Return of the Links

Break out your umbrellas! After a dry December, the rain has returned to the Rose City—and how! We’re pushing record levels of precipitation over the last few days and the forecast is for a lot more over the next week. Meanwhile, I received an email from a friend in Orlando who said it was 82 degrees and sunny there today. Do you suppose there is good coffee down there? Might be worth taking a trip to find out.

Don’t let the gray get you down, though, there are plenty of things to do inside. Here are a few links to take your mind off the weather for a while:

This story about DD made me want start a campaign “Stop! America does not run on….well, you know.” The last thing this country needs is more opportunities to by more sugar, fat and mediocre coffee.

David Lynch, who produced Twin Peaks,  is obsessed with coffee, though he is down to only seven cups per day (from a high of twenty).

Headed to Seoul? Check this café out.

For the environment, which is worse—throwing nine billion (9,000,000,000!) K-cups into a landfill, or making coffee and not drinking all of it? This article from the Kansas City Star takes a look at that question.

The political philosopher Leo Strauss once wrote that democracies need apathetic populations to function properly. Apparently that’s true for dictatorships too. Coffee consumption has a history of scaring rulers bent on controlling their people, according to NPR. In some cultures in the past, coffee drinkers faced capital punishment for sipping up. Imagine what such a policy would do to the population of the Pacific Northwest.

The Northwest Barista Championship is coming up next week in Tacoma. Here’s the link to the competition’s site, where you can see the schedule of events and (soon, hopefully) the list of competitors (currently there’s a nice video from last year’s event on the site too, by the way!).

Stay dry (and out of low-lying areas)!

2011 World Barista Championship - Alejandro Mendez, Campeón!

This past weekend, the 2011 World Barista Championships took place in Bogotá, Colombia. For the first time ever, a competitor from a coffee-growing country won first place. El Salvador’s Alejandro Mendez won the competition, beating out the US’ Pete Licata, who finished second after having the highest score in the semi-finals.

Mendez put on an impressive display of coffee knowledge, enthusiasm and creativity. For his signature beverage, Mendez combined flavors from all parts of the coffee plant. He made an infusion from dried coffee flowers (that he had collected himself), one from the mucilage (the fruit pulp), another from the cascara (dried skin from the coffee fruit) and combined all of them with an espresso made from the roasted coffee beans. His goal was to give the judges the entire flavor of the coffee tree. The commentators (yes, the broadcast has commentators, much like golf) thought that this was the first time anyone had combined all of these elements into a beverage (you can see the video here. Mendez’ finals performance starts at about 1:30 into the video and lasts 15 minutes).

If you watch the video of the performance, you will notice Mendez’ deep knowledge of the coffee, his attention to detail and his willingness to try unconventional techniques. Mendez tells the story of how he tested his espresso at the same altitude as Bogota and found that 14 days post-roast was the best day to use it for the competition. He also made a very bold move when he had the judges strain off the crema from the espressos before they drank them. Personally, I question whether this should be allowed, because the crema is an integral part of the espresso experience. However, the judges allowed it, and it certainly helped to make his performance memorable.

Mendez’ win is more impressive because he was competing in English, which did not appear to be his first language. Imagine if the other competitors had to learn the language of the host country in order to compete—that would make it much more challenging. That is what the competitors from non-English-speaking countries have had to do for years.

The 2011 competition was the first time the championships have been held in a coffee-growing country (excluding the small amount of coffee that is grown in Hawaii), which was a big deal for the coffee industry. One of the biggest social issues involved with coffee production/consumption is the fact that for years, coffee producers in developing countries have not benefited from the increase in value of coffee as it was roasted, brewed and sold to customers at high markups.

Coffee-importing countries placed tariffs and quotas on roasted coffee in order to protect their own roasters, which hampered the development of a roasting industry in coffee-growing regions. The system led to much of the value of the coffee crop leaving poorer countries and moving to richer countries.

Today, the specialty coffee industry is trying to make the distribution of the value of the coffee more equitable, and by holding the barista championship in Colombia, the SCAA/SCAE has raised awareness about coffee production and demonstrated its respect for the coffee-growing countries. Hopefully, it will not be another decade before the competition is held in one of these countries, nor will it be surprising when a barista from El Salvador, Colombia, Rwanda or any other coffee producer brings home the top prize.

Congratulations to Alejandro Mendez, the 2011 World Barista Champion.

[If you want  a more complete 2011 WBC wrap-up, complete with lots of photos, visit Barista Magazine’s blog here.]

Coffee, Rumor and Innuendo

Last Friday, I posted a link to what I said was a sign of the impending rapture—that Stumptown Coffee was in negotiations to be bought out by Starbucks. There was absolutely no truth to the rumor whatsoever, so you can imagine the surprise I felt today when I went online to read the latest coffee news and one of the first things to come up was a story claiming that Stumptown had been sold (though not to Starbucks).

Todd Carmichael, the founder of LaCombe Torrefaction, an East Coast-based coffee company, wrote an article for Esquire that Stumptown’s Duane Sorenson had “sold his life’s work to the highest bidder.” Needless to say, this caused quite a stir in the coffee blogosphere and Twittersphere. Could it really be that Stumptown, Portland’s most famous coffee company who seemed to be everything but corporate, could be ‘selling out?’ What would that mean for Portlanders who cannot stand the idea of supporting a “corporate” coffee company? The idea seemed an anathema to many people.

There were several reasons to be skeptical about the article’s accuracy. Carmichael likes to make fun of the hipster coffee culture, as evidenced by this article, so it is not surprising that he took a shot at Stumptown. Also, the tone of the article and lack of evidence in it, lead one to believe that Carmichael, whose company is a direct competitor to Stumptown, does not like the fact that Stumptown is expanding on the East Coast and was looking for a way to give his rival some bad publicity among the anti-corporate crowd.

In response to the news, Willamette Weekly dug up a document showing that Stumptown Coffee Corporation, which is a separate entity from Stumptown Coffee Roasters, did apply for an  amendment to authority with the Oregon Secretary of State at the end of April. The new agent for the company is Alexander Panos, a managing director at TSG Consumer Partners, a private equity firm based in New York. In other words, there was a small bit of evidence behind the rumors.

However, the document does not address any questions about any relationship between Stumptown and TSG. It is impossible to tell from that document what Stumptown’s plans are, and Carmichael’s speculation is premature, unless he has other information. Esquire, if it wants to be taken seriously, needs to make sure there is more evidence before an article like this is published, especially when the author has a financial stake in a rival company.

Update: In the latest news this afternoon, also from the Willamette Weekly, Stumptown responded to the article, saying that it did open itself up to some outside investment to help fund its expansion, but that Duane Sorenson, Stumptown’s founder, is still in charge. Therefore, Portlanders can relax—Stumptown has not sold out. You do not have to worry about losing another local chain to corporate America.

Update 2 (June 2): Stumptown did allow for some investment by Panos (Sorenson still controls the company) and the plan is to expand into Chicago and San Francisco. The NY Times has the story here.

Update 3 (June 6): Willamette Weekly is today reporting that Stumptown sold 90% of the company to TSG, though it seems like the source is Carmichael. It's hard to know what to believe. . . You can read the story here.

My question is, if Stumptown had sold out, so what? It is Sorenson’s company, after all, and the last time I checked, we still live in the USA, where capitalism is the economic system. If someone wants to build a company and sell it so that he or she can fulfill other dreams, that should be his or her right. There is nothing especially noble about starting a company and staying with it until you die. Times and people change—we have to accept it. Unless, of course, the news is just a rumor or a blogger’s attempt to be funny.

Tired of paper transit tickets? (updated)

Today, I want to step away from coffee for just a moment. One of my favorite things to talk about is entrepreneurship, and I have something I would like to share with you.

When I’m out traveling around the city, I prefer to walk or take public transportation. Walking around, you really get the feel of a place, and on the bus or the train, you don’t have to stress about traffic.

Since I take the bus and the train pretty regularly, I can say with confidence that it would be nice to be able to pay for tickets using an app on my phone, especially when riding the bus. Even better, the phone would serve as a ticket itself.

Tri-Met (Portland’s public transit agency) doesn’t have a system like that yet. However, a couple of my classmates from Portland State’s MIM program are trying change that. Nat Parker and Michael Gray have started a company called GlobeSherpa to develop mobile phone apps, and their most promising app at this time is called TransitSherpa, an app that acts as an electronic ticket management system for Tri-Met. I’ll let Nat explain:

Their company is currently in negotiations with Tri-Met to make the system a reality, but they need some funding to speed things up. Tomorrow evening, at 5:30pm, Nat and Michael will be at the Backspace café/pub competing in the second-to-last round of the Oregon Entrepreneurs Network’s Seed Oregon competition, a competition that helps start-up companies with funding and guidance. The winner is determined by popular vote of the audience, so the more supporters TransitSherpa has, the better chance it has to win. The winning company gets to present at the Angel Oregon conference in March, where it could acquire the funding it is looking for.

If you think that a Tri-Met ticket app is something that you would rather have sooner than later, come by Backspace tomorrow evening at 5:30 and support TransitSherpa. It costs $25, which I know is kind of steep, but it’s supposed to include some kind of food and drink spread. In addition, Nat has promised me that he’s going to be especially entertaining during his presentation.

You might wonder if I get anything out of this advertisement for them. Nope. I’m just spreading the word for them and trying to speed up the process of creating a Tri-Met ticket app. It’s 2011, and the time for e-tickets is here. Let’s help TransitSherpa make it happen.

No más

Update: GlobeSherpa won by two votes! Congratulations and good luck at the next round.