R w a n d a

K a n z u

N a t u r a l

Nestled west of Lake Kivu, the Kanzu station thrives amidst mineral-rich volcanic soils, where smallholder farmers cultivate Bourbon variety coffee alongside sustenance crops. Rigorous quality control processes at the station, including cherry flotation, dry fermentation, and sustainable water management, ensure exceptional coffee production. Expect balanced and sweetness throughout the drinking experience, with prominent fruited notes, thanks to the soft fruit esters imparted during the natural processing.

How much do I need?

Rwandan coffee production has evolved significantly, emerging from colonial coercion to offer truly exceptional coffees. Despite a devastating past, Rwanda has rebuilt, relying on its bright, floral, and citrus-forward coffees. The country's commitment to specialty coffee has fostered partnerships with international buyers and roasters, driving economic growth and elevating Rwanda's coffee profile globally. We work with cooperative-led mills to process smallholder-produced coffees, purchasing both micro and macro-lots from across the country.

About Our Origins

We currently source coffee from more than twenty producing nations across the globe, and regularly seek to establish new relationships as we continue to navigate various territories with each passing season. By combining decades of experience sourcing specialty coffee, our team embarks on a journey every year to design a menu of single-origin offerings that balances quality, diversity, and impact, giving our community nothing short of the best coffee that the market has to offer. Origin has implications for the daily coffee drinker just as it does for our green buying team, informing everything from flavor profile diversity to the minutia of global trade. Read more below to discover how origin might alter the way you think about your next morning cup.

With less than 25mg of caffeine per 12oz cup, these coffees still have full flavor. Whether you are sensitive to or abstain from caffeine, you can enjoy them in the morning, noon, and night.

Measuring Caffeine Content with the Lighttells CA-700

We rely on the Lighttells CA-700 to accurately measure caffeine content in our coffee samples. This device uses spectrophotometric analysis, assessing how light interacts with the sample to determine both caffeine and chlorogenic acid (CGA) concentrations. By following a precise and repeatable process, we ensure that every measurement is accurate and reliable.

Before testing, we carefully prepare the coffee sample to ensure an accurate reading. First, we filter the coffee through a paper or fine mesh filter, removing particulates or oils that could interfere with the measurement. If the sample is freshly brewed, we allow it to cool to room temperature to prevent temperature-related inaccuracies. For highly concentrated samples, such as espresso or cold brew, we may dilute the coffee to ensure it falls within the device’s measurement range of 10–500 mg/dL.

Once the sample is ready, we use a micropipette or dropper to measure 0.1 mL and carefully place it into the CA-700’s sample well or cuvette. This minimal sample requirement allows us to test efficiently while conserving resources.

More from Lighttells

1800 MASL

Elevation influences coffee cultivation, impacting flavor and quality. Higher elevations offer cooler temperatures, slowing the growth of coffee cherries, allowing more time for complex sugar and flavor development. This results in coffee with brighter acidity and a nuanced flavor profile. Additionally, cooler conditions at high altitudes reduce pests and diseases, making these coffees highly prized for their superior quality and distinct taste.

Red Bourbon

Bourbon (pronounced Bor-Bone) originally hails from the island known as La Réunion. It spread to Brazil and onwards, and now is grown worldwide. It is slowly being replaced by more 'modern' varieties with better yield and disease resistance, but we love that classic, juicy Bourbon profile when we come across it.

Since the 15th century, cultivation of the coffea genus has disseminated from its birthplace in Ethiopia to equatorial countries across the globe. In the process, genetic adaptations and mutations have allowed for the introduction of an increasingly high number (the true count is unknown) of unique variations underneath the Arabica species alone, each with their own distinguishing properties and identifiers. For Onyx, part of our commitment to sourcing some of the greatest coffees in the world includes having an adept understanding of the many varieties currently being cultivated, and a devotion to seeking out the highest performers among them. We intentionally list the variety of every single coffee we publish, but the implications behind this information are much less commonly known. Read on to learn more about the importance of coffee varieties, how they impact flavor, and the role they’ve played in the history of our industry.

What Are Coffee Varieties?

When understanding coffee varieties, it is helpful to think of other commonly known fruit species that vary. One frequently used example is apples. All apples fall under the Malus domestica genus, but beneath that species there are thousands of apple varieties grown worldwide, all with a unique color, shape, texture, and flavor. Among them are Honeycrisp, Pink Lady, Granny Smith, and Red Delicious – all familiar apple varieties found at our local grocery store, but each one appearing and tasting dramatically different from the other. The sweetness and pastel pink hue of a Pink Lady sets it apart from its sister fruits, just like the acidity and size of Honeycrisps make them desirable in their own way. Different regions and soils bear different apples, and they are all sought after for special reasons and purposes.

Coffee varieties follow a similar pattern. There are varieties of many monikers, such as Pacamara, Pink Bourbon, Gesha, and Java. Much like apples, they all have distinguishing characteristics that pervade through the roasting process – characteristics that influence the color of the cherries when they are ripe, and the shape, texture, and flavor of their seeds once roasted. Pink Bourbon and Java seeds have a pointy shape and are bright in acidity, while Pacamaras can be identified by their remarkable size. Gesha, on the other hand, is a worldwide renown variety for its intense florality and silky smooth tactile. There are, however, greater merits to the importance of different varieties than simply the cup quality.

Are Varieties Significant?

Indeed, the diverse disparity between varieties informs pivotal decision points at nearly every level of our industry. Many of these reflections, however, begin at origin when producers are faced with the monumental weight of choosing which varieties they wish to plant, maintain, and eventually harvest over the course of the next few decades. Different coffee plant varieties carry unique traits that make them more or less effective, accessible, and coveted. Planting cultivars of desirable stock is one of the first and foremost steps in a farmer's journey to enhance his or her profitability and reputation within the market.

Over years upon years of colonization and cultivation, coffee seed genetics have been adapted and bred to enhance aspects of their efficiency as producing plants, such as their yield and capacity for disease resistance. Frequently, varieties will be bred to excel in a particular coffee growing region, which is how the Paraneima and Marsellese varieties were conceived and are now prolific in Honduras and Nicaragua respectively. Within their domestic climates, these kinds of varieties are highly accessible and are regularly encouraged, distributed, and sometimes even enforced by local governments; especially governments whose economic stability relies heavily on that coffee being successfully sold and exported. Outside of their native climates, it is not unusual for these biologically engineered varieties to struggle. Regardless, indigenous cultivars grown on the soils they were designed for are a sure bet for the farmer as much as the buyer, reducing barriers between the farmer and an abundant harvest, which can free up resources suitable for advancing post-harvest processing techniques and investing in better equipment that enhances quality.

Occasionally, high-performing coffees indigenous to one country or another are transplanted somewhere else entirely, with the theory that they will also prove to be viable in other climates and adapt uniquely to the native soil. One excellent example is the SL28 variety. Originally designed by Scott Laboratories in Kenya to complement the high mineral composition of the volcanic soil there, the SL28 cultivar has been successfully transplanted and can be found thriving all throughout Latin America in countries like Costa Rica, Colombia, and Ecuador. While this cultivar pairs excellently with the phosphorus-rich soils in east Africa, it has proven its ability to prosper with high yield potential and remarkable cup quality abroad. It is an exciting thing to gander at a shelf of retail coffees and identify a variety grown unusually far from its familiar territories. We anticipate similar success stories with other transplanted phenotypes as specialty producing communities around the world continue to grow closer in communication.

Some varieties, despite their desperately low yield or inferior resistance to disease, are deliberately cultivated because of their highly coveted cup quality. The Gesha variety, for example, has populated the global coffee competition stages for a couple decades now. Competing companies will search the world every year for the intense floral and sweet tropical fruit flavors that well-manicured Geshas are capable of delivering, in hopes of showcasing them victoriously on the mainstage. Even outside of competitions, roasters will regularly pay exorbitant prices for microlots of this extraordinary variety, tempting producers all over the world to consider cultivating small lots of their own, even though they are difficult plants to maintain and are known to deliver a fraction of the cherry that more common varieties typically yield at harvest. Because of the high markup on such sought-after varieties, it is not uncommon to pay a premium just for a single 10oz retail bag. More affordable lots have become available in the market since Gesha first ‘boomed’ in Panama in the early 90’s, but their quality is not always verifiable. The best Geshas are astoundingly floral, unlike anything else we’ve ever discovered. They also have a tendency to maintain a certain silkiness in texture on the palate, which regularly draws the drinker back for more.

In the end, the variety listed on each and every one of our coffees is not simply a data point, but a testament to a long and convoluted story. This story delineates the life events of a coffee tree that lives far away, which can be retraced across many seasons all the way back to the moment the producer decided to plant it there. But the true story of coffee varieties does not end on the tree – it testifies to the hard work of the producer on their path to prominence in the vast and growing specialty coffee market, the roaster and their broad menu of coffees from all over the world, and culminates its campaign in your cup. So the next time you pick up a new bag of coffee and taste it for the first time, consider the variety behind it. Think about the story they have to tell, and the beauty they contribute to the delicious cup before you. Then, enjoy.

Rwanda

The regions of Rwanda, Burundi, and Uganda all share a similar harvest window. The pickings begin around August and extend through October. A few months ahead of most East African countries, the freshness season extends from December to April typically, with our purchasing and selection happening within the months of September and October.

About Harvest Seasons

Coffee seasonality can be a tricky thing to understand. In countries like Kenya and Ethiopia, we tend to get all of our coffee in one fell swoop. Within growing regions like Colombia, we often see harvest times spanning an entire calendar year. With staggered arrival and harvest times from all over the globe, it's not easy to know if coffee is fresh. We strive to source coffee directly and quickly, cutting out long consolidation times at the mill and warehouses. The harvest season for coffee varies significantly around the world, based on regional weather patterns and sunlight. In regions close to the equator coffee can be harvested twice a year due to relatively stable, year-round temperatures and dependable weather patterns.

These primary and secondary harvests allow for an ongoing export season, where coffee harvesters can sell their product more than once per year, allowing for more frequent cash flow. In contrast, other regions have a well-defined harvest season influenced by distinct wet and dry periods. As all specialty coffee is hand-selected, timing the harvest is critical; coffee picked too early or too late can affect the flavor profile, resulting in less desirable qualities. Once processed, coffees undergo a period of rest and stabilization before exportation, which may take up to thirty days in some cases. We publish harvest dates with an approximate timeframe of when the coffee was picked and processed, allowing consumers access to harvest times for all single origin offerings.

Natural

This is the oldest recorded method used to process coffee. It involves drying the seeds without removing any of the cherry at all. The fruit ferments with the seeds still inside, taking on a raisin-like appearance as complex chemical reactions enrich their flavor potential over several days, sometimes weeks. Once the cherries have reached 10-12% moisture content, the fruit is removed and the seeds are exported. The process requires very little if any water to execute, making it a historically prudent choice as developing coffee-producing nations were industrialized and standardized. However, the modern-day equipment currently being leveraged to moderate these fermentations didn’t exist in the early days, and as the industry pushed the boundaries of natural processing it became synonymous with dirty, moldy characteristics in the cup. Over time, it was relegated as less desirable in exchange for more consistent methods. As the coffee industry has evolved in the last 30 years towards more artisanal and culinary aspirations, revolutionary advancements in agricultural technology have vindicated natural processing techniques, bringing them back into the fold. Contemporary naturally processed coffees have the ability to demonstrate a complexity and personality that customarily eludes other methods, boasting bold fruity flavors, a silky smooth texture, and candy-like sweetness. Producing partners that excel in regulating the fermentation process of naturals have been able to deliver consistently exceptional results season over season.

Processing Methods

When it comes to coffee, there is always more to discover than what meets the eye. The journey our coffee takes from the rolling hills where it was grown to the delicious cup in your hand is tumultuously long. Each seed has a layered history behind the flavorful characteristics they portray in the final brew. One of the most crucial steps in this story occurs immediately after the harvest. The method with which our producing partners process their fresh coffee cherries once they’ve been picked has immutable implications in the flavor potential of the final product. A detail often omitted on your everyday grocery coffee bags, this is a pivotal decision that every producer must eventually make, and has eternal ramifications in the life of the lots they sell. Read on to learn more about the four most commonly used methods of processing, how they directly impact your coffee’s flavor, and how this singular distinction can dramatically change the way you buy and brew your coffee.

All over the world, coffee grows on vibrant tropical trees situated in mountainous regions across the equator. When the cherries that encase the raw seeds (beans) turn bright red, farm workers will pick the ripest of them and transport them to a place commonly referred to as a wet mill. At the wet mill, producers escort the harvest step by step through what is arguably its most defining moment: the processing method. The purpose is ultimately to separate those precious seeds from the inside of their sticky fruit-flesh exterior and dry them for export. There is technically no limit to the combination of techniques producers can use to accomplish this, but they can be summarized across four predominating methods: Natural, Washed, Honey, or Experimental.

The Buying and Brewing Process

The method used to process a particular coffee is key in determining what it will taste like. The assigned tasting notes aren’t meant to prescribe flavors but instead offer an explanation of how that coffee’s unique origin, variety, and indeed its processing method have orchestrated a specific tasting experience. Natural or experimentally processed offerings frequently deliver juicy and tropical fruit or berry-forward drinking experiences, while washed and honey processed coffees lean toward floral and tea-like characteristics. It is possible to find fruity flavors in washed or honey processed coffees, but they usually manifest as stone fruits or pome fruits, like peaches and apples. If you are someone who tends to dislike juicy and fruit-forward coffees, look to avoid natural or experimentally processed offerings. If a coffee suggests a floral or tea-like experience, it has likely undergone a washed process, and in addition to those notes you can expect a light body and very subtle fruit flavors, if any.

Just as each processing method changes what a coffee will taste like, they are equally significant contributors to the coffee’s behavior when brewing. Coffees that have been processed with extended periods of fermentation (naturals, experimentals, and sometimes honeys) have degenerated in some way or another, and are thereby more soluble. You don’t need to grind very finely to adequately and evenly extract the flavor from these coffees, and you may find that on filter methods, quick drain times typically coincide with coffees that have been processed this way. On the other hand, washed coffees are oftentimes quite dense, and it takes a little extra work to effectively brew these offerings. Consider using water directly off boil, and grinding a bit finer if you are afraid of under-extracting your brew.

Every single coffee in existence has endured an elaborate journey before coming into our possession, and the unique flavors they exemplify in the cup give a spectacular anecdote of that journey. One way we can better understand not only the story that a coffee has to tell but the strategy to best prepare it is by first comprehending the methods that were used to cultivate and process it. From washed to natural, experimental or honey, there is something for everyone to discover, and emerging innovations in coffee processing are just one of many ways our industry pushes the boundaries of what is possible every single season.

Raised-Bed Dried

Raised-beds are scaffold like structures that elevate perforated trays that hold coffee parchment or cherries. This has high airflow and yields a longer drying time.

Raised-beds are scaffold like structures that elevate perforated trays that hold coffee parchment or cherries. The holes in the structure allow for airflow on a near 360 degree level, ensuring that the coffee dries evenly when proper bed turning is practiced. Some even go as far as covering the beds with a partial block from the sun, which extends drying and ensures the cell structure of the coffee goes largely undamaged from the UV.

About Drying Methods

Drying coffee takes many forms, each with its own unique upsides and downsides. Raised beds have gained popularity over the years, with noticeable upsides. Once coffee is fermented, it’s moved to a raised bed, allowing for airflow to first remove surface moisture, then slowly the seed loses moisture over the course of ten to sometimes thirty days. This process, known as anhydrobiosis, stabilizes the seed allowing for shipment and for uniform roasting.

More and more focus has been placed on this process, which has created new and innovative techniques surrounding this process. By modulating temperature and exposure to UV, coffee producers have achieved vastly different flavor profiles simply by modulating the amount of sunlight coffee receives when drying. Techniques implementing slow drying processes have gained popularity, with many cuppers scoring these coffees quite highly. New technology is emerging as well, in the form of sensors placed within drying beds which provide data like relative humidity, as well as temperature over time, reading much like a temperature curve on a roaster. This innovation in drying techniques propel the industry forward, producing higher scoring coffees, and more stability as coffee is shipped.

Loring S70 Peregrine

Prior to production, each roast goes through a rigorous dial-in process, where we fine-tune our temperature curves. We roast to tight tolerances, with no more than 1° deviation from target temperatures, ensuring quality and consistency in each batch.

Selecting A Roaster

Coffee roasts by absorbing thermal energy from a heated environment, which causes it to brown, expand, and ultimately transform into something that can be ground and partially dissolved into the delightful beverage we know and love. Most roasteries rely on one of three methods of heat transfer in order to enact this transformation – but the arsenal of equipment available at our facility grants us access to all of them.

Across our wide array of roasting devices, we are able to choose between all three methods of heat transfer – conductive, convective, and radiant – to complement every single coffee we source and curate our offerings toward an even higher degree of quality. The ability to distinguish our menu in this way is a privilege not typically afforded by smaller roasteries and notoriously neglected by mass-production chains. It means that even the most minute details of your cup have been calibrated to meet our standards of excellence, with no stone unturned.

Each type of heat transfer comes with a respective list of benefits in the cup. Conductive roasters apply heat by direct contact: the coffee physically touches the internal components of the machine. This method lends itself to exceptionally well-developed sugars and a more desirable tactile experience. On the other hand, devices that employ a primarily convective system, or heat transfer by the rapid movement of piping hot air, tend to output coffees that are marvelously light in body and possess a supremely complex acidity. Finally, roasters using radiant heat are relatively new developments in the industry, but have proven to deliver incomparable clarity in the cup through the use of halogen heat lamps.

With this understanding, we are able to consider the needs of each and every coffee that arrives in our warehouses and handpick a roasting system to complement it. Where sweetness and body are more desired, we will enlist our predominantly conductive heat with our two Diedrichs. More delicate coffees showcasing a bright acidity are best served with a convective system, such as our Loring 70kg machine. Our most exotic offerings require incomparable clarity and balance; something we can achieve using the radiant heat transfer provided by our cutting-edge Stronghold S7 roasters.

Ground: #123.8
Whole Bean: #78
Roast Level: Expressive Light

Nordic-style roasting is a moniker applied to the very light roasting style that many employ in Northern Europe. We've opted to refer to this as Expressive Light. If a coffee falls within this category, you can expect a bright acidity that dominates the cup, as well as a silky but tea-like tactile and a sweetness that is light and short.

Measuring and Describing Roast Profile

While roast level doesn't tell you everything about a coffee, we've been working hard to collect roast information on each coffee that passes through our roastery. We are primarily gathering our roast color data from an Agtron M Basic III, an abridged spectrophotometer measuring the wavelength transmittance of our roasted coffee. All published numbers are in the proprietary Agtron Gourmet scale, which we have adapted to create our own reference system for roast level according to color. Each number published is of one roast, unless it's published as an average. We calibrate our Agtron stringently every hour to ensure we are referencing and publishing solid data. And while saying abridged spectrophotometer makes us sound smart, these readings aren't super helpful to people making pour-overs. With the help of our on-staff cuppers, we've developed terms that we find helpful while referencing roast level for our coffees.

Roast Development

All of our roast category names refer to the amount of development we apply in a roast. There are many ways (infinite) to heat a coffee, and our general approach to roasting our coffees is to balance bright acidity and sweetness. This approach sees us often adjusting roasts by half a degree or seconds. As we talk about development, we talk about it in two main ways: temperature and time. It's possible to achieve a 'darker' roast by adding time to a roast while keeping the drop temperature static. While we were creating a tool to track and map our offerings, referring to roast level by talking about development helped bridge the gap while retaining the understanding that while roast can impart flavor, it often will be minimal in our endeavor to strike a balance between perceived acidity and sweetness.

Learn more on agtroninc.com.

5819 LBS

Day after day, producers, roasters, and cuppers alike all spend countless hours of work to produce and roast small, traceable lots that we within specialty coffee call microlots. Ranging anywhere from a few pounds to full containers, this nebulous category refers to a traceable single-origin, producer or even a specific picking date. We work on the producer or exporter level to separate, label, and import coffees that will ultimately end up as single-variety, single-producer lots. This directly works against the grain in a culture of commodification, as the machines turn to build the monolith that is (capital C) Coffee. Long has specialty coffee beat their drum to the tune of traceability, from the first producer's name listed on label, to now where we list prices paid to the producer and countless other details. As an industry, we continually hone in on what to communicate to consumers in the name of traceability. We do so to honor the hard work of producers while adhering to our skills as roasters, knowing that the combination of those two can be transcendent – where we have the lucky role in playing a hand in shifting the consumer perspective from the hegemony of commodity, to realizing that coffee is more complex than they ever realized. Is all that hard work keeping things separate worth it? That is up for you to decide…

Filter, Espresso

Our Education Team, guided by a commitment to quality, uses a blend of sensory skills and technology to brew the best coffee in our cafes and brew guides. We strive for vibrant and mouthwatering acidity, complex and approachable flavor, persistent and clear sweetness, and structured and pleasant mouthfeel, ensuring you're getting the best coffee experience.

Preferred Extraction:

Coffee beans are full of soluble materials that become accessible upon grinding, but each compound responds slightly differently when boiling hot water is introduced. The most soluble materials, namely acids and salts, react quickly in the very earliest stages of extraction. These elements contribute most of the end cup’s flavor, delivering bright and fruity flavors from lighter roasts and essential balancing agents from darker roasts, but when isolated from more complex solutes they are dreadfully unpleasant to drink. Towards the middle of brewing, we gain access to simple and complex sugars that add a considerable dimension of sweetness to the brew. The final stages of extraction bear smaller amounts of soluble material, such as fats and bitters that bring texture, complexity, and stability to the tincture.

The goal of any brew is to create balance between all three stages; understanding that the absence of balance leads to over or under-extraction, represented in the way the coffee tastes. The flavor of an unbalanced brew tends to signify which stage of extraction is misaligned the most, portrayed by which soluble compounds are most prevalent in the cup. A salty, sour, or watery flavor signifies under-extraction, because the brew did not effectively advance into the latter stages where sweetness and texture are achieved. It is missing the essential components dissolved near the end of the extraction period, which bring those deviant acids, salts, and sugars back into balance. On the other hand, tasting bitterness or a lingering dry finish would suggest over-extraction, due to a disproportionate amount of time spent in the final stage. This brew is out of balance because complex sugars and acids from the early stages are overpowered by excessive bitter compounds extracted during the last stage. All of this is useful knowledge, but how can we move to troubleshoot these rogue brews?

How to ‘Dial in’ to the Perfect Cup

Dialing-in ultimately amounts to finding the most favorable balance between each stage of extraction. There are many variables that can be adjusted to manipulate the progression across stages, but none are as significant as the quality of the ground coffee.

Grind size is the quickest and most effective way to change how your coffee extracts. This is partially why we always recommend grinding your coffee fresh, right before brewing. Most modern coffee grinders have variable settings, allowing you to adjust your grind to be coarser or finer, depending on your needs. The coarser the grind, the less surface area is exposed, limiting the ability for water to access soluble flavor compounds in the seeds. The finer the grind, the more surface area is exposed, making solutes considerably more accessible – for better or worse. Grinding too fine accelerates the extraction process, and can cause the latter stages of bitterness to dominate the cup. Similarly, grinding too coarse limits available solutes and reduces their contact time with water, causing acidic, salty, and sour flavors to supersede. The perfect grind size lies somewhere in the middle, and finding it is the most efficient way to achieve a balanced extraction and the best-possible brew.

Taking the leap to try a brand new bag of coffee can be an intimidating thing, especially when the first couple brews don’t go as planned. Everyone deserves to enjoy their morning brew, and that’s why we list recommended grinding and brewing parameters alongside every single coffee we post on our website.

Located just west of Lake Kivu’s blue-green (and deadly) waters, the Kanzu station is set against verdant green hills where coffee, sugar cane, and bananas are grown. There is a fertile crown of land around the ancient volcanoes where ash has collected and caused the soil to be rich in minerals. Smallholder producers grow small amounts of bourbon variety coffee alongside sustenance crops of bananas and beans. The Kanzu station begins collecting cherries in March, and harvest stretches all the way to July. Thanks to stellar management and harvest planning, the Kanzu station separates the harvest into outturns. (much like Kenya) Cherries that arrive at the washing station are floated to separate the less dense cherries away, just as an initial quality check before fermentation. A Mckinnnon disc pulper then strips away the outer skin of the cherry, leaving a mucilage-covered seed that undergoes a dry fermentation for up to 18 hours. The wastewater is then treated with Effective microorganisms (EMTechnologiesTM) to ensure runoff and erosion are managed, securing precious water resources for the surrounding community. The community surrounding the Kanzu station has been the subject of focused aid efforts since the mid-’90’s which has transformed the Rwandese coffee industry following the end of the genocide. Much of this has been due to USAID and Dr. Tim Schilling, who has led the effort to build collection stations and developed cooperatives. This work has led to the burgeoning market access that specialty coffee grown in Rwanda has experienced over the decade.

Green Cost

The subject of paying for green coffee is inherently complicated. While the amount paid is very important, the payment terms and type of contract negotiated during the purchase are also paramount. Paying $5/lb of coffee can be a great price, but could be detrimental to a producer if the payment terms exceed that of their needs. Here we will dive into not only what was paid for the coffee, but how the coffee was purchased. There is a glossary of terms to be found below which will aid in your understanding of industry terms.

Farm Gate - This reflects what is paid to the producer of the coffee at the farm level. Oftentimes in terms of our relationship coffees, FOB is fairly close to the farm gate price, except for countries like Ethiopia and Kenya, when it is very difficult to trace back all the way to the producer.

FOB - Free on Board. This means that the seller is responsible for any overland fees that happen before the coffee is on board the ship. This is our most frequently listed green cost, as it is the most simple way to present what we pay a seller, but it does not reflect what the person growing the coffee was paid.

EXW- This most often reflects the 'spot' price that we paid for a coffee. All of the cost is paid by the importer, and more often than not the FOB price as well as the transport costs are unknown.

Transportation Cost

This number represents the cost we incurred while the coffee was moved from the producing country to our roastery in Arkansas. The amount of information we supply here is correlated to the transparency grade we issue the coffee. The better the grade, the more we can break down this information.

The price listed below is the cost we incurred while moving this palletized coffee from New Jersey to our roastery in Arkansas. All other import and export fees are unknown at this time and included in the Green Cost.

Production Cost

The following list includes many of the costs associated with producing our coffee. We have always maintained transparency as a principle but have lumped these things under the label of “production costs” without going into detail. While the following list isn’t exhaustive, hopefully it gives you a picture of the work, expense, and investment involved in executing coffee at the level that we do. At this time we are listing our cost of production for each pound of coffee at around $5.45. There are obviously many other aspects to running a business such as shrink, mistakes, new equipment and maintenance, but this works as an arbitrary cost associated with making one box of coffee. 

Fixed Costs
These are costs associated with simply having a business. Things like utilities of internet, natural gas, phones, rent, business licenses, fees, etc. These things increase every year. For example, most commercial leases increase by 2% every year. We periodically look at these costs and try to reduce expenses, but work in this area are small moves of the needle as these are mostly the same and usually increase every year. In 2019, we invested in a solar energy system for our roastery. It was installed in 2020 and we are seeing a great return in terms of monthly costs of electricity. 

Packaging
This is all the things that go into packaging the coffee from the roaster to your house. There’s the biodegradable bag, the recyclable box, the compostable mailer, different boxes for bulk shipping, the paper that pads the coffee, tape, and a few odds and ends. (Read about our new retail packaging HERE). These costs are separate from the green and roasted coffee but a part of the cost of producing coffee ready to ship and consume. We want our coffee to arrive in a secure fashion, looking like it did when it left our roastery: with style and design but also keeping the environment in mind. Shipping packages inevitably has waste associated and we’re working towards sustainability at each step. 

Labor
We are proud of our team and the way they are so thoroughly dedicated to excellence and to being the best at their respective roles across the industry. We work to make coffee jobs both sustainable and celebrated. We pay salaries, provide health insurance, and give regular raises. Our coffee doesn’t taste the way it does without all of our team working had and performing at a high level. Often we have a handful of staff that get celebrated, but everyone on our team contributes and is valuable. Our roastery production crew has earned a small commission on coffees sold since 2017. Onyx is not just a brand or a design or a café, we are truly made by every person on our team.

We all know it takes work to make anything. Our approach has more labor involved than you may think. Because we visit every Relationship Coffee producer, that means our green buying team of Jon and Dakota typically spend a total of six months traveling. We’re committed to visiting and cupping on the ground, this inevitably is an investment of time, of money, of long lay overs, of encountering government coupes and protests, and forging some of the greatest friendships and seeing some of the most beautiful landscapes imaginable. 
Another place we are highly invested in labor is in our coffee quality control. Our QC manager literally cups every single batch of coffee that we roast, scores it, makes notes, gives feedback. These records can be found in Find My Roast. This is essentially a full time job. This is something that we technically don’t have to do, but in chasing our goal of having the world’s best coffee we can’t know exactly how each roast measures up without cupping it. 

We have more roasters than we technically need. We roast in small batch size, meaning we don’t max out the capacity of our roasting machines. This translates into us roasting more actual batches and necessitates more time. This concept is driven by our desire for quality.
 
We have a creative team that helps create all things visible, digital, and print. These folks are very talented and have really helped push the dream of Onyx to the next level. We believe that coffee can inherently be great, but having something that looks and feels good helps inform expectations, helps bring value, and tells the stories in coffee in a way that is tangible and important.

These are a few of the jobs we feel really have more involvement than might be imagined, but throughout Onyx there are touch points of intentionally positioned team members to help create the best possible coffee experience. 

Coffee Roasting
Roasting itself creates loss in coffee. There’s the straightforward fact that when coffee is roasted it loses between 7% and 8% of its weight, meaning that if you bought 1000lbs of a lot you end up with 920lbs of roasted coffee. We also use what’s called an "optical sorter" which sorts all of our coffee after its roasted and kicks out 2% of all coffees. Sorting just creates an overall cleaner coffee, eliminating any outlying beans that are discolored, are quakers, etc. This totals around 10% loss of coffee before it even is bagged for retail or wholesale. We donate this rejected coffee to local food banks, non-profits and halfway houses.

Then there’s profiling the coffee. We roast test batches before we release coffees to dial in roasting profiles, and we often make multiple tweaks. The coffee is then cupped multiple times, used to create brewing recipes and guides and used in training. We also pull a sample of each batch of coffee to quality control. 

We are committed to shipping only the absolute best coffees to our customers, and these measures—although costly—are in place to help create trust between you and us.

Taxes
We all know what this is. We set aside and submit money every quarter for taxes along with paying all of the weekly and monthly taxes we are obligated to pay. This can be tough for a small business as there are ebbs and flows in cash flow, and taxes are often not paid in conjunction with the sales season.

Fair Trade Minimum

Since coffee was first sold, producers have sought to increase or maintain the price of their product. In 1988, the first certified Fair Trade coffee was sold in Holland as a partnership with a cooperative in Mexico. This was a major stepping stone in coffee trading, as it promised farmers a safety net when the volatile commodity market of coffee plummeted. Fair Trade ensures that farmers will be paid a minimum price for their product, which serves mostly as a safety net when all other prices drop. As the specialty market has grown, criticism for Fair Trade has grown alongside it. Consumers and coffee professionals alike have misunderstood Fair Trade Certified coffees to be the answer to a growing coffee price crisis. Many have used these ethical labels to continue to pay coffee producers a minimum price for a product that has exploded in popularity through the years. We are careful not to minimize what Fair Trade and other certifications have accomplished through the years, viewing a set minimum price as a stepping stone to a larger conversation about how the industry treats valuable producing partners. As we avoid settling for the bare minimum, we always pay at least double Fair Trade minimums based on the quality of coffee we purchase.

In a recent decision, Fairtrade International made a historic raise to its coffee prices. The new Fairtrade minimum price for washed arabica coffee will be $1.80/Lb, an increase of $0.40/Lb. Additionally, the guaranteed premium for coffee sold as both Fairtrade + Organic (FTO) is increasing from $0.30/Lb to $0.40/Lb. These changes bring the base price for FTO to $2.40/Lb, up 26% from the current $1.90/Lb level. The new Fairtrade prices will come into effect for contracts issued from August 1, 2023, onwards.

C Market

In the modern world, coffee is valued as one of the most important agricultural exports of developing nations. Most coffee in the world is produced as an ubiquitous green seed to be roasted by large roasters and sold on a shelf with little information about where it comes from and who grew it. Like other agricultural commodities, coffee is traded in future contracts on many exchanges. This price is dictated by global economic forces such as supply and demand, which is set by the largest suppliers and the largest buyers. The price of commodity coffee has been in major decline since the collapse of the International Coffee Agreement, and also due to forces outside the coffee industry as a whole. The minimum price that a producer has gotten for their product since the collapse of the ICA has hovered around $1.20/ lb, but within the last few years it is most frequently found to be under $1.00/ lb, which many industry experts consider to be under the cost of production. The commodity price of coffee never dictates the prices we pay for coffee, due to the precedence that quality takes in the specialty industry. We factor in cup score, variety, process, country of origin, and other factors when drawing up our private contracts with producing partners. Choosing to list the commodity market price at the time of our purchase shows the distinct difference in markets, as we strive for a more holistic and honest approach to the way that coffee is purchased.

Cup Score

As we travel the world and taste coffees, we evaluate all the coffees we taste on a scoresheet developed by coffee professionals around the world. Through this, we can participate in and use the language of an industry standard set of guidelines. This allows us to honestly assign a numerical score to any coffee we taste, creating the ability for a starting point in a discussion of the quality of each coffee. We list the cup score of each coffee we purchase as part of our ethos of transparency, not as an end all be all statement of drinkability. Many of us agree that we’d rather drink an 86 point coffee rather than an 88 point coffee. We list it because the cup score serves as a reference of quality, allowing producers to negotiate higher prices based on the hard work they’ve done to achieve this quality. This is the imperfect industry answer to the commodification of coffee, which can be bought and sold based on economics, rather than the nuances and sweetness in the cup…

For more information on coffee sensory science, check out the Coffee Quality Institute.

Lot Size

Lot size is seemingly straightforward when taken at face value, but it gets more convoluted as you look closely at the vernacular of the specialty coffee industry. Terms such as micro-lot and macro-lot get awfully blurry as we buy coffee from different parts of the world. Like many other things in the coffee industry, there is not one catchall term that will tell you if your coffee is indeed a micro-lot. The size of a lot rarely informs us of the quality of that lot, which is a difficult concept to shake coming out of the early years of specialty coffee. Lot size informs us of one thing: the size of that lot. We can, however, take this time to talk about how coffee is separated at the production level, and how we make sense of it from country to country.

The first way we see coffee divided up is by region. These lots are often built up of many farms, Coops, or washing stations. This often signifies that the lot was built to reflect the flavor characteristics of the region. Colombia comes to mind when we think of regional blends, and these blends can often be very valuable to roasters and producers if transparency is upheld and fair prices are paid. We partner with friends like Pergamino Coffee to build regional lots, where within we seek to uphold transparency and quality.

The second way we see coffee represented is by a cooperative, farm, or washing station. Oftentimes this is where you begin to see 'micro-lot' sized offerings, which can often be built from several parts of each farm, or a few farms in one area. (Sounds a bit like a regional blend, doesn't it?) These lots represent an entire harvest, where individual day lots are blended to form an offering that is of a decent exportable size. This ranges from just 100-300 kg all the way up to several full containers of exportable green. One thing is to note, forming a single farm lot can often take just as much cupping and profiling as the large regional blends, due to each day or weeks pickings being separated and cupped to ensure they fall into quality standards.

The final way we see coffee represented is by day lot. This is where terroir comes into play, due to organic variations in the environment such as shade, soil type, tree age, and many other factors. Nearly any quality control program that is on a farm level will evaluate harvest this way. This allows producers to isolate parts of the farm or crop that is facing some challenges, as well as to select truly remarkable day lots to represent the pinnacle of their work. These small offerings range from just a few kilograms up to several thousand. We see these lots most often during auctions such as Best of Panama and Cup of Excellence, where they fetch high prices. Each one of those lots not only represents the hard work of each producer, but they also represent the amount of coffee that was filtered out during this quality control stage. This focus on the minuscule may seem like semantics to some, but as you zoom back out to your cup you realize just how many decisions were made before it arrived in your hands.

Pay Structure

These ratings do not signify the “ethical grade” of a purchased coffee, instead they are created to show data to everyone. These ratings simply signify how much we understand what the grower of our coffees actually make. This is not an “us” vs “them” mentality of Roasters & Producers against Importers & Exporters or Farmers vs Customers that narrative can be damaging and usually full of fallacies. All parties are needed for this beautiful industry to thrive and our position is that sharing data has no moral position. It is simply numbers and math. We’ll leave the morale high ground to others even if this data is filtered through preconceived notions.

A+

This rating signifies we have published the price and payment went directly to the producer as well as all parties involved in logistics. Money exchanged was only though Onyx and producing parties. No procurement payments or bank financing were made. Mills, Exporter, and Importer are all known and quality scores are published. Farm gate, FOB, Milling, Logistics proven.

A

This rating signifies we have published the price and payment went directly to the producer . Money exchanged was only though Onyx and producing parties. Importer was hired to move coffee in the United States. No procurement payments or bank financing were made. Mills, Exporter, and Importer are all known and quality scores are published. Farm gate, FOB, Milling, Logistics proven.

A-

This rating signifies we have purchased directly from a cooperative or association and published price of FOB and wire to the head of a Cooperative or Farmers Association who pays members we are working with at Origin. We ask and publish what farm gate price was that is reported from farmers. Mills, Exporter, and Importer are all known and quality scores are published. FOB, Milling, Logistics proven.

B+

This rating signifies a published price of payment that went directly to a producer but producer also buys cherry from other neighboring farms. Verbal confirmation and published prices of Farm gate are acquired for coffees, but we only pay producer in contact. Mills, Exporter, and Importer are all known and quality scores are published.
FOB, Milling, Logistics proven.

B

This rating signifies we have published FOB price and pay directly to Cooperative or Exporter at Origin. Farm Gate price is proprietary or lacks of records of payments. Mills, Exporter, and Importer are all known and quality scores are published.

B-

This rating signifies we purchased this coffee from an Importer and visited farm, cooperative or exporter with the importer. We negotiate the contract with the importer representative and not the producer or cooperative. We pay directly to the importing company, Farm Gate price is provided by importer and published. Price, Logistics and Quality scores are published.

C+

This rating signifies we purchased this coffee from an Importer. We pay directly to the company. FOB price was provided by importer and is published, Farm gate price is unknown or proprietary information and unshared. Price and Quality scores are published.

C

This rating signifies we purchased this coffee from an Importer. We pay directly to the company. FOB and Farm Gate price is unknown or proprietary information and unshared. Price and Quality scores are published.

F

Little to no information is known about the producer and process itself. Transactional system without understanding the factors that combine into getting the coffee produced and exported.