Becoming a Coffee Entrepreneur— My Experience Trading to Europe
European coffee consumer tastes are shifting towards higher quality
The European Market has been one of the most important for coffee producers. European countries created a coffee culture that has become essential for their daily life. Every country has its own characteristic — In Italy, coffee making is national pride, this is where espresso coffee machines come from and has attracted their population to be interested in consuming it as a daily basis for socializing or just having for breakfast to start the day. In Austria, their elegant coffee houses have become attractive for tourists and are a big part of the Austrian culture for having a good time with friends or alone. In Portugal, coffee tradition is big because of their relationship with Brazil.
Big coffee chains such as Starbucks have entered the European market to satisfy new needs by providing variety in their coffee preparation. In addition, they also offer great working spaces for people who work remotely. Starbucks currently has about 2500 stores around Europe. Local cafes still control the market by having over 300,000 shops of which about 98% are independent and not big chains.
Specialty Coffee in Europe
A big part of the European consumers didn’t have the education of coffee — there was no knowledge about how the coffee is produced. Nowadays, a high volume of information found online and greater environmental awareness led to a greater interest in knowing more about the product they consume.
Coffee producers such as Central American countries and Colombia have produced high-quality coffee for decades because of their advantages in their climate. However, the international demand for this coffee hasn’t been big until recent years. Nowadays, we see more cafes that offer specialty coffee from different regions and more roasters that have direct relationships with producers from abroad. The entry of roasters and coffee shops to the market that offers specialty coffee has been important. Roasters and coffee shops nowadays provide information about coffee to consumers to understand more about the product and incentivize them to try new characteristics that coffee can offer.
This new market niche has motivated important countries in the production of coffee to focus again on the quality of their product that has been affected in the past years due to low prices in coffee and environmental issues that were making coffee production hard to sustain. However, there are still concerns that stop producers from getting motivated again to produce higher quality and become more competitive.
My experience trading coffee to Portugal
I’m from El Salvador, a small country from Central America that has a big tradition in coffee production because of its climate advantages and the volcanic soil that gives unique characteristics to their coffee. My family members have been coffee producers since 1938 and focused on the quality of the product. But same as them, several producers are proud of the quality of the product they have offered for years. Coffee has been one of the main sources of income for a big part of the Salvadorean population for years.
I’ve been living in Portugal since 2016. The experience of living here has given me a wider knowledge of how the European culture works and their tastes. Portugal has a coffee culture, but the population doesn’t have the habit of consuming a higher variety of international products.
Why aren’t they risking to try?
Portugal didn’t have a direct relationship with Latin-American countries apart from Brazil — they just ignore the information regarding products from abroad.
My Challenge
I always wanted to trade products from El Salvador to Portugal, but this was going to be a challenge to satisfy their tastes.
In 2019, I discovered a local roaster that has been roasting coffee since 1950 in the city of Lisbon. They started demanding specialty coffee to roast from different regions in the world and became coffee experts. I contacted them to understand better how the coffee business works in Portugal — I liked their passion and the way they operate.
I discovered that there are few roasters in Lisbon, but coffee shops that offer specialty coffee have increased. After several conversations about Salvadorean coffee, I offered to them samples from my family member’s coffee farm and they liked it. They wanted to buy my coffee, so I started arranging with my contacts in El Salvador to prepare the coffee and customize it according to their needs.
Getting into a coffee deal made me proud — I was the first Salvadorean to trade coffee directly from El Salvador to Portugal. The roaster already bought Salvadorean coffee in the past — but it came from European distributors. The disadvantage of buying coffee from distributors is that there is no direct contact with the producer and distributors charge higher prices with lower quality. By having direct contact with the producer, there is a stronger relationship between the producer and their buying product. I’m not a coffee expert, but I had some knowledge of productivity and consumption through my childhood.
The coffee arrived at the beginning of 2020 and unluckily the COVID-19 pandemic started making countries enter lockdown, affecting all industries. Coffee sales went slow and stopped new business deals. There are expectations when life becomes normal again, coffee sales will increase and there will be a rise of curiosity from people wanting to try quality products coming from abroad. However, this pandemic brought challenges to the producer, distributor, and consumer. The pandemic left serious economical damages that everyone is fighting to get out of. When we overcome the negative effects of the pandemic, they are high expectations that the trend for new quality consumption of coffee will come back on track.
This trade experience made me notice that coffee entrepreneurs are trying to motivate local consumers to experiment with new products and providing them knowledge about the complex world of coffee. More people are gaining information related to the coffee world — consumer preferences are shifting to better quality and more environmentally sustainable products. Greater knowledge makes a bigger market niche that will be beneficial for producers that focus on selling specialty coffee. Hopefully, after the pandemic — businesses will get back on track, and the motivation of new entrepreneurs will be greater to enter the wonderful world of coffee.