Coffee marketing seems to be all about meeting consumers needs and wants. Country of origin, while less important to the overall taste than the varietal of the coffee plant, is often displayed in large font on the front of labels for coffee bags. According to Sam of Olympia Coffee Roasters, sumatra blend is considered a roasting defect but it is still widely produced and distributed due to it’s popularity among coffee drinkers. The Roasting process also plays a large part in developing flavor in the coffee bean but is usually in smaller font on labels. There seems to be an overall theme of “just give the customers what they understand or like” which I find odd. Educating your consumer to really understand the product you’re selling so they can appreciate it should be important as well. Why not make the bean varietal the largest text on a bag of coffee, spread an understanding of roasting styles by placing descriptions on packaging, and avoid catering to consumer’s ignorance just to make sales?

Some companies like Batdorf and Bronson are interested in spreading their coffee and shops to people throughout the country, they want their coffee to reach as many people as possible. While other businesses like Olympia Coffee Roasters try to provide high quality coffee beans and specialty coffee beverages to their local community in the hopes of securing a loyal fan base through superior flavor. The goals of a coffee company dictate whether they are 3rd, 2nd, or 1st wave coffee business. The first wave was focused on mass production, advertisement, packaging, and getting more people into drinking coffee. The second wave dealt with arabica beans taking the stage, the origins of beans becoming a business interest, and roasting styles being explored however there was a focus on branding, consistency, and expansion that not everyone enjoyed. This divide started the third wave which brought artisinal specialty coffee drinks produced at the highest possible quality by thoroughly experienced baristas, their overall goal being cup quality not expansion. Batdorf and Bronson was described to us by Sam Schroeder of Olympia Coffee Roasters as a second to third wave company while OCR is completely third wave in their business practices.

Our coffee farm would be located in the tropics, 20 degrees north and south of the equator. Ideally located near active or recently active volcanic activity so the oxisols receive nutrients and carbon from volcanic ash. Our seeds would be a local varietal that favors the climate near our farms location. The coffee farm would be small enough that it can produce a meaningful yield but still be worked by hand for less environmental impact. Since coffee plants prefer elevation they would be located on an incline, an area not many plants can grow in, around 3000-6000 meters high depending on local high and low temperatures and the location of the frostline. Local labor would be employed at fair livable wages with minimal machinery used. In addition the farm would compost, utilize rain water, minimize removal of local plants, produce as little waste as possible and ideally would have solar panels. The land would be terraced up the incline to trap as much water as possible and hopefully allow for dry farming with the aid of collected rain water. Dry grasses or hay would be lain between crop rows to catch and hold rainwater as well. Other local crops would be grown alongside the coffee but nothing that would produce a canopy too thick to allow sunlight for the coffee cherries to develop their flavor.

Since the cherries don’t all ripen at the same time the cherries would be picked by hand as they ripen to avoid waste by harvesting them all at once and tossing the unripe cherries. After the cherries are harvested they would be fully washed using a high efficiency, low water usage, coffee washing machine we heard about on our field study that washes many pounds of beans with just a liter or two of water. The beans would then be fermented to remove any remnants of coffee cherry fruit. After drying, the cherries would be ready to send out to buyers. Ideally a contract would be lined up with a buyer before the crop was finished for the beans produced and they would be bagged up and shipped out. Even more ideal would be a small coffee roastary attached to the farmhouse to allow for local coffee sales and less pollution from shipping overseas.

Some people are so disconnected from their food now days that the thought of dirt and earth do not even cross their mind when they crunch into a carrot. But coffee is different, coffee is “Earthy”, no matter your depth of knowledge on the subject, most people relate coffee to the Earth, ground coffee resembles dirt, strong coffee can sometimes be described as “mud”. From it’s color to its flavors, coffee really boast its relationship to the Earth.

The ideal climate for coffee farming would be in a well drained soil with a lot of available nutrients between 1000-2000 meters above sea level, on a 15% slope between the Tropics of Capricorn and Cancer. Deep sandy loam and Volcanic soils support coffee growth very well. When you look at the regions surrounding volcanoes it becomes obvious why they support coffee farming so well. You will often find a nice slope to farm in the mountains for starters, you also find good soil for farming coffee, maize, tea and other crops. Volcanic soils or andisols are relatively young and have not undergone extensive leaching or weathering, for this reason they still retain a lot of the nutrients from formation. These soils are also well draining but have a unique structure that contains small vesicles that retain water for use by the coffee plant during dry periods. All these factors together are the reasons that some of the worlds best coffee comes from volcanic regions of the world.

Climate change will affect the coffee industry due to increasing temperatures and drought that will directly affect coffee farming. One of the biggest threats to coffee is what call a borer beetle or Hypothenemus hampeiI. The borer beetle lives in warmer climates and usually only affects lower quality, lowland Robusta coffee. With rising temperatures, H. Hampei has been able to survive at higher altitudes ad have more of a negative effect on Arabica coffee. It has been estimated that in Columbia, farmers would have to move up 167 meters for every 1 degree of warming to protect their Arabica coffee. In East Africa, the farmers will not have the choice of moving up in elevation because higher elevations in that region would be unsuitable for coffee farming.

In addition to changes in viable growing elevations, water usage will have a large impact on coffee quality and quantity. Less reliable rainfall will lead to less predictable harvests. Countries that traditionally use water to process coffee cherries will be forced to adapt and use less/no water to process. This will result in new flavors (good or bad?). The traditional terroir of coffee will shift with the climate.