As we approach the end of the trip, reflecting on the past two weeks becomes extremely important for the sake of how we’ve all grown academically and culturally. For a supply chain and marketing major, this trip was chock full of pertinent information that has grown my curiosity in the coffee and chocolate industries, as well as learn much more about the supply chain process in practice. Each of these steps in the supply chain process comes with a large number of inner workings and complexities that pertain to my group’s topic of supply chain delivery. Coffee was by far the most interesting product to me, and so I want to focus on that for my final blog post.
When starting on a coffee farm, the process of seed to roast takes a long time – nearly 25 total years. The primary thing I learned is that coffee beans need proper conditions to survive and thrive, namely very humid temperatures, high altitude and fertile soil. When transporting from farms to processing mills and exporters, it’s important to maintain these conditions for the coffee beans to maintain these specific conditions.
Moving to the processing mills and exporters, delivery is extremely important. For the product to reach the next stage, roasters and retail stores/cafes, the best method of physical transportation needs to be implemented. Whether this is by via airplanes or through freight ports, making sure that coffee beans reach roasters and cafes to reach the consumer in the cheapest way possible is a large factor for mills and exporters to properly compensate their workers, which is a large source of pride for Costa Rican coffee manufacturers. When looking at a company like Café Britt, often these retail locations are in domestic airports.
Once the coffee has reached roasters and retail stores/cafes, the delivery to the customer is not always so dramatic. In many cases of roasters, and in virtually all cases of stores and cafes, customers go directly to the location to purchase the coffee. This is obviously extremely important to sell the coffee, but it’s also a large step in the supply chain process I hadn’t considered before.
The biggest thing I’ve taken away from this trip is the complexity of the coffee supply chain process, and made me appreciate the coffee I drink much more. I am a big consumer of coffee, and so being able to not only understand where and how it’s grown and processed, but also how it’s transported and delivered, has added to my appreciation of coffee. As I’ve mentioned multiple times before, I would heavily consider going into the coffee industry after this trip. I found the whole process and history behind these coffee companies to be very interesting and I am so happy I had this experience.