[image from Jim's Organic Coffee]

So I’ve said that Starbucks’ fair trade coffee’s alright on Tea Leaves, but apparently, some disagree. One anonymous reader and ex-Starbucks employee says Starbucks’ fair trade coffee just tastes bad, and that FT days would elicit customer complaints.

Well — I think any discriminating coffee drinker would agree that Starbucks can’t hold a candle to Monkey & Son‘s Velvet Hammer. If you’re gonna buy bagged coffee, Starbucks is out, though maybe during the Cafe Estima Blend repackaging, Starbucks improved the beans, which would account for the difference in opinion between anonymous and I. Either that, or my tastebuds just aren’t as refined as I’d like to think.

Still, this is a serious concern, as many coffee drinkers will be coming to fair trade the first time via Starbucks, and may start to associate fair trade with grossness. Why’s Starbucks’ fair trade coffee nasty?

Starbucks isn’t the only chain that’s pushing socio-enviro friendly but tastebud unfriendly coffee. Both I and The Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf‘s rep Jay agree — The Bean’s one organic blend is quite gross. Of course, Jay used the unpopularity of this offending coffee to rationalize The Bean’s disinterest in expanding their organic or fair trade offerings.

Could Starbucks and The Bean be intentionally choosing poor quality beans to discourage customer appeals for fair trade organic java?

This concern with quality is one that socio-enviro friendly coffee companies have brought up. Quality is not required for fair trade certification, though quality improvement is encouraged. People like James Cannell, prez of Jim’s Organic Coffees, are leery about guaranteeing a floor price regardless of the bean quality. And according to The Gourmet Retailer, the coffee industry as a whole is primarily concerned about quality, “believing that if retailers don’t have quality coffees to sell, consumers will not return to purchase more.”

Well, yeah. Quality’s important. And gross coffee is a big part of the problem. And to get quality coffee, companies usually have to maintain long term relationships with farmers, which generally encourages fairer trading practices.

But as one who embarassingly bought Folgers as a less-informed young girl, and a witness to Fogers’ continuing popularity on supermarket shelves, I’m not sure quality is the simple solution either. According to the International Institute for Sustainable Development’s 2003 study (careful — 198-page PDF — not for the lighthearted) coffee needs to be of “adequate quality,” but markets don’t always reward superior quality. And worse, even when consumers pay more for superior quality coffees, that money doesn’t necessarily go into improved social or environmental benefits. Their conclusion: “while a quality output is important, it is equally important to consider the process of production and trading relationships in order to improve sustainability.”

Meaning — in an ideal world, all people would drink only high quality, yummy coffees, and the extra money paid for those coffees would go to farmers. In the real world, many people like their sugar with coffee and cream, a la Beastie Boys, and couldn’t care less — or can’t financially afford to care — what the coffee part tastes like.

Still, most socio-enviro friendly coffee companies, are small specialty companies, with a high emphasis on quality. They cater to customers who shun the cheap stuff. I’m wondering if this quality issue is the one Ric of Groundwork Coffee is worried about.

I’ll find out tomorrow, 1:30 p.m, in a fully-caffeinated meeting at Groundwork’s offices.

Update: Details from the Groundwork Coffee meeting with Ric :)

Filed in: fairtrade coffee starbucks losangeles california environment

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