I get asked once in a while,"Is this coffee Organic?"
Well, the short answer is "No", I currently don't have the certification to use the word Organic on my product.
However, that clean cut question and answer really over simplifies the reality of the world we live in.... a more accurate picture requires better questions, and longer answers.....
The main focus in my coffee purchasing is to get great tasting coffee with a short-as-possible supply chain (my distributor purchases it from the farmer, if possible). The short supply chain does a number of things, it gets me the freshest green beans (great taste), it puts more money into the hands of the farmer, and it means that i have reliable information on the farm practices and growing conditions, since many small producers are not certified to call their product "Organic". Often they use the term "grown traditionally" as they don't have to pay anyone to say that.
For them, and for myself, the issue comes down to some cost / benefit maths...
The one biggest reason that i don't produce a certified organic product is that i don't have the time it would take to maintain compliance with the certification. There's a fair bit of paperwork involved, inventory tracking, and some inspections. At the moment i'm pretty focussed on the operation of the business and I have a bit of a hard time getting all my administration tasks completed as it is. There is some inventory management software that would help with tracking the certified beans but then we get into the next big reason.... it costs money.
Generally the certification schemes are less affordable for smaller producers. The cost for my production would be about $1 per pound, just for certification. With additional expenses, inspections, stickers, time spent on paperwork / money on software, added costs of some beans, i would expect my wholesale price would have to go up by around $2 to cover that. The economics will improve as i grow, as larger producers get a lower price point since the work required from the certifying body is not really affected by the scale of production. Also, the workload involved with compliance doesn't really increase with scale either.
But, as it is now, pushing the retail price up say $3 / pound will, i think, make my product less accessible to a lot of people.
So, that's the costs there, but for the benefits.....
I'm not sure there is a net benefit. A lot of green coffee that i buy is certified organic, probably 60% of it is (and another ~25% is certified by Rainforest Alliance), but a lot of the really good coffee that i get comes from small producers who are not certified. Some of these producers are much like myself, in that they don't have the time or money to put into the certification process. I understand there are other reasons some producers choose not to certify... In Ethiopia, for example, coffee farms have been producing for hundreds of years and some see the certification schemes as a form of neo-colonialism. In many parts of the world, coffee rust fungus has been decimating production, and there are no organic solutions to that problem. If i was committed to an organic product there would be some origins that would be not available, or very expensive, or poor quality, or some combination of those.
My priority in sourcing green is to get great coffee from small producers with a short supply chain, as i stated above. This allows me, when my brokers tell me that these farmers grow their beans traditionally, and invite me to go visit the farms, to have some faith in how they operate, even if i don't have time right now to go on trips to producer regions. Likewise, at my scale of production, i can offer many of my customers the opportunity to stop in at the roastery to see the certification markings on the bags and see what goes into each blend.
So, if anyone out there is reading this, do you prefer to buy roasted coffee that is certified? Does a lack of certification prevent you from buying Stoke Roasted Coffee?? How much more are you willing to pay for a certified product??
Let me know your thoughts in the comments!!!
Well, the short answer is "No", I currently don't have the certification to use the word Organic on my product.
However, that clean cut question and answer really over simplifies the reality of the world we live in.... a more accurate picture requires better questions, and longer answers.....
The main focus in my coffee purchasing is to get great tasting coffee with a short-as-possible supply chain (my distributor purchases it from the farmer, if possible). The short supply chain does a number of things, it gets me the freshest green beans (great taste), it puts more money into the hands of the farmer, and it means that i have reliable information on the farm practices and growing conditions, since many small producers are not certified to call their product "Organic". Often they use the term "grown traditionally" as they don't have to pay anyone to say that.
For them, and for myself, the issue comes down to some cost / benefit maths...
The one biggest reason that i don't produce a certified organic product is that i don't have the time it would take to maintain compliance with the certification. There's a fair bit of paperwork involved, inventory tracking, and some inspections. At the moment i'm pretty focussed on the operation of the business and I have a bit of a hard time getting all my administration tasks completed as it is. There is some inventory management software that would help with tracking the certified beans but then we get into the next big reason.... it costs money.
Generally the certification schemes are less affordable for smaller producers. The cost for my production would be about $1 per pound, just for certification. With additional expenses, inspections, stickers, time spent on paperwork / money on software, added costs of some beans, i would expect my wholesale price would have to go up by around $2 to cover that. The economics will improve as i grow, as larger producers get a lower price point since the work required from the certifying body is not really affected by the scale of production. Also, the workload involved with compliance doesn't really increase with scale either.
But, as it is now, pushing the retail price up say $3 / pound will, i think, make my product less accessible to a lot of people.
So, that's the costs there, but for the benefits.....
I'm not sure there is a net benefit. A lot of green coffee that i buy is certified organic, probably 60% of it is (and another ~25% is certified by Rainforest Alliance), but a lot of the really good coffee that i get comes from small producers who are not certified. Some of these producers are much like myself, in that they don't have the time or money to put into the certification process. I understand there are other reasons some producers choose not to certify... In Ethiopia, for example, coffee farms have been producing for hundreds of years and some see the certification schemes as a form of neo-colonialism. In many parts of the world, coffee rust fungus has been decimating production, and there are no organic solutions to that problem. If i was committed to an organic product there would be some origins that would be not available, or very expensive, or poor quality, or some combination of those.
My priority in sourcing green is to get great coffee from small producers with a short supply chain, as i stated above. This allows me, when my brokers tell me that these farmers grow their beans traditionally, and invite me to go visit the farms, to have some faith in how they operate, even if i don't have time right now to go on trips to producer regions. Likewise, at my scale of production, i can offer many of my customers the opportunity to stop in at the roastery to see the certification markings on the bags and see what goes into each blend.
So, if anyone out there is reading this, do you prefer to buy roasted coffee that is certified? Does a lack of certification prevent you from buying Stoke Roasted Coffee?? How much more are you willing to pay for a certified product??
Let me know your thoughts in the comments!!!
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