged, more conscious consumers,” says Weedon. “Consumers are more interested in where products come from, and the impact they have on the planet.

If enough people make these small changes, it will add up to a large change.”

Eco-Innovation

The recent no-waste event provided the perfect opportunity for Atkinsons— a fixture in Lancaster since 1837—to introduce its newer, second shop to a new audience in Manchester, says Steel.

“This was a wonderful chance for us to say ‘Hi’ to the rest of the coffee community in Manchester,” he says.

“It was an evening of good-natured, caffeine-based frivolity—a gathering of the ‘coffee clowns.’”

The no-waste aspect stemmed from Oatly’s goal of “focusing on how we can improve sustainability across everything that we’re doing,” says Toby Weedon, one of Oatly’s barista market developers for the U.K. But the brand’s focus on sustainability isn’t new.

“Oatly’s founding stemmed from a Swedish university sustainability

64 ] APRIL 2019 » freshcup.com

project to create a plant-based, dairy alternative,” explains Weedon.

Sustainable Substitute Because oat milk is plant-based and doesn’t involve the same innate by-products involved in traditional dairy farming, including methane and carbon dioxide produced by cattle, Oatly’s research estimates that, compared liter to liter, oat milk produces 80 percent fewer greenhouse gas emissions than traditional dairy milk.

Their research also suggests that oat milk requires 60 percent less energy and 79 percent less land to produce than cow’s milk, says Weedon.

The product has quickly caught on in the U.K., to the point that oat milk is now outpacing soy and almond milks at Kaffeine.

At Atkinsons, sustainability isn’t limited to no-waste latte art events.

It’s a daily practice.

“We use fully biodegradable takeaway cups, and we do have quite a big sustainable policy in our shops,” says Steel, who’s even done a short TEDx talk on sustainable coffee sourcing and the importance of supporting the local coffee supply chain. “We try to practice what we preach.”

Atkinsons uses a high-efficiency Loring roaster in its main Lancaster shop. And for its Manchester location, Steel worked with staff at the University of Lancaster to bring a 100-year-old, seven-pound shop roaster back to life using 3D, computer-engineered replacement parts.

“In a way, even saving old machines is a part of sustainability,” says Steel.

“It’s now working really well and knocking out great roasts.”

Someday down the line, Steel hopes his entire roasting operation will be no-waste. As a member of the Centre for Global Eco-Innovation at the University of Lancaster, he is working with partners there to try to develop a fluid-bed heating stove that uses coffee ground waste as a heat source.

They hope to create a product different from coffee logs already on the market, explains Steel.

“It’s a great collaboration with the university. They have a management school and an environmental school there, and we’re all working together in this eco-hub,” he says. “We’re working on the holy grail of eco-innovation: turning waste into energy.” FC

PHOTO AND GRAPHIC COURTESY OF OATLY

Advertiser Index

To view our advertiser list and visit the websites listed below, go to freshcup.com/resources/fresh-cup-advertisers

ADVERTISER

CONTACT ONLINE

1883 Maison Routin

800.367.1883

1883.com

Abbotsford Road Coffee Specialists

646.983.0448

abbotsfordroad.com

38

ABCD

610.828.6000

abcdusa.com

23

AeroPress

650.493.3050

aeropressinc.com

50

Barista Pro Shop

866.776.5288

baristaproshop.com/ad/fresh

29

Brewista

888.538.8683

mybrewista.com

45

Café Femenino Foundation

360.901.8322

cffoundation.org

49

The Canadian Coffee & Tea Show

877.687.7321

coffeeteashow.ca

46

The Chai Co.

888.922.2424

chaico.com

Coffee Fest

425.295.3300

coffeefest.com

30

Coffee Kids

team@coffeekids.org

coffeekids.org

32

Curtis

800.421.6150

wilburcurtis.com

Custom Cup Sleeves

888-672-4096

customcupsleeves.com

Danone Away From Home

888.620.9910

danoneawayfromhome.com

Descamex

844.472.8429

descamex.com

Ditting

810.367.7125

ditting.com

Divinitea

518.347.0689

divinitea.com

Dr. Smoothie

888.466.9941

drsmoothie.com

Eastsign

sales@eastsign.com

eastsign.com

45

Eco-Prima Tea

877.ECO.Teas (326.8327)

ecoprimatea.com

28

Fresh Cup Magazine

503.236.2587

freshcup.com

65

Ghirardelli Chocolate

800.877.9338

ghirardelli.com/professional

68

Golden Bean

503.706.1330

goldenbean.com

59

Gosh That’s Good! Brand

888.848.GOSH (4674)

goshthatsgood.com

11

Grounds For Health

802.876.7835

groundsforhealth.org

44

Healthy Kids Concepts

916.730.5275

healthykidsconcepts.org

44

Host - Fiera Milano

39.02.49971

host.fieramilano.it/en

51

HotShot Coffee Sleeves

800.991.3702

hotshotsleeves.com

57

Java Jacket

800.208.4128

javajacket.com

24

Lotus Energy Drinks

888.702.5584

lotusenergydrinks.com

41

Malabar Gold Espresso

650.366.5453

malabargoldespresso.com

19

Modern Oats

888.662.2334

modernoats.com

39

Monin Gourmet Flavorings

855.FLAVOR1 (352.8671)

monin.com

3

OVerus

732-233-4559

overus.org

57

Pacific Foods

503.692.9666

pacificfoods.com/foodservice

13

Peerless Coffee & Tea

510.763.1763

peerlesscoffee.com

35

Planet Oat

800.242.2423

planetoat.com

67

SelbySoft

800.454.4434

selbysoft.com

32

SerendipiTea

888.TEA.LIFE (832.5433)

serendipitea.com

57

Service Ideas

800.328.4493

serviceideas.com

55

StixToGo

800.435.6789

stixtogo.com

31

Sustainable Harvest

503.235.1119

sustainableharvest.com

47

Theta Ridge Coffee

800.745.8738

thetaridgecoffee.com

57

Toddy

970.493.0788

toddycafe.com/business

29

Torani

800.775.1925

torani.com/foodservice

33

World Tea Expo

866.458.4935

worldteaexpo.com

Zojirushi America

800.264.6270

zojirushi.com

66 ] APRIL 2019 » freshcup.com

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