Point of View
These days, the news from the world of coffee and tea is difficult, at best, but this issue brings us some hopeful stories, including Dan Bolton’s feature on tea retailers successfully pivoting to online sales. Takeaways include the following bottom lines: 1) There is no going back to how things were before Covid-19; 2) transparency and the ability to deliver fresh tea redefine the premium category; and 3) safety, convenience, and the ever-present threat of Covid-19 add urgency to tea’s historical reputation as a healthy beverage that combats inflammation and boosts immunity. These observations are not only original, they are also quite helpful for those facing important decisions as business owners.
Another opportunity for those on the retail side of tea to prosper is to differentiate their products by way of understanding and providing education on botanicals, a strong tool for differentiation and value-added potential. Read Peter Keen’s take on this. And gain deeper insight into financing your tea venture in these precarious times with our story on capital and credit, also by Keen.
On the coffee side, this issue brings us a look at the consumer market in Korea. Joel Peterson Ivre, who is based in Seoul, investigates the pandemic scene just as the city prepares to host Café Show Seoul just around the corner in November.
Our Q&A this issue is with coffee luminary Willem Boot, who wears many hats, from educator to farmer, and whose Finca Sophia just took top honors in the 2020 Best of Panama auction. Here, he reflects on the challenges facing the coffee industry, as well as projects he is involved in, including Coffee for Peace, which is helping revitalize Colombia’s coffee sector.
We also report on two somewhat controversial news stories in this issue: Starbucks’ release of a new traceability app and Atomo’s launch a new coffee-like “molecular” beverage that actually contains no coffee whatsoever. While we report the news we think you’ll want to know about, it’s also important that we provide dissenting views, especially when the stakes are high.
The Atomo launch is touted as a gesture against climate change — because its “molecular coffee” is not made of coffee, one crop that climate change threatens — but it might also be viewed as a cynical way of taking advantage of a bad situation. Instead of helping farmers work with their realities to develop hybrids that use less water than average or are resistant to disease, Atomo has created a non-coffee beverage from agricultural waste whose origin is not shared. Despite raising nearly US$12 million in funding to bring this product to market, its sensory characteristics might not carry it too far.
In the case of Starbucks, while the new traceability app is an improvement over simply not naming the many farmers who grow the monolith brand’s coffees, the app doesn’t go as far as the average local roaster has for many years. For the better part of a decade, the trend among small specialty roasters is to give as much information as possible about what’s in your cup — the farmer and his or her farm, varieties of Arabica, details about processing, regional information, and so on. But more importantly, the Starbucks app neglects transparency entirely. Despite the fact that the C-market is still just hovering above rock bottom ($1.11 per pound as of this writing), you’ll never know how much, or how little, Starbucks is paying farmers. And this is shameful for a company as large and powerful as Starbucks, which has the resources and infrastructure to change the game.
Look for an article in the next issue of STiR on iFinca, a company that is providing customers full transparency by using blockchain technology to verify the farmgate price paid to the people without whom you wouldn’t have your morning cup.