In the world of specialty coffee, the term direct trade is often referred to as the absolute ideal. While direct contact with growers is key, the reality of global trade is more complex. For many small farmers who grow the most interesting microlots, working with a quality distributor is the way to survive and grow.

Here are a few reasons why this model is actually more profitable for farmers.

Farming is a full-time job – marketing is not

Most of the really small farmers are first and foremost experts in agriculture. They devote all their time to tending coffee trees, harvesting and processing cherries. Often they do not have the staff or technical capacity to:

• Marketing your production: building your brand and finding buyers in Europe.
• Foreign language communication: constant correspondence with dozens of roasters from all over the world.
• Bureaucratic burden: food imports into the EU are subject to strict rules that require piles of documentation and certificates.

In this relationship, the distributor takes on the role of the administrative and sales department, freeing the farmer’s hands to do what he does best – grow exceptional coffee.

The logistics barrier and the power of one container

Logistics is one of the biggest bogeymen of small business. If a farmer grows a few bags of high-end coffee, he can’t fill an entire shipping container with it. Shipping a few bags separately across the ocean is uneconomical and extremely expensive, which would ultimately disproportionately increase the price of the coffee to the end customer or reduce the farmer’s profit.

Distributors act as consolidators. They will collect coffee from several small farmers in one area, fill the container and ensure safe transport. In this way, even the smallest farms can reach the world market at competitive prices.

Distributor as a partner on the ground

Quality distributors are not just “box-stuffers”. In many growing areas, they have their own stations and operations where they literally live with the farmers. Their contribution is invaluable:

• Education: They teach farmers exactly what defines the term Specialty coffee and how to modify processing processes to achieve higher flavor scores.
• Fair pay: thanks to the higher quality they teach farmers to achieve, they help them to get many times more money for their work than on the commodity market.
• Stability: they provide farmers with certainty of marketing and often financial advances before the actual harvest.

Reality directly from Vietnam – the experience of farmer Marian Takáč

A farmer’s personal view directly from the field is brought to you by Marián Takáč, who runs the Zanya coffee station in Vietnam. Marián has experience with both approaches and points out that direct trade carries a huge bureaucratic burden – for the farmer, the paperwork associated with exporting is the same whether he sends five bags or a full container. In addition, he points out the financial burden, where, in direct trade, a farmer can wait up to nine months from the start of the harvest to receive payment. Working with a quality importer thus provides the small producer with important financial security and logistical back-up, allowing him to concentrate on what is important – the quality of the coffee grown.

How we approach this at Goriffee

For us, working with a distributor doesn’t mean sitting in the roasting room and just clicking on green coffee e-shops. We believe in a combined model. Once a year we try to visit coffee farms around the world – whether it’s our trips to Kenya, Sumatra, Vietnam or Colombia.

We build personal relationships, get to know the farmers and their families, and see first-hand the conditions in which coffee grows. The distributor is then a strategic partner for us, ensuring that this particular bean, from a person we know, makes it safely and legally to our roasting machine.

The foundation of Goriffee is a personal partnership with the farmers. We travel directly to the places of origin, we know the people who grow our coffees and we work with them for a long time. As a result, their unique microlots return to our offer every year. We’re committed to fairness, transparency and rewarding quality work – just the way it should be in the modern coffee world.

Erik of Goriffee

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

Is direct trade always better than buying through a distributor? Not necessarily. Direct trade sounds romantic, but it can be a huge risk for a small farmer if a roaster cancels mid-season. A distributor provides stability and infrastructure that an individual often can’t pull off.

Is the distributor unnecessarily increasing the price of coffee? The distributor takes a margin for services that the farmer or roaster would have had to pay for anyway – transport, storage, insurance and quality control. Because of shared logistics, buying through a distributor is often more efficient than importing individually.

How do you know the farmer got a fair reward if there is a middle man? Transparency is at the heart of the specialty coffee market. Modern distributors publish farm gate prices that clearly show how much money has ended up in the hands of the grower.

Why do you travel to farms despite working with distributors? Quality control and trust building can’t just be done via email. A personal visit allows us to understand the unique terroir and select the best batches for our roastery, which the distributor will then logistically cover.