The Year in Coffee News

After Years of Union Avoidance, External Pressure Is Building on Starbucks

Nearly five years since the first Starbucks location unionised, contract negotiations are still dragging on. Can external pressure from shareholders and human-rights campaigners make a difference?

Will Sky High Retail Coffee Prices Ever Come Back Down?

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?

It’s a special bonus coffee news roundup, featuring a look back at the last twelve months. I write one of these at the end of every December—it’s a lot of fun (and a lot of work) to compile—in order to determine the overarching themes in coffee over the previous year.

In 2024, some themes included:

Coffee prices and climate shocks: the price of both arabica and robusta surged over the year, in no small part due to bad weather across many coffee-producing regions.
Corporate competition, specifically Starbucks’ struggles and Luckin’s re-emergence: the Seattle-based coffee giant had an annus horribilis, replacing its CEO half way through as it tried to rediscover its mojo, while Luckin soared in popularity and dabbled with expanding to the U.S.
Another big year for coffee unionizing, with hope of a first contract for Starbucks Workers United (although the year ended with a nationwide strike due to lack of progress), while there were successful—albeit contentious—union drives at Blue Bottle and Compass Coffee among others.
There was lots of corporate coffeewashing, and the question of whether coffee is good for us or not continued to go unanswered.
And, of course, there were some goofy stories too: like how Rudy Giuliani launched a coffee brand in a desperate attempt to raise some cash (it didn’t go well).

To read the full year in review—and I hope you do as it’s a doozy—head on over to Fresh Cup’s website:

CLICK HERE TO READ 🗓️

For more on the price surge and climate crisis, why not catch up on my latest deep dive—a look at what the past twelve months means for the future of coffee:

I’ll be back on Friday with my annual State of The Pourover, but until then have a lovely New Years Eve however you celebrate, and thank you for reading my work over the past year.

And goodbye from Merlin, who is ready to party: