Pre-SCAA Open House - Extended to Friday, April 15th!
Due to popular demand, we've added a second day to our Open House. Visit our decaffeination facility in Vancouver, Canada on Thursday, April 14th or Friday, April 15th. Buses will leave Seattle at 8:00 and return by 6:00, reserve your seat by replying to this email. Hope you enjoy this issue!
-- Ben Hieltjes, vp, sales
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As mentioned in our January edition of The Wave, we are continually striving to diversify and expand our product portfolio. This month we added two new decafs, Organic Rainforest Alliance Colombia Santa Marta and Rwanda Grade A Nkora Select. Below, Diana Chan, our green coffee buyer, provides some information and insight into these new coffees.
"The Organic Rainforest Alliance Colombia Santa Marta hails from the farms of Tolima, located on the slopes of the Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta, the highest tropical coast mountain range in the world. The El Tolima farm has numerous fresh water springs and its extensive forest areas are home to many migratory and indigenous birds. Grown at altitudes of 3500 to 5500 feet, this coffee cups very soft and sweet with a deep aroma, medium body, medium acidity and milk-chocolate flavor.
Rwanda Grade A Nkora Select is from a 2004 crop. It was screened to 95% above screen size 16, milled in late November (one week prior to shipment) and grown at 5400 to 6000 feet in the area of Gisenyi (Kayove). This region is blessed with sufficient rainfall, year-round sunlight and volcanic soils. This bourbon coffee was then wet-processed in Nkora, sun-dried and dry-milled in Kigali, by the UPROCA Cooperative-the highest-paying cooperative in Rwanda. Their goal is to improve the price to the farmer through focusing on social responsibility, environmental leadership and expert coffee processing. The green coffee is a bluish-green color, while the cup profile is floral, with bright citrus notes and the complexity of a dry red wine."
These coffees come on the heels of our debut of Organic and Organic Fair Trade Certified Mexico SHG EP Udepom, Organic SHG Peru and Organic Fair Trade Certified Peru EP Chanchamayo La Florida.
To order, contact your broker. For a complete list of our product offerings, please visit: http://www.swisswater.com/partners/coffees/offering
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It's no secret that we invest a great deal of time and money in marketing our decaffeinated coffee to consumers through advertising and also through the merchandising materials we make available to our customers, the green dealers, roasters and roaster/retailers we sell to. While to some, the word "marketing" smacks of hucksterism, we believe that it is simply the science of communicating effectively with the people that are most likely to buy our product. What good is it to have a great product if you don't know who is likely to be interested in it, or why they might like it?
Over the past few years we've seen a lot of great coffee farmers and some roasters fail to reach their full potential because they couldn't find an audience for their coffee, whether it was fairly traded, organic, shade grown, or whatever. We argue that for a coffee to be truly sustainable it needs to have a following of coffee drinkers (not dealers, roasters, or retailers!) that love it, and want to drink it regularly. To get that coffee out to enough of those receptive drinkers takes more than a great cup of coffee (let's call this a given) or even passion and salesmanship. It takes aggressive, skillful marketing.
With the recent long overdue run-up in prices, many folks will argue that issues of sustainability are a thing of the past, but we disagree. For everyone in the supply chain to make a decent, sustainable living (again), it's going to take informed, passionate consumers who care enough to know the difference between a coffee that's carefully grown, picked, sorted and yes, perhaps, even decaffeinated. When that happens we probably won't all get rich, but we know that everyone within the chain will benefit, from the picker on the farm to the person serving your coffee and all of us in between that comprise the "coffee industry."
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Last year, Michel's Patisserie in Australia decided to dispense with the use of chemically decaffeinated coffees in favor of SWISS WATERŪ,  "partly to fulfill the aim of being a pure specialty roaster committed to environmental sustainability, but also because of the excellent taste we discovered during cupping sessions," explains George Sabados, general manager at Michel's.
Michel's Patisserie and SWDCC worked together to co-brand the Swiss Water Consumer Info Cards, credit card size cards that describe how the process works, adding a perforated "Decaf Coffee Club" incentive card on the back. The incentive card enables consumers to buy five decafs and get the sixth free.
So far, Michel's efforts in promoting Swiss Water decaf to consumers has been successful. In fact, their average decaf volume has tripled per store. "Decaf sales have risen dramatically," says Sabados. "This is even more remarkable when you consider that Australia is a 100% espresso market, with no operation selling filter coffee. That means that the amount of decaf used in the average espresso shot is far less that the amounts used to brew decaf filter."
The "Decaf Coffee Club" cards are distributed with each and every drip decaf order at more than 200 Michel's Patisserie outlets.
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 As always, we'll be exhibiting at the SCAA's Annual Conference and Exhibition, Apr. 15-18 in Seattle, WA. Please drop by to say hello, and learn about our exciting new lineup of coffees.
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Look for our next issue in August!
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®/TM are trademarks of Swiss Water Decaffeinated Coffee Company Inc.
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I get some grief around here for being a bit too "technical" sometimes, and I have to admit that this characterization may be somewhat deserved on my part. I came to my job here at Swiss Water Decaffeinated Coffee Co. through a route that is relatively rare in our business-as a food scientist. Now, I'm not saying that coming from a food science background means that I know any more about coffee or cupping coffee than anyone else in this business. But perhaps my training has helped me understand what I don't know.