Fresh Cup Magazine, providing specialty coffee and tea professionals with unique insight into the trends, ideas, products and people that shape their world.
Issue link: http://freshcup.epubxp.com/i/50871
LETTER TO THE EDITOR new year is upon us, and for Fresh Cup, 2012 promises to be an exciting one. This month, associate editor Dan Leif and I will split off to different countries in Central America to explore origin projects we will cover in future issues. In April, Fresh Cup will be among the Portland- based specialty coffee businesses excited to welcome the indus- try to our city for the annual SCAA Exhibition. And perhaps most special of all, this summer Fresh Cup will publish our 20th-anniversary issue, marking two decades of monitoring specialty coffee's forward progress. When writing a start-of-the-year column, it's always tempt- ing to pontificate about what we might see in the next 12 months and beyond. That temptation is even stronger this month because our cover story ("A Seat at the Table," p. 40) addresses specialty coffee's relationship with the restaurant scene—a topic that could be a key component in the industry's future. An increasing number of restaurants are lavishing the same attention on their coffee menu as they do on their wine list, and that increased focus from another sector could bode well for our beverage. In reporting that story, I sat down with Edwin Martinez, owner of the unique retail shop Onyx Coffee in Bellingham, Wash., and also an importer of Guatemalan coffees. He spent a good part of this year assembling the coffee program for high-end Seattle restaurant Canlis, and we talked extensively about the past, present and future of coffee in restaurants. But while he has big hopes for the restaurant sector, Martinez is simultaneously excited about another, somewhat surpris- ing area: office coffee. In Martinez's opinion, the quality of coffee in U.S. offices has plummeted dramatically in recent decades because the category has more to do with function Opportunity amid the cubicles than taste. "Office coffee is all about productivity," he says. "It's about not wanting people to leave the office to get coffee because you need them working. You need them awake and productive, but you don't need to serve them something that tastes good." However, in Martinez's view, office workers are appreciating great coffee in higher numbers, and it's starting to change that category. "Now people are leaving the office for something that tastes good, even though there's coffee in the office," he says. "And that might be making them less productive at work." The solution, then, is office coffee that satisfies that quality demand. It's a transition that Martinez thinks will hap- pen in the months and years ahead. "Somebody's missing out on an opportunity for office coffee," he says. "That's a huge, huge market." Most people in specialty coffee probably feel like they have a skewed perspective on office coffee—myself included. Coffee is our livelihood rather than a productivity booster, and so it is treated with the appropriate reverence where we work. But I experienced the plight of sub-par office coffee in my pre-cof- fee-job days, and I regularly hear tales from friends and family about the bad-news brews in their workplaces. I know a lot of people who would be happier—and more productive—with better beans and devices in the office kitchen. What's key in Martinez's theory, though, isn't necessarily that the demand is happening in offices, but that the demand is happening at all—because it's a sign that the demand for better coffee may soon exist everywhere. It's restaurants now, offices soon, and ideally, even more categories to explore in the future. LETTERS TO THE EDITOR welcomes letters to the editor at comments@freshcup.com. Letters must be 250 words or less. Authors must provide verifiable phone number and city and state of residence. CHRIS RYANEDITOR 10 Fresh Cup Magazine freshcup.com F r esh Cup CYNTHIA MEADORS