For paid subscribers: retail coffee prices have soared in recent years, driven by climbing commodity costs and tariff stupidity. Some of those pressures have now started to ease, and yet retail prices continue to rise. Will they ever come down?
I'm a coffee writer and creator of The Pourover. Based in Scotland, I have over a decade of experience in the specialty coffee industry. Ask me about coffeewashing. It's pronounced Fin (he/him)
Chatbots telling us what we want. Robots making our coffee. Baristas reduced to smiling servers. If Starbucks and other brands get their way, this is the future: a frictionless, interactionless, lifeless coffee experience.
The internet is full of warnings about the dangers lurking within coffee, whether it’s mould, mycotoxins, or other contaminants. The truth, however, is far more prosaic.
For paid subscribers: A fascinating academic paper delves into the ways Korean Buddhists, after centuries of drinking tea, have started to embrace coffee.
Demand for coffee is growing, and climate change threatens supply—yet consumers don’t want to pay more. In an intensified and unequal industry, however, someone always pays.
For paid subscribers: One of Howard Schultz’ final acts as Starbucks CEO was inflicting upon us a line of olive oil-infused coffee drinks. He was so confident the Oleato would change the world. It didn’t.
