August 2021 Newsletter
"Oh lord, we're stuck in lockdown again!" (sung to the tune of Creedence Clearwater's Lodi.) It's just as well that we've never really got out of lockdown mode or we'd be scrambling to keep up. A number of customers have queried what I meant when I mentioned "tight roasting conditions" in last month's newsletter.
It's not just the roasting conditions, but more or less the whole logistics chain from green bean to roasted coffee at your doorstep. I'm sure everyone is well aware of the trouble we've been going through to get green coffees. Now, just when international shipping is settling down a little bit, political problems in Colombia and Ethiopia look like causing supply disruptions into next year. We should be OK up to Christmas, though.
If we look back at times BC (Before Covid) our business was set up to "roast on demand". This meant totalling up the orders we received in the morning then arranging to roast the coffees involved that day, with only a few kilos of any roasted coffee kept in stock. Under current lockdown conditions we can only roast one day per week, so we have to try and predict the orders a week ahead. The actual hours we can roast are limited as well, making everything feel a bit squeezed.
The good side of all this is that it forces us to pay close attention to our customers' buying habits, and it really minimizes face-to-face contacts. We do sometimes run out of a particular bean, which can cause a couple of days delay in shipping, but so far we're doing pretty well.
You may have found some of your recently purchased coffees shipped in kraft-outer paper bags. This has come about as a result of our investigations into compostable bags, flagged up in October 2020.
We got hold of sample bags and tested them to see what happens. After 9 months, the answer is, unfortunately, not a lot. There weren't even any signs of our paper loving snails and slugs eating the kraft paper outer, let alone any breakdown of the plastic inner bag. Filling the retrieved bag with water showed no signs of pinhole leaks in the plastic liner. It appears that only industrial composting actually breaks down the polymers involved in these bags in reasonable time.
Since you can't just chuck them in a backyard compost bin and expect them to decompose, we won't be using them in the near future. If a truly biodegradable bag comes along we'll reconsider. The next best thing is our move to the bags with kraft paper outers. This cuts the plastic usage by half with all the follow on environmental benefits you'd expect. Since they're not using rare and expensive inner plastics the increase in cost is small enough for us to absorb.
And finally, our monthly special coffee roasting slot will be filled by
$56 Per Kilogram
Strong
Strong, well balanced flavour, aroma and acidity and a rounded body. A great after-dinner coffee.
Since we only had 8kg available last month we sold out in a couple of hours after the newsletters went out. The feedback from those who did get some was excellent: "Very much in the style of the greatly missed Colombian Maragogype, thank you." We've managed to get enough green coffee that it may even become our substitute for the current Colombian if the problems there continue.
Until next month,
Alan
