The Fair Trade label is hard to pin down, especially when it comes to coffee. From 2007-2009 there was a massive push from some major retailers overseas (Starbucks) and here in Australia. But since then most big companies have stopped talking about Fair Trade certification, and coffee drinkers are left confused and misinformed.

Is Fair Trade coffee really fair? Or is there a better way?

Is Fair Trade coffee really fair?

Fair trade

At its basic level, Fair Trade labelling is meant as a promise to the consumer.

Fair Trade labelling is meant to promise the consumer that the coffee they’re drinking has not been produced by exploiting workers along the supply chain. That’s actually a great premise. But it doesn’t always mean a good news story for small producers.

Fair Trade certification has upfront costs and ongoing fees. And many small-scale farmers simply can’t afford those costs. The results? They’re squeezed out and the middle men end up being those who profit most from a Fair Trade certified product.

The debate is still ongoing. But most people in the industry believe that there’s simply not enough evidence-based research to show whether Fair Trade certification really benefits the producers.

We want to take a better approach.

How we buy our coffee

We want everyone in the coffee chain to prosper, but especially our producers. They’re responsible for growing the best beans that make the best coffee, yet, they’re the ones that suffer the most when the commodity market fluctuates. And when they don’t get a living income from coffee production, they simply move on to something else.

At the end of the day, the more producers that get pushed out, the less varieties we get. And that means we all enjoy our coffee less (something we’re keen to avoid!).

Direct commitments

When you buy Fair Trade you have to believe in the system. When you buy direct, you create the system. For us, it feels most fair to buy directly and independently from smallholder producers, and to commit to keep buying from them into the future.

When these producers have confidence that we’ll buy from them again next year, it helps them invest into their own coffee production. After all, they know they’ll get a return. It’s also the most effective way to build meaningful and mutually beneficial relationships with our producers. We’re big fans of that.

Transparency

When we buy our coffee beans, we look for transparency. That simply means understanding the supply chain – where the beans were grown firstly, but also how they get to us from there. Understanding how the beans move up the chain also helps us understand how the money goes back down the chain. And, ultimately, how much the producers are making.

Communication not the New York C price should determine coffee prices

The New York C Price is the reserve price paid for Arabica beans on the stock exchange. Other types of coffee are traded or price set under other indices. But these prices are notoriously volatile, and affect all coffee producers around the world.

We believe that as an industry we need to find better ways to determine the right price for coffee, and sustainable ways to ensure that money flows down the chain. The best way to do this is to talk to the coffee producers directly. They understand, and can communicate to us, what their production costs are and what they need to make in order to have a liveable income.

When we pay them a ‘fair’ price in their own eyes, our producers are incentivised for their hard work. They know they won’t just get paid the minimum amount that is considered ‘fair’ by some external market force.

Passing that on to our customers

At the end of the day, our customers love coffee. But they have their own passions, work, families and lives to live. It’s our role (since coffee is our passion and work) to provide our customers with incredible tasting, ‘fair’ coffee each and every day. So, they can confidently enjoy their coffee while getting on with their own lives.

We’re always happy to talk to our customers about the producers and the beans that we source. And each and every coffee in our shop has the origin story included. We want our customers to know that we support the coffee suppliers and the coffee industry as a whole, and we’re extremely proud of that.

We live for coffee. But if the producers can’t live from producing coffee, we’ll all be worse off (and our daily brew will be, too).

Check out our shop and read the origin stories of your favourite beans.

Is Fair Trade Coffee Really Fair (and How We Buy Our Coffee)?