The coffee supply chain is complex, and often misunderstood.

The quest to learn about it usually begins with coffee drinkers wondering how their coffee is made. Coffee drinkers soon become baristas wondering how their coffee is roasted, and roasters wonder where the coffee comes from, and so the journey begins.

After opening Omar & the Marvellous Coffee Bird in 2010, our coffee curiosity was well underway. By 2013 we had begun travelling to coffee-producing countries worldwide to quench our thirst for more, more, more!

Travelling to origin versus ‘Direct Trade’.

When we tell people we are travelling to origin, the assumption is that we are buying coffee directly from farmers (Direct Trade) and that our time is spent solely visiting farms to ensure the coffee is grown and processed well. This is not the case.

There is a complex and often confusing chain of custody over our beloved coffee beans. The farm is just the first link in the chain. The desire to understand the entire coffee supply chain is the driving force behind our travel to origin. As we deal with the end consumer of the product — that’s you and us — we feel it’s our responsibility to understand and explain what lies behind a simple cup of coffee.

Supporting the existing supply chain

We believe that supporting existing supply chains is the way to have a long-term effect on the coffee’s quality and the farmers’ wellbeing. As a very small roastery, we cannot devote the time and resources necessary to foster direct trading relationships with coffee farmers. However, we are lucky enough to work with suppliers that have the skills and means to station teams of people around the world, sharing knowledge and improving coffee quality and livelihoods throughout the coffee supply network. Importantly, they are more than happy to show us around at origin and explain what is happening (in front of and behind closed doors).

So is Direct Trade just a fancy-schmancy marketing term? Sort of.

Direct Trade is a seemingly simple term that has caused much confusion and discussion within our coffee industry in Australia. Does it mean that the roaster buys straight from the farmer? Most farmers don’t have business management training, let alone computers, internet or phones. How does the farmer invoice the buyer? Do they even have an international bank account? How does the coffee get from origin to us? Does the farmer take the coffee to the ship themselves? Do they have a truck? Who picks the coffee up from the port when it arrives in Australia? Does this mean that Direct Trade deals with a coffee farmer, processing mill, exporter or broker?

From confusion comes some clarity!

Once you’ve been to origin and visited a farm, you start to think, “Finally, I get it! I know where coffee comes from”. It all seems to make sense. You see the steps and challenges involved in growing coffee at a farm with your own eyes. Then, just as you start to get confident with your newfound knowledge, you visit a coffee mill where they process, grade and pack the coffee. You’re left wondering who you would talk to if you wanted to buy coffee. Is it the farmer? The mill? Every question you ask is met with “it depends.”

You realise that the more you see and learn, the more questions you have. This is certainly true of our experience with coffee. Coffee likes to grow in countries with complex politics, ethics, economics and geography. Each coffee-producing country (even different farms or regions within the same country) has different circumstances and challenges to navigate. Before coffee can be grown, processed, packed and shipped, there are many steps to consider, whether it’s soil type, governmental intervention, finance, logistics, machinery accessibility, availability or just the weather.

For these reasons and many more, we buy coffee through an importer with strong relationships with local buyers and agents living in these coffee-producing regions. Use the local knowledge and expertise, we say! It’s a bit naive for a roaster to think they can travel to a country and simply find the best product and find a quick and easy way to get it home to their roastery. Ideally, each coffee company would grow its coffee and control every step of the process (growing, processing, drying, hulling, sorting, grading, roasting and serving), but that’s a lot of work!

So, why do we travel to origin?

To get more confused? Well, kind of. Realising that not everything is in your control or scope is an important but bitter pill to swallow. Nevertheless, it is essential to know our place within the coffee chain and to see how much hard work goes into getting coffee from around the globe into our hands. It reinforces the idea that our job at the roastery is not to create amazing coffee — that is the work of many. It’s our job not to screw it all up!