Coffee bean prices have been rising significantly over the last few months, mainly due to another drought in Brazil, but also in Colombia and Vietnam. Brazil, (A major international coffee producer,) has suffered similar climatic changing effecting coffee yields over recent years. This has a knock-on effect globally, as buyers look for an alternative source of green beans. This has led to steadily increasing Global prices.
The price of green coffee is now at its highest in 5 years, with forecasted to go even higher by the end of this year. UK markets of coffee prices to consumers has increased by 15%, and expects further increased over the coming year to 20-25%.
When we compare our own purchases since 2020, we see the Peruvian HB Grade 1 (which is a key bean in all of our range is going from a low of €4.73 a kilo up to its current price which is close to double that. Likewise, the Colombian Excelso Arabica which we use with the Peru HB for our Purely Arabica, has gone from just over €5 a kilo to over €8.
The Indonesian Sumatra Mandheling Raja Gayo Arabica which is the predominant green bean in our Culture Blend has gone from a low €5 to just under €10.
Even the quality Robustas we use, has significantly increased from €3.25 to a staggering €8.16, and we struggled to get any decent Organic Robusta at all. (This has probably been effected the most by Vietnam’s crop as Vietnam contributes to more than two-thirds of global robusta production).
As for the Peruvian Arabica CO2 decaf, with high demand, there is nothing left for secondary processing and decaffeination of any type. We were lucky to find 60 kilos of it available, and it certainly wasn’t cheap.
Some fluctuation in bean prices is normal, depending on quantities available and time of year. A lot will also depend on how many pallets of beans you purchase, but global warming is certainly having a long-term impact on Coffee production.
As always, I compare prices whenever we seek to buy beans, and try to order at the right times, in order to get the best possible price. Sometimes, a particular bean is dearer than normal, but usually, this is offset by the price dropping in another bean… but sadly, that is no longer the case.
We try to keep our coffee prices as low as we can but have been forced to increase the prices for the three blends we have and will probably have to increase again in the near future.
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