Producer Toolkit: Marketing & Sales, Pt 1 - The power of story

This episode explores why specialty coffee is a luxury business that runs on story more than flavour.

Part of The Coffee Producer Toolkit, a series made in collaboration with Lucia Solis, it will help you understand coffee farming better than most professionals you'll meet at a trade show.

Each episode takes one part of the farming business — agronomy, processing, fermentation, storage, quality, sales — and lays out what the best farms are actually doing.

Related podcast episodes:

Lucia:

• #54: Visiting Producers, Advanced Tourism & The Coffee Hunter (farm visits, the buyer relationship)
• #56: Pranoy Thipaia (finding export markets, expo advice)
• #65: To Blend or Not to Blend? Wine Vintages, and Harvest Update (sales strategy, consistency over novelty)
• Cabal Cafe Podcast en Espanol

James:

• Filter Stories: The Hard Business of Selling Beautiful Coffee

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People mentioned in the episode:

• Diego Robelo — Aquiares Estate, Turrialba, Costa Rica
• Cristian Reyes — Finca El Rodeo, Santander, Colombia
• Cristian Reyes — Personal Instagram
• Catherine Bedoya — Eje Cafetero, Colombia
• Hamsini Appadurai — Sangameshwar Coffee Estates, Chikmagalur, India
• Melissa de Gasperín — Rancho San Felipe, Veracruz, Mexico
• Edilberto Tovar — Finca La Esmeralda, Huila, Colombia
• Desnudo Coffee (Austin) — Austin, Texas, USA
• Alejandro Rodríguez Delgado — Hacienda San Pedrito, Puerto Rico
• César Marín — Chacra D'Dago, Peru
• Karla Boza — Jacinta Y Su Cafe, San Benito, El Salvador

Resources:

• Algrano — Producer Sign Up
• The list of 144 international trade shows
• Clases Gratis de Inglés en linea - USA Learns
• Clases Gratis de Inglés en linea - Voa News
• English Accent Training
• The SCA Coffee Value Assessment, Extrinsic Criteria List
• PDFs of CVA Form in 7 languages

The Coffee Producer Toolkit is made possible by these leading coffee organisations:

The Coffee Quest | BWT | Descamex | InterAmerican | Pinhalense | Novonesis | GrainPro

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