|
|
Five bucks for a cup of coffee?
VANCOUVER -- Aiming to attract the true connoisseur, a British Columbia company has paid a record price for a batch of Brazilian coffee that leaves a fruity after-taste, and plans to sell it in Vancouver next month for $5 a cup.
"We want to differentiate ourselves from the competition by being able to offer our customers the option to buy the best coffee in the world," said Vince Piccolo, president of Caffè Artigiano, which has five stores in downtown Vancouver.
To achieve that, Mr. Piccolo teamed up with an Australian company to pay a record $49.75 (U.S.) a pound at Brazil's seventh Cup of Excellence Internet coffee auction. That smashes the previous Brazilian record of $13.65, which was paid by a Japanese roasting company in November, 2004.
"It might seem crazy that we were prepared to pay that price," said Mr. Piccolo, a 40-year-old former fine-dining restaurant owner. "But when you break it down by the cup, it is about the same price that people would pay for a mediocre glass of wine."
The hand-picked, pulped, natural Bourbon coffee was grown by Francisco Isidro Dias Pereira of Fazenda Santa Ines in the mountainous Carmo de Minas district of Brazil's Minas Gerais state. Six of the top 10 coffees at the auction came from the same district in the prime south Minas coffee region.
"It has great acidity, great body and sweetness, and leaves a nice, fruity type after-note," Mr. Piccolo said.
It was awarded a record 95.85 per cent by an international jury, which chose it in November from among 553 entries after several rounds and weeks of tasting.
The international jury variously described Mr. Pereira's coffee as "sensual, juicy and elegant" and tasting of "fat peaches, tangerine and pineapple."
The auction price was about 48 times higher than that paid for export-grade Brazilian green coffee, of which about 22.5 million bags were shipped last year. Exports of specialty coffee were less than one million bags.
Mr. Piccolo said he is sure there is a market for the high-priced brew because Vancouver has become a coffee centre, rivalling Portland and Seattle, and the palates of customers in the city have become more sophisticated.
Yesterday, two Artigiano customers supported that view, saying they would like to at least try a coffee that could fetch such a price.
"But I'm not sure that I'd want to be drinking it every day," said computer salesman Steve Donnelly, as he waited for cup of decaffeinated cafe latte.
Heather Braun, a self described coffee addict, said she would want to see whether there is an extraordinary difference between the expensive Brazilian brand and the $2.50 cups of Americano that she normally drinks.
But she worries about what this will do to coffee prices in general.
"I'm a bit concerned that we are going down a road with coffee where wine has already gone," said Ms. Braun, who drives to Artigiano virtually every day, and regularly buys packets of espresso coffee to take to Whistler.
Artigiano and the Australian coffee company, Michel's Espresso, paid nearly $79,000 for 12 bags weighing 60 kilograms each of the top coffee offered at the on-line auction of 36 coffees.
After the green coffee beans are shipped to British Columbia, Artigiano plans to have them roasted by its sister company in Burnaby, and serve them up to customers, either by the cup or by the pound.
The company has just installed a machine that will allow its sales staff to brew freshly made cups of high- end coffee in 40 seconds.
The farmer
The record-setting coffee was grown by Francisco Isidoro Dias Pereira, a Brazilian farmer who employs 35 on his 214-hectare plantation in the mountainous Carmo de Minas district of Minas Gerais state. The farm is at about 1,000 metres elevation and receives 2,000 millimetres of a rain a year -- almost what Vancouver gets.
The coffee
Mr. Pereira grows beans of the bourbon variety, which are fast growing but tend to fall off in high winds. The beans are hand-picked and placed in cloth bags to prevent bruising before being carefully washed and dried. Bing cherries, pineapple, melon and chardonnay were some of the words jury members used to describe his coffee.
The auction
Described by some as the Oscars of the coffee business, the Cup of Excellence was founded in 1999 to offer an international market to small Brazilian coffee growers. A jury ranks the beans of specialty growers. Once a year, the beans are auctioned over the Internet in small lots. The auction has since expanded to include other growers of high-end beans in Central and South America.
The purchaser
Caffé Artigiano --and its customers -- are serious about java. Its website boasts it is the home of Sammy Piccolo, three-time Canadian champion barista and third-place finisher in 2005's world event. The coffee shop opened in 2000 and now has five cafes in Vancouver, garnering a mention in the New York Times for its "beautifully decorated lattes."
Staff, Reuters
|
|
