0:20

Hello, and welcome to episode 57. You

0:24

cannot utter a sentence about Vietnam

0:26

specialty coffee without including the name

0:28

Wilfrith. Wil is the

0:30

guy, capital T, capital G

0:33

when it comes to Vietnam specialty coffee. My

0:36

first introduction to Will was watching his Rico

0:38

talk titled, Vietnam, a New Vocabulary.

0:41

First of all, what an amazing title.

0:44

You know, your girl loves talking about

0:46

words and coffee vocabulary, so

0:48

I was immediately gonna click on this video.

0:51

And it's unlikely that many of you have

0:53

already seen the video, but I sincerely hope

0:56

that you check it out after listening to this conversation.

0:58

I have it linked in the show notes. Will

1:01

was born and raised in the United States. His

1:04

father is American and his mother is Vietnamese.

1:06

As he was growing up, he went to Vietnam several times

1:09

to visit his family, and then in 2013,

1:11

he decided to move to Vietnam. In

1:13

2019, he opened a wholesale coffee

1:15

roasting company, called Building Coffee,

1:17

with his partner Kel. In 2021,

1:20

he opened Bell, a specialty coffee

1:22

shop in Saigon. In his

1:24

Rico Talk, Will challenges us to

1:26

disentangle our Western view of the American

1:29

war in Vietnam from the Vietnamese

1:31

people and culture. The war

1:33

ended in 1975. Forty

1:36

eight years ago, he shared

1:38

that the median age in Vietnam is 33

1:40

years old. So while in the West,

1:42

Vietnam is still synonymous with that episode

1:45

of history today, much of its

1:47

population knows a very different

1:49

country, one that doesn't always

1:51

live in the shadow of this war. One

1:54

point I especially love is how Vietnam

1:57

has a domestic closed loop specialty

1:59

market. Vietnam is known

2:01

for robusta production. They produce

2:03

30 million bags of robusta to 1. 1

2:06

million of arabica. 30

2:08

to 1 is a pretty dramatic ratio, which

2:11

would make it seem like arabica is insignificant.

2:14

And yet that volume of Arabica

2:16

is almost more than double, double

2:19

what El Salvador or Kenya produces.

2:22

So that's just to put it in context of

2:24

how much we think

2:26

about coffee from those areas. And then thinking

2:28

about, you know, Vietnam, Arabica really

2:30

doesn't ever make it into our radar, even though there

2:32

is a lot of it. Will

2:36

also talks about a lot of themes familiar to

2:38

listeners of this podcast Like how

2:40

to make buying trips more equitable and thinking

2:42

about how to make them more of an exchange

2:44

rather than an extraction also

2:47

talks about how often our current model

2:49

centers on the buyer's agenda and questions

2:51

the benefits that accrue in the direction of

2:53

farmers This video

2:56

is so refreshing so nourishing

2:58

that it was a deciding factor in our Asia

3:00

travels when

3:02

we were planning before we had everything settled

3:04

for FTC, Nick and I wanted

3:06

to take advantage of the 40 hours of travel

3:09

from Guatemala to Indonesia. We

3:11

knew we didn't want to go halfway around the world

3:14

and turn around and just come

3:16

home right after the camp. But

3:18

we're aware to go. We

3:20

looked at a map and salivated with the opportunities.

3:23

Should we go to Thailand? Cambodia?

3:25

The Philippines? We even considered

3:27

going to Australia for a minute. But

3:30

after watching Will's video, I knew

3:32

Vietnam was the winner. In 19

3:34

minutes, I knew I wanted to visit Vietnam

3:36

and meet Will. The best

3:39

French wine is in France. The

3:41

best German beer is in Germany. The

3:43

best Guatemalan or Kenyan coffee... It's

3:46

probably in New York or London or

3:48

Dubai. But the best Vietnamese

3:50

coffee is still in Vietnam. This

3:53

is powerful. This is what I wanted to see.

3:57

Soon after watching the video, I started reading

3:59

some of his blog posts, and it was very clear

4:01

how well our philosophies of coffee and life

4:03

mashed up. Or, I guess, overlapped.

4:07

Like you'll hear me say in the recording, before

4:09

I even met Will, I knew we were friends.

4:12

Not that we would be friends, but

4:14

that we already were. We were already

4:16

long time friends who just hadn't met yet.

4:20

I knew Will and I were long lost strangers

4:22

slash friends, but what I wasn't expecting

4:24

was that we would also be couples friends. It

4:27

wasn't just that the two of us hit it off. It

4:29

was that the four of us had great chemistry.

4:31

Will and his partner, Kel, and myself

4:33

and Nick. Will and Nick went to get

4:35

haircuts together, and Kel and I went to get our

4:38

nails done. This conversation...

4:40

It was recorded in the few hours before

4:42

Nick and I went to the airport because I

4:44

realized we had spent a week going

4:46

to lunch and dinners and drinking coffee,

4:49

cupping coffee, walking around Saigon,

4:51

and just generally hanging out. And

4:54

after five full days together, I still

4:56

hadn't captured anything that I could share with

4:58

you. I meant to capture

5:00

his refreshing take on what it's like to be

5:02

in a producing and consuming country. I

5:05

meant to bring you a serious and important

5:07

conversation. But instead...

5:10

I bring you something more casual, And

5:12

you get a sense of what it's like to hang out with us.

5:14

In this conversation, Will cautions us

5:17

against bringing a Western mindset to Vietnam.

5:20

We talk about French occupation and the resulting

5:22

mash up culture, including some of our favorite

5:24

foods. He talks about the importance of

5:26

a middle class to support a new coffee

5:28

category of specialty coffee. We also

5:31

learn Will's rule of thumb for cheap coffee

5:33

and what he drinks first thing in the morning. We

5:36

learn about his journey from being a coffee purist

5:38

to being more reasonable. We

5:40

talk about meeting people where they are. One

5:43

thing I really appreciate about Will is his

5:45

emphasis on meeting people where they are.

5:48

Because I know, as a coffee enthusiast, we can

5:50

often alienate people from what we are trying

5:52

to bring to them. And

5:54

with Vietnam's specialty arabica in such

5:56

high demand within Vietnam, Will and

5:58

I contemplate the question. Who is

6:01

copy for? I'm so excited

6:03

for you guys to meet your new friend, Will

6:05

Frith. All right, let's get started.

6:07

Hey, will. Hey,

6:09

Lucia. How's it going?

6:11

Welcome to your apartment.

6:13

And making coffee. Yes, thank

6:15

you. I'm glad you're taking full

6:17

advantage of the executive suite here. Absolutely.

6:20

Well, actually, I did want to say that I

6:23

have been wanting, I have like a

6:26

whole list of things that I want to talk to you about

6:28

and questions that I want to talk about and

6:31

I think that I over, I

6:33

underestimated My

6:35

energy levels in a

6:37

busy place like this and

6:40

just like our timing. So I'm definitely

6:42

going to do like a more thoughtful

6:45

part two with you. When I get home and have

6:47

my space, but I wanted to take

6:49

advantage of our time together just

6:52

to have some more casual chats, talk

6:54

about coffee. Oh yeah, for sure.

6:56

Get some background into. Just

6:58

the Vietnam specialty coffee scene.

7:01

Oh yeah, for sure. From the guy.

7:02

And, you know, like, we couldn't expect

7:04

that the chemistry between

7:07

all of us would be so, like, like,

7:09

I feel like it's kind of an instant friends moment.

7:12

Yeah, but are you actually surprised?

7:14

Yeah, because I never, I try

7:16

not to expect things like

7:19

that. It's like serendipity cannot

7:21

be expected, or it's not serendipity.

7:23

Mm hmm. Yeah. So I expected

7:26

nothing and got everything.

7:29

That's very sweet. So it's been great. Well, and

7:31

I, I, I hear you on the low

7:33

expectations. I think that is also

7:35

part of my personality. But

7:38

I, when I started reading

7:41

your blogs and reading what you had to write, I,

7:43

I was like, no, this is already, like, we

7:45

know each other. Yeah. Like, I already

7:48

have that feeling, and I think it's interesting,

7:50

I'm kind of curious as to your perspective as to,

7:52

we live on opposite sides of the world. Yep.

7:55

And we work on, you know,

7:57

pretty different parts of the coffee chain. I work mostly

7:59

with producers, you work with roasters, and you

8:01

have a cafe, so you are much more

8:03

consumer facing. Yep. And

8:05

yet, I feel like our approach to

8:08

coffee and life is very similar.

8:11

100% agree.

8:14

So, I'm wondering, you know, what you see some

8:16

of your... Like your philosophy

8:18

about coffee and some of those things that maybe

8:20

you've been able to, that kind of transcend

8:23

parts of the chain and that are just like principles

8:26

of how you approach coffee.

8:28

Well, it's definitely evolved a

8:30

lot. When I first came out here, I

8:33

didn't really have much of a plan

8:36

and I was definitely like a lot

8:38

of people who are just enthusiastic

8:40

about specialty coffee and sharing

8:42

the gospel and all of that stuff within

8:45

it. And then as I started

8:47

to notice people's

8:49

responses and reactions to

8:52

the, the whole paradigm I was

8:54

bringing there were two,

8:57

I think, equally illuminating

9:00

responses on one side, there was like

9:02

this deep enthusiasm and

9:04

the hunger for just collecting

9:07

knowledge that to

9:09

some extent I could relate to, but also

9:12

that turned me off a little bit. Because

9:14

then you just end up with a lot of like the equivalent

9:16

of Google experts. When,

9:18

what year was this? Like what time frame?

9:20

2013. Okay. And so there were

9:22

a lot of people who were enthusiastic about what

9:24

I was offering, but also

9:27

it just became like another

9:29

pair of sneakers in their collection,

9:31

you know? And I was like, no, that's not exactly the

9:34

attitude I want to like encourage

9:36

in this. I want, I want people to like recognize

9:38

that these are. You know, livelihoods

9:41

that stretch all the way through a supply

9:43

chain that we need to like, be

9:45

thoughtful about. And so like that,

9:48

although the enthusiasm helps get the

9:50

things started what we really

9:52

need is just a little bit more temperance

9:55

and like a good pragmatic mindset

9:57

towards this. On the other side,

10:01

I started recognizing that what I was

10:03

bringing was a bit overwhelming

10:05

And so on the opposite side, I found

10:07

that some people were a little bit overwhelmed

10:10

and perhaps even threatened at the paradigm

10:13

I was trying to bring. Because they thought

10:15

I wanted to replace the coffee that

10:17

they grew up knowing and loving.

10:20

Which is not at all like part of

10:22

what I wanted to do, like by bringing specialty

10:24

coffee to Vietnam, that a

10:26

place that already has a strong coffee

10:29

culture. I was hoping

10:31

to introduce the concept

10:33

of diversity within a familiar product.

10:36

And so like coffee is this

10:38

way now, but it can be so many ways.

10:41

And so finding that

10:43

was actually the, the side

10:45

of responses that I

10:47

attached myself to the most was like,

10:49

okay, so bringing a new paradigm

10:52

is very threatening to some people

10:54

and I want to learn how to like kind of

10:56

cushion that and make it less

10:59

threatening and make it more of like an

11:01

opening and broadening of horizons. So

11:03

when you

11:03

say a new paradigm, you're, you're speaking

11:06

about the concept of specialty

11:08

Arabica.

11:10

specialty arabica specifically

11:12

but then like kind of broadly like

11:14

just ways to look at the

11:16

same thing differently which

11:19

that came along a bit different a

11:21

bit later like I said it was a

11:23

bit of an evolution of

11:26

an evolution of sort of my mindset

11:28

around it in the beginning it was like I have the specialty

11:31

coffee paradigm from the USA I

11:33

want to bring it to the world very

11:35

much. I think that would be kind

11:38

of a colonialist mindset. And

11:40

then as I got more experience

11:43

here, I started to temper that a little bit more.

11:45

And so I would say it has evolved into

11:49

kind of being a bit more, I

11:52

guess, yeah, thoughtful is the word. And

11:55

now I think the main

11:57

approach I take to any and

12:00

all of this this information

12:02

that People want me to share or

12:04

that I want to share with people is

12:06

just kind of like a how can

12:08

we make this easy? What's the simplest

12:10

way to? Apply whatever

12:13

it is. I want it whether it's like paying

12:15

attention to your extraction or

12:18

Timing your roasts that sort

12:20

of that sort of mindset. It's like how can

12:22

that apply to their the paradigm?

12:25

They've already got and then if

12:27

they want to pursue something more

12:29

like the international specialty coffee movement,

12:32

how can we bring them towards that without

12:35

just kind of smacking them over the head with a bunch

12:37

of books? So

12:39

that's kind of how my approach has changed

12:41

a little bit.

12:42

Well, let's back up a little bit. If you could help

12:45

illuminate a bit about having

12:48

worked in the United States, and you worked in Washington,

12:50

right? And you worked in Texas

12:53

as well? Yeah.

12:55

Not so much in Texas. I'm from Texas,

12:57

but I didn't really get my coffee,

13:00

my specialty coffee career started in

13:03

Olympia, Washington. And then I

13:05

spent a little bit of time in Portland, Oregon

13:07

with, with that. So

13:09

how do you compare the Pacific

13:11

Northwest kind of coffee consumer scene

13:14

to what you've experienced here in

13:15

Vietnam? It's really,

13:18

really different. In. Although

13:21

the, I would say the similarity is that

13:23

it's very entrenched and people

13:26

don't want to change it, right?

13:28

And so like in the Pacific Northwest,

13:30

it's very much like, you

13:32

know, don't bring your fancy

13:35

flower coffee to me. I want this

13:38

dark, whatever stuff.

13:40

And then in Vietnam is very

13:43

much like, don't try to change my

13:45

daily iced coffee with condensed milk

13:47

habit. And so that

13:49

I think that those similarities are kind of

13:51

where it ends. The main difference is the

13:54

occasions for consumption are

13:57

quite a bit different. So I couldn't bring my

13:59

cafe operations mindset

14:02

to Vietnam. I had to learn

14:04

to understand like when people went

14:07

for coffee to places. And so. Even

14:10

if I decided to open up my cafe at

14:12

like 6 a. m. to try to capture

14:14

more commuter business, it would not

14:17

work well. Because the commuter

14:19

here wants to get a quick and easy

14:22

on the side of the road kind of coffee

14:24

first thing in the morning. And then most

14:27

people who drink coffee here have

14:29

it once in a day. And

14:31

because it's Robusta, they're not gonna

14:33

have multiple cups. And

14:35

so I would say that's the biggest difference in

14:37

the U. S. I think per capita consumption

14:40

is like three times. And in the Pacific Northwest,

14:42

it could be as much as like four or five times the

14:44

amount as Vietnamese people

14:46

typically drink. So that informed

14:49

a lot of like what I was doing

14:51

here and why I decided

14:54

to do what I'm doing at the

14:56

cafe where we're, even

14:58

though my roasting company does a lot of Robusta

15:00

by volume. We don't sell any

15:02

of it in the cafe because my, my

15:05

mission here is to just try to increase

15:07

per capita consumption. And I can't do that with

15:09

the high caffeine content species.

15:13

It's funny you

15:13

mentioned that. I don't know if I've told the story on the

15:15

podcast before, but one of the things

15:17

that kept me away from coffee for a really long

15:19

time was in 2008,

15:21

I was working in a first

15:24

floor coffee shop in the financial district

15:26

in San Francisco. So it wasn't a cafe. It was

15:28

like for the building for like the business people

15:30

there. And I had the first shift. So I would leave

15:33

at four 30 and like go and make coffee for

15:35

people, like open it first thing. Cause people,

15:37

San Francisco want their coffee at five in the morning.

15:40

And I would, you

15:42

know, make coffee for them. And then I'd see

15:44

them again at like 10, and then I'd see, cause it's the same

15:46

people, and I'd see them at lunchtime, and then I'd see them at

15:48

2, and I'm like, these people have coffee

15:50

4 or 5 times a day, and it was so

15:53

expensive. So at that time I remember

15:55

thinking like, oh, I don't want to be part of this like club, I don't

15:57

want to be part of this group, cause I just, that was like my only

15:59

model of coffee consumers, was

16:01

like you had to be that I don't know, like that

16:03

addicted to it. So, one

16:05

of the things that I have noticed in my

16:08

short time here in Vietnam is, I,

16:11

I wanted to come here because

16:13

I wanted to see A culture

16:15

that was a strong producer and a strong consumer

16:18

culture. I wanted to see how those two things go

16:20

together because where

16:22

I'm from in Central America, it's, it's

16:24

so rare. And most of

16:26

the cafe culture that is like developing

16:29

that I've seen in Columbia and Guatemala

16:31

is very similar to, it's just kind of

16:33

a lot of stuff borrowed from the state. So it doesn't feel

16:36

like that organic of those cultures.

16:38

It just feels like we're seeing. What

16:41

Europe is doing. We're seeing what America is doing and we're just

16:43

going to bring it here. So I wanted

16:45

to see if there was more of

16:47

that authenticity feels like

16:49

a charged word, but something a little bit more

16:52

like homegrown instead

16:54

of copy and pasted. So

16:56

all of this to say, I really have been

16:59

inspired by. How

17:02

coffee is consumed here. How pumped people are

17:04

about consuming Vietnamese coffee.

17:06

Like, I really feel

17:08

yeah, just inspired it. I feel like, you know, sort

17:10

of refreshed about that coffee

17:13

perspective. But still just as an

17:15

outsider, seeing it briefly. So I'm just wondering if you

17:17

could give a little bit more kind of context

17:19

into the culture here

17:21

and what you've seen and maybe something that I'm missing.

17:23

Like,

17:24

I think if we back up like more

17:26

than a hundred years at the kind

17:28

of. Past the peak of French occupation

17:31

and towards them finally like

17:33

getting booted out, there was this

17:35

moment of kind of mashup.

17:38

And I feel like Vietnam is very much a mashup

17:40

culture for a couple of reasons.

17:42

But at the end of French occupation

17:45

came things like the banh

17:47

mi sandwich and pho soup.

17:50

And so before that, there

17:52

were lots of different types of soups in

17:54

Vietnam. But pho came

17:56

about as like an, like

17:59

an attempt to make a French style

18:01

brothy noodle soup. And

18:03

so it, it was kind of a mashup

18:06

of, of Vietnam and France.

18:09

I'm not even sure who's responsible for it,

18:11

but and then so I, you know,

18:13

then with the bánh mì sandwich, of course,

18:15

there wouldn't be any bread in Vietnam if

18:17

it wasn't for that. And then

18:19

so moving forward, there were so

18:21

many things that came as a result

18:23

of that. And so what I'm seeing now

18:26

is at first in specialty

18:28

coffee here, there was a

18:30

bit of a copy paste culture. People wanted

18:32

to do what the Europeans were doing. People wanted

18:34

to do what the Americans were doing. And

18:37

now I'm starting to see people

18:39

combine things from the local

18:41

coffee consumption culture of like

18:43

just sitting on the street drinking Robusta

18:45

drinks with lots of sugar or milk. And

18:48

bringing that into

18:50

kind of a modern style of cafe.

18:53

And I think that that's one of the most exciting,

18:56

like, points in the coffee

18:59

movement that's happened here. And

19:01

so historically mashup

19:03

culture and then, you know,

19:05

like geographically, it makes sense

19:08

that it's that because if you look at where

19:10

Ho Chi Minh City slash Saigon

19:12

is situated on a map, It's

19:15

kind of at this confluence point to where

19:17

everything from the north, Mongolia,

19:19

China, a little bit of, you

19:22

know, Himalayan area pointing

19:25

straight down at Saigon, and then everything

19:27

from the west of that

19:29

would be India,

19:32

Thailand, Cambodia, so all

19:34

that's like moving towards and meeting

19:36

in Saigon, and so

19:38

this is like a huge shipping port as well.

19:41

So you can see like where all of this kind of mixing

19:43

and blending of cultures starts

19:45

to happen here. And so it's, it's almost

19:48

like saying nothing is sacred. And

19:50

and so anything that gets introduced immediately

19:53

gets blended and churned into

19:56

whatever is going to happen next.

19:58

And so that's, that's what I think culturally

20:00

is important to understand about anything

20:02

that's introduced into Vietnam is immediately

20:05

going to get... Taken up, maybe copied

20:07

for a couple of years, but then it's going

20:09

to be blended into something else. And

20:11

that's, that evolution is kind of what's really

20:13

exciting about being here.

20:15

Well, I'm wondering too if that's also maybe

20:18

kind of a consequence of like culture,

20:20

like a sine wave of culture of like things first

20:23

diverge until they have to come back

20:25

and converge and then they kind of, you know, it's like you have to

20:27

copy enough and then it's like long enough

20:29

that you can then make it your own. Right.

20:31

And then at some point, like there's just like this, like

20:33

swinging back and forth. So I think

20:35

that maybe in Central America, we're just in

20:37

the baby stages like we have to still

20:40

We have to go through this like learning process of everybody

20:43

kind of converging on something feeling comfortable

20:45

enough to then diverge

20:47

and I think like there's also very much

20:49

like the nearly There's

20:52

there's almost like this nearly

20:54

external need For

20:57

the macroeconomic circumstances

20:59

to be right, right? If you don't have

21:01

a middle class that's growing, that

21:04

has the right level of income

21:07

at the right time when information

21:09

or a new product category

21:12

is introduced to a place, then

21:14

there's not enough uptake to sustain it.

21:17

But right now, the trajectory of Vietnam's

21:19

middle class is, you know, buying

21:21

cars, condos. Experiencing

21:25

lots of different things from

21:27

the outside because there's this hunger for

21:29

experiences. And if that

21:31

doesn't exist in a place, then

21:34

it's really hard to sustain anything that's

21:36

new or introduced to the culture.

21:39

So

21:39

how much is a cup of coffee? Can you tell

21:41

us what a, you know, like, if you're

21:44

a worker, you're commuting to, and you get a

21:46

cup of coffee on the side of the road from

21:48

a vendor. About a buck. One US

21:50

dollar. Okay. Sometimes

21:52

cheaper and I, I

21:54

kind of have a rule of thumb about drinking

21:56

coffee on the street. If the cup of coffee

21:59

is as cheap as like

22:02

a bottle of water, I'm not going to touch it

22:04

because there's a lot of adulterant,

22:06

a lot of adulterated coffee here.

22:08

And some of it's not even coffee. It's like burnt

22:11

corn and soybeans blended together with

22:13

some coffee essence and flavor. So,

22:16

and. But do you

22:17

sometimes get those

22:18

coffees? Sometimes and

22:20

you know, it's not exactly the fact that it's like

22:23

not pure coffee. That bothers me. It's

22:25

that there's no kind of Standard

22:28

about food safety and

22:30

and health and sanitation and a lot

22:32

of these very low What

22:35

would we call it? But yeah, just

22:37

the, in that category of coffee, there's

22:39

just not a lot, you know, protecting the consumer.

22:42

So you're not being like a coffee purist. You're

22:44

just worried about

22:45

your... Right. I, yeah, I, I

22:47

definitely, I've gone through my

22:50

periods of being a total

22:52

purist, you know about coffee.

22:55

And then I've, over the years

22:57

as I gain more experience and seen more

22:59

examples of things have just

23:02

gotten a lot more reasonable. And

23:05

Just, that's just kind of, that

23:07

seems to be my response to everything

23:09

now in coffee is just like, be

23:11

reasonable. I

23:15

totally get that. Yeah. And, and kind of being involved

23:17

in customer service day in and day out. Most,

23:19

most of my F and B friends

23:21

would heartily agree with the sentiment

23:24

and, and we've probably all heard it before,

23:26

but like, I really do believe

23:28

we need to meet customers, meet

23:31

consumers where they are. Even

23:33

if that just means reaching your hand out

23:35

so you can pull them up the steps, you know,

23:37

like it really is important

23:41

not to alienate people with

23:43

what you're trying to bring them because that could put a

23:45

really bad taste in their mouth for

23:47

future opportunities to experience

23:50

a similar thing. And

23:52

so what I mentioned before, like in the Pacific

23:54

Northwest, I've heard plenty of coffee drinkers

23:56

saying, I don't want any of that fruit

23:58

flower coffee that you're bringing. Because

24:01

somebody had ruined that introduction

24:05

to, for them. So I'm

24:07

very mindful of that and really just,

24:10

yeah, be reasonable. That's all I

24:12

ask.

24:13

So if one of those, you know, kind

24:16

of more traditional coffee experiences

24:18

for most consumers is about a dollar or

24:20

a little bit less, then if they wanted

24:22

to come into a specialty shop and get Some,

24:25

a more elevated cup. What does that cost?

24:27

Mm-hmm. I'd say like expect anywhere

24:29

between, $2 50

24:31

cents all the way up to $10.

24:34

Just depending on how special the thing is.

24:37

If you're getting like a latte, it's

24:39

gonna be in the $4 range, maybe

24:41

up to six. So it's very much

24:43

on par with just about anywhere

24:45

else in the world I would say. Mainly

24:48

because the cost of ingredients is

24:50

pretty much the same. Supply chains don't

24:52

change their prices based on the local

24:55

culture. So I'd

24:57

say expect to pay wherever

24:59

you're from, same prices. And

25:02

How do you feel that it's different being

25:04

in a producing country where your coffee doesn't have to

25:06

travel as far and that you have such access

25:09

to the producers and that you're able to,

25:11

you know, have these relationships where you can check

25:13

in on the coffee traditionally in the

25:15

coffee shops that they're producing? We're

25:18

used to in the States coffee has to come

25:20

really, really far and have long distances,

25:23

long delays in shipping and

25:25

sitting in warehouses. It's like, what

25:27

advantages

25:28

do you think you have? Well, I mean, besides

25:30

the smug satisfaction that I get from

25:32

it I think the advantages that it has is

25:34

just like this really kind of

25:36

like closer connection

25:38

and a more meaningful kind

25:41

of relationship between. The

25:43

production of the coffee and

25:45

the consumption of it, people are

25:47

having a cup of like delicious

25:49

specialty level Arabica

25:51

coffee that was produced

25:55

less than six hour drive

25:57

away. And that's like

26:00

almost a source of like national pride

26:02

for some people. I know a lot

26:04

of folks who myself included,

26:07

like, I don't consider myself very patriotic

26:10

in any way, but. When

26:12

I hear some good news about Vietnam,

26:14

I'm like, I feel a little bit of, like, warmth

26:17

in my chest about it. And so I, I

26:19

can only imagine what it must feel like to be

26:21

a Vietnamese citizen, having

26:24

their coffee being, like, internationally

26:27

recognized as something good.

26:29

It was this idea. It was from your blog,

26:31

The Vietnam Coffee Guy, where

26:34

you were talking about, It's like, who

26:37

is Vietnamese coffee for? Yep. And

26:39

so the fact that you have such the, that

26:41

Vietnam has such a strong consuming culture,

26:44

and that people here do want to pay for

26:46

this coffee, and yet some of the better,

26:48

better prices are usually exporting

26:51

prices, and that's not

26:53

necessarily true here. Right. And so like you're

26:55

shifting, it's like, it's like this completely,

26:57

I don't know. Upside down for us.

27:00

Right. Kind of paradigm that the

27:02

better price is here. And so

27:04

this idea of like, who is the coffee

27:06

for? Is it for the people that

27:08

make it? Or for the highest bidder?

27:11

And so I think that there's also this kind

27:13

of, the note that I wrote down is like,

27:15

you have been also brought up

27:17

in a western culture. Yeah. For

27:20

me also, my American capitalism is like,

27:22

Oh, it's for the highest bidder. And

27:24

then we have like Vietnamese communism

27:26

where it's like, no, it's for the people. And

27:29

so having, so I just wanted to ask you specifically

27:31

having a foot in each of these cultures,

27:34

like where do you land on that, that

27:36

question? Well, I intentionally asked it

27:38

as an open question because it

27:40

brings up so many good conversations

27:42

out as a result, you know, like it

27:45

really gets. The people

27:47

who, for the 12 people who have read

27:49

my blog, there, there have been

27:51

12 distinct, like, good conversations

27:54

that come out of it because everybody comes out with their own

27:56

meaning from it. But I mean,

27:58

who is it for? I think it's, I

28:00

think it's for anyone

28:03

who is curious or

28:07

anyone who would have

28:09

something to gain from experiencing

28:11

it. You know, beyond satisfying

28:13

curiosity, more like maybe like the

28:16

quasi national pride thing I was talking

28:18

about before. But I don't have

28:20

a precise answer for that. Like,

28:22

who's it for? It's for me because I'm enjoying

28:24

it. I'm the one who's enjoying it. I think

28:27

it's for the person who wants to enjoy it. That's

28:29

who it's for. Whether that's the producer

28:31

who enjoys sharing it with a

28:33

buyer or a roaster or someone,

28:36

or whether that's, The consumer

28:38

who's coming into a cafe and purchasing it.

28:41

I don't necessarily think it's for

28:44

trading companies and

28:47

exporters to determine.

28:50

Like, it might be for them, but it's not

28:52

for them to determine. And so,

28:55

highest bidder, I don't know

28:57

if that necessarily makes a thing sustainable.

29:00

But definitely the most consistent

29:02

bidder. I would

29:04

say is more important than the highest bidder. Yeah,

29:07

but I still don't have an answer for that exactly.

29:10

But who, I mean, who is coffee

29:12

for in general? You know, I think we're, we're

29:14

coming up at this sort of introspective

29:17

kind of a moment in the coffee

29:19

industry altogether. I'm a

29:21

big fan of the Instagram

29:23

account coffee black. Because

29:26

they're asking a lot of hard questions.

29:28

I have never had their coffee. I

29:31

don't know anything about it. I've met

29:33

I've met someone from there once

29:36

maybe at a at an event. They

29:38

wouldn't remember me But

29:41

I really appreciate the questions that

29:43

they're asking and the kind of the

29:45

issues that they're bringing up Because

29:49

it's it's not about It's about answering

29:51

things, it's about questioning things,

29:54

and I think that that's so much more important. I

29:56

completely

29:57

agree, and I was, I was kind of cracking

29:59

up because I was thinking, I

30:01

often like to do that too, just like, pose a question,

30:03

be like, not my responsibility to answer!

30:06

Like, it's just, I'm just gonna toss this out there.

30:08

But since I have you as a captive audience, I was like, nobody

30:12

usually gets to push me, cause it's my

30:14

podcast. I was like,

30:16

you

30:16

asked. So, Lucia, who's

30:19

coffee for?

30:21

No, I, you know, I, I, I also

30:23

wanted to ask you about that,

30:25

like, do you have that opportunity

30:27

to, like, who do you talk

30:30

to about these questions? Like, do you

30:32

have that sort of community

30:34

to,

30:36

I mean, I don't want to make it sound

30:38

like, like any sort of way,

30:40

but like in Vietnam,

30:42

I don't necessarily have that dynamic

30:44

of of, like. experienced

30:47

coffee industry peers to

30:49

talk about these questions with everybody

30:52

that I interface with in general

30:54

are either like people who want to

30:56

learn something or

30:58

people who want to enjoy something.

31:01

And so they're not necessarily looking to make it

31:03

more difficult for them themselves

31:06

in their brain space. These

31:08

are things that I usually talk with

31:10

with industry friends from

31:12

the States or from Europe. Online,

31:15

basically, so I'm not discussing these

31:18

big questions on a

31:20

regular basis with people, so I have a lot of time

31:22

to just kind of mull over

31:24

it in my own brain, and then maybe

31:26

sometimes write it down in my very

31:29

intermittent blog. But

31:32

sometimes I can capture the question, someone

31:34

will read it, and they'll reflect it back to me,

31:36

and then I'll remember, oh yeah, I did

31:39

ask that question. So,

31:41

it's not necessarily consistent there's

31:43

not always a point to it, it's

31:46

just kind of like a brain dump, in a way.

31:49

Yeah,

31:49

I really appreciate that you're able to make

31:51

these posts, like, very concise,

31:54

and very, they're very tight. And

31:56

a lot of the times I'm like, oh, it took me like an hour

31:58

of a podcast to like get around to like

32:01

something. And so I really admire when I can

32:03

just like have your

32:04

snapshots and blog. I have the benefit of editing.

32:06

Nobody sees me in the process of writing

32:09

any of this. And then my

32:12

partner in life, she's

32:14

a very good with words

32:16

kind of person. So I owe her

32:18

a whole lot. Kel is like

32:21

probably. The reason

32:24

that there's even a blog that I'm contributing

32:26

to online.

32:27

I think we share that as well. And Nick, my

32:30

partner is also the editor

32:32

and the polisher and somebody

32:34

who contributes a lot to the things that

32:36

we get to put out. Yeah.

32:38

Kel has a really good, like kind of BS meter

32:42

as well. She, she'll be like,

32:44

yeah, you're, you're totally full of

32:46

it right here. I think you need to delete that

32:48

paragraph or find a different way to say

32:50

it. And so. I totally

32:52

appreciate that. Because I, I

32:54

kind of, I get impressed with myself

32:56

a little too easily if I'm left alone, you

32:58

know? That's mostly how

33:00

I

33:01

operate. Like, you saw pictures earlier

33:03

of our house on the mountain, and I'm like, I spend a lot

33:05

of time alone. I spend a lot of time, like, just

33:07

kind of in my head, so it is really nice to have that

33:10

like, what's that called? The, like,

33:12

backboard? Bouncing board?

33:15

No. Sounding

33:16

board. Sounding board. That's it. Yes.

33:18

Yes. We're so used to being intercultural,

33:21

we lose these little words

33:23

for

33:23

things. Sounding board. I'm glad you brought

33:25

up coffee black too, because I, I

33:28

also have never met, I think it's Bartholomew.

33:30

I've never met him, but

33:32

I just was one of those things with like a very

33:35

small introduction of

33:37

like the concept and the brand. I

33:39

was like, so in, I was just like,

33:41

yes, that more of that. And

33:44

I also really like that most of,

33:46

at least the communication that I've seen is

33:48

not about processing and it's not,

33:51

it's like appreciating coffee from a different

33:53

angle about. Where it's

33:55

coming from and who's making it and

33:57

that idea of like who who gets to enjoy it,

34:00

right? And so I really

34:02

really admire What they're

34:04

doing.

34:04

Kind of like my sniff test

34:06

for coffee things now

34:09

is Is

34:11

somebody trying to oversimplify

34:15

Something that's really complex, you

34:18

know, and so saying that coffee is all

34:20

about What's in the cup,

34:22

or all about what's, what

34:25

the roast color meter is reflecting,

34:27

or whatever, like people are trying to distill

34:29

coffee down to. I kind of turn

34:32

away from that. I'm like, no, you have to

34:34

embrace the complexity because it

34:36

is all these things, but it's all

34:38

these things. And so I

34:40

really appreciate what Bartholomew

34:42

is doing by bringing a cultural

34:45

and a political element. Back

34:47

into it because it is those things

34:49

you can't, you can't detach

34:52

politics from coffee because

34:54

it's such a charged industry and

34:56

it depends on politics to

34:58

get movement in the world. And it also,

35:01

it also kind of brings up a lot of things. I just

35:04

read a really great blog entry from

35:07

Christopher for an about Ethiopia

35:09

and my God, it

35:12

It contains everything, you know,

35:14

economics, philosophy, culture, politics,

35:17

and all of that is relevant. And

35:19

unless you're willing to accept

35:22

all of that as being a part of the big thing

35:24

of coffee, you're kind

35:26

of diluting yourself. In a way.

35:29

And that's also one of the reasons why,

35:31

and I haven't been able to articulate it as well as you

35:33

just did, why when we talk

35:35

about coffee, I get so bored talking

35:37

about flavor, or like things like,

35:39

I'm like, that is the least interesting part about

35:42

coffee, like there's so many things that we could talk about,

35:45

and like, flavor notes, I

35:47

just, I can't like, get

35:49

excited about that as much anymore. Yeah,

35:51

and the same because, you know, it's like

35:54

vanilla chocolate strawberry, you know,

35:56

like. Are you going to just

35:58

limit all of coffee to one of

36:00

those three choices and say, this is quintessential

36:03

and what everyone should like? It's

36:05

like, no man, 31 flavors,

36:08

right? Like let's, okay. Now

36:10

that we recognize it's complex and

36:12

it has all this to offer, let's push that

36:14

aside and start talking about the other stuff. Right?

36:17

Yeah. I get bored of that too.

36:19

Well, and I think. I want

36:21

to add something that I don't think I'm disagreeing

36:23

with, like, the general sentiment. I feel like we're saying

36:26

the same thing. But I think sometimes

36:28

we can get lost in thinking

36:30

that complex is always

36:32

better. Or, like, I think the easiest

36:35

thing to do is make something more complicated.

36:37

And so I think of that way when I'm... Trying

36:40

to make a processing protocol where it's

36:42

like, I want simplicity. And I think that

36:44

once you understand the fundamentals, like things

36:47

don't have to be so complicated in

36:49

certain aspects. And so I think a lot of times

36:52

it, it seems okay

36:54

for doing. 24 hour fermentation

36:56

than 50 is better. Okay, now we're going to do like a double

36:58

soak and now we're going to do like a triple soak. And

37:01

now I'm going to do it like a honey plus

37:03

100 hour fermentation that you can continually

37:05

add and make something more complicated. But

37:07

that's

37:07

not for sure. No. And I think we're talking

37:09

about it pretty much the same

37:12

thing. We're not disagreeing. I'm talking about

37:14

in terms of thinking

37:16

about coffee, right?

37:18

If you're going to think about an industry, if

37:20

you're going to talk about the way something should be

37:22

appreciated. You have to accept the

37:25

complexity. That's basically

37:28

what I, what I think. But

37:30

when it comes to action, when it comes

37:32

to protocol, when

37:34

it comes to teaching, you have

37:36

to simplify, right? You don't,

37:38

you don't go into an intro to biology class

37:41

and immediately start getting into organic

37:43

chemistry. That's just like the wrong

37:45

way to teach somebody something. And

37:47

so I think, yeah, yeah, as a teacher,

37:50

as... A maker of protocol.

37:53

You have to simplify. That's

37:55

like the only way to get a start in

37:57

anything. Yeah, like you said,

37:59

it's easy to make things complicated.

38:02

Well, it's interesting. I was wondering if you had any more

38:04

insight into the moment where, or

38:06

not necessarily the moment, but kind of your,

38:09

how you're thinking open from being. More

38:11

of a coffee purist, maybe more traditional,

38:13

and then Unlocking and saying wait,

38:16

this is way more complicated than I thought or having

38:18

more of that open mind Because

38:20

I think it's like you need that simplification to

38:22

enter and then you have to

38:24

like graduate out of it

38:26

Right, right, and I think for

38:28

me that came due to the response

38:32

That people close to me had

38:34

to the things that I loved in coffee.

38:36

And so when I was drinking I

38:39

was drinking super light roasted coffee

38:41

and I was trying to share it with my dad who's

38:43

been a lifelong coffee drinker and

38:46

he hated it. He's like,

38:48

no, I'd rather have my cup of Folgers

38:50

or Hills Brothers, whatever he's drinking. And

38:53

then, you know, he, after

38:55

he brews a pot, he puts a scoop of fresh

38:57

coffee grounds on the spent coffee grounds

38:59

and brews a second pot. And

39:02

he, he's an environmentalist. I

39:05

guess so. He's way more efficient than I

39:07

am. But at the same time,

39:09

like, I can't tell him he's wrong,

39:11

like, what's right, you know? And

39:14

so, those,

39:16

those sorts of things just kind of illuminated to

39:18

me. And it's like, well, I think it's pretty fashionable

39:20

now to say taste is subjective,

39:23

but it, it really is a subjective

39:25

thing. And like, who am

39:27

I to tell someone whose favorite color is

39:29

yellow that they're wrong? And

39:31

so, I think that it, it really made

39:34

me. Step back just

39:36

a bit and, you know, just climb

39:38

out of my own ego and recognize

39:42

that, like, coffee is for everyone.

39:44

That's who it's for. And

39:47

no matter how they enjoy it, like,

39:49

we've got to, like, celebrate it

39:51

and hope that they want to learn

39:53

more about it. That's the only hope that I have.

39:56

I've also shared, I think, the story of my mom,

39:58

how she loves lattes and,

40:01

but she has, like, a very High

40:03

ratio of milks. I've always teased her that

40:05

she likes milk. She doesn't really like coffee.

40:08

But one of the things that I realized is,

40:11

Oh very recently, only recently

40:13

did I realize that my mother taught

40:15

me the ritual

40:18

of coffee. She loved making

40:20

her coffee. Even that was like 90% milk.

40:23

It was one of those things that I got to observe early

40:25

on in her. Just

40:28

how she would like get in the zone and prepare it. And

40:30

it was something that she couldn't miss every day. And

40:32

in the beginning, when I was a teenager and I was

40:34

like, you know, being obnoxious and rebelling

40:36

against my mother it was one of those, another

40:39

thing that kept me away from coffee for a long time where

40:41

I'm like, that's her thing. Like, I don't want to be coffee.

40:43

Like that's Emma's thing. But

40:45

now reflecting, I'm just like, she loved

40:47

making her coffee. And it was something that I could

40:49

really notice made a difference

40:51

in her day. And she. at

40:54

her machines and her, all of her little

40:56

carafts, and I can really appreciate

40:59

that element of it, so that it's not

41:01

just, you know, judging the quality

41:03

of the coffee that's going into the cup, but the

41:06

whole ceremony of preparing it, and that

41:08

was, like, really lovely, and I was just like, oh, it's

41:10

such a dick,

41:11

for like... Oh, for sure. Like,

41:19

one tiny example is my morning ritual is to make an iced pour

41:21

over. Every single morning. And that might be

41:23

sacrilege to some, but I

41:26

could just as easily make a huge

41:28

batch, stick it in a bottle, keep

41:30

it in the fridge and just pour a glass

41:33

in the morning and not have to brew coffee

41:35

for like five days. And

41:38

it would be acceptable. I could, I could totally handle

41:40

it. It'd be fine. It, in my opinion,

41:43

it would taste better than cold brew, but that's

41:45

also an opinion. But the ritual

41:48

is what. Wakes me up in the morning.

41:50

It's what, like, makes me look forward to my

41:52

day. Oh, I get to make coffee tomorrow,

41:54

you know, and I, I think

41:56

that there's something in that. I just like,

41:58

I get these images of growing up,

42:01

riding around with my dad and his work truck

42:04

and just like seeing the big Stanley

42:06

thermos, you know, holds like nearly

42:08

two liters of hot coffee sitting

42:11

in a seat. And just,

42:14

that was like my growing up with coffee.

42:16

I guess that was part of the ritual. It was like, Drive

42:19

into work to the construction site

42:21

and like having this thermos of

42:23

coffee. And the first thing you do when you step

42:25

onto the job site

42:27

is not check in with your employees,

42:30

but pour yourself a cup of coffee

42:33

and stand there and lean on your truck and

42:35

just kind of survey the land, you know, like

42:37

moment for yourself. It's the moments

42:39

it's, you know, like, I feel like all the Folgers

42:41

advertising in the eighties captured

42:44

exactly the essence of all the stuff we're pointing

42:46

towards now in coffee.

42:48

I think that's really fair. I,

42:51

and I also feel kind of bummed when people,

42:53

like, say they love coffee because they like drinking

42:55

it, but they don't make their own coffee. They just, like, sort

42:58

of buy it. I'm like, oh, you're missing out. Like, making coffee

43:00

is so

43:00

fun. Yeah, but then, like, how many

43:03

coffee makers does it take to

43:05

crash a cafe industry? That's

43:10

hard to figure out. Maybe

43:12

that's, that's another reckoning for another

43:14

time. Fair enough. Yeah. Another

43:16

thing I wanted to, actually, really

43:19

thank you for, because you have helped me

43:21

open up, unlock this part of,

43:24

of terroir, where I

43:27

hate that word for coffee, in terms

43:29

of, I don't like the baggage that it brings. Yep.

43:31

I've been very Maybe not vocal enough, but

43:34

I'm somewhat vocal about how I don't think

43:36

that this is what we should be borrowing

43:38

from the wine industry. I think it does more harm than good.

43:40

For sure. But I didn't have a good replacement

43:43

until you. And

43:45

the word, the thing that we're looking for is provenance.

43:48

Provenance is the thing that we need

43:50

to be talking about. It matters where things come from, but terroir

43:53

is not the way to capture that.

43:55

Exactly. There was a point in my

43:57

roasting career early on. I told,

44:00

I think maybe Oliver would remember this.

44:02

I was working for Olympia coffee and

44:04

I told him, I want to destroy

44:06

this concept of terroir, terroir,

44:09

terroir, because

44:12

I've tasted enough coffees from

44:14

Columbia specifically that

44:16

have so much diversity and variety

44:18

of flavor that this concept

44:20

of locking a single country

44:23

into a single flavor profile

44:25

is like. limiting

44:27

and I guess I would have

44:30

said wrong. And I'm just like,

44:32

what if we can get profiles like

44:35

we experienced from Yirgachev

44:37

from a basic place?

44:40

Like, I don't know, Brazil,

44:44

you know? And like, what,

44:46

why is Brazil basic? Like,

44:48

is it their processing

44:50

methods? Is it their cultivation methods?

44:53

Or are they locked into the flavor of their

44:55

soil? And I don't

44:57

think the soil is the only thing at play

45:00

there. Right? If you think about,

45:02

like, mechanical harvesting, and

45:05

separating cherry instead of

45:07

selective harvesting, then

45:09

you can start to get an idea of why the

45:12

coffee is the way it is from there. And

45:14

same with Vietnam. Like, the reputation

45:16

for low quality is well earned.

45:19

There was a race to the bottom, and they were trying

45:22

to increase volume. And

45:24

strip picking was the norm. And

45:26

so, that's where the reputation came from.

45:28

You know, but reputations don't have to stick,

45:31

either.

45:31

So, yeah. And I think that's what people don't realize

45:34

when we use a word terroir, is that

45:36

it, it sounds so

45:39

romantic, and it sounds like, the,

45:41

the intention is, I want to appreciate where this

45:43

came from, I'm appreciating the land, it's

45:46

like I'm doing something positive. For sure. But

45:48

it's that lack of Education or lack

45:50

of understanding that along with that is what you said

45:52

the locking in is like you can't get

45:54

that terroir without locking in

45:56

and stifling innovation stifling

45:59

any kind of change or any opportunity,

46:02

right? Yeah, I mean, I

46:04

think it's becoming a little bit more fashionable

46:07

or popular now to talk about

46:09

limiting beliefs, you know,

46:11

when it comes to mental health. I think

46:13

that we can. Expand that

46:16

into industries, you know, we have a lot

46:18

of limiting beliefs about what certain countries

46:20

are capable of. And just

46:22

last year I tasted an Indonesian coffee

46:25

that I swore was like

46:27

a Yirgacheffe washed processed

46:29

coffee. That, I mean, I, it's

46:32

like somebody is cheating here. This is an

46:34

Ethiopian coffee for sure. And

46:37

then, of course, like I was, I'm

46:39

gladly, I was wrong about that.

46:41

Yeah, and I think that there's also

46:44

Something that I really appreciate about the information

46:46

that you put out there is that you also care about words

46:49

and you think that vocabulary is really important.

46:52

And because these

46:54

words kind of like shape our thinking. And

46:56

so I think it's important to be precise.

47:00

And there are better words to

47:02

use. So I think that's... For sure. I

47:05

mean, I'm just, I was just so like relieved.

47:07

Like I remember this like... Very

47:09

palpable feeling of relief when I, when

47:12

you said provenance, and I was like, that's it

47:14

because we want to

47:16

care about where things come from. We want to have

47:18

that pride. We don't want to

47:19

erase the history of the object. Yeah.

47:22

It's exciting when you

47:24

have this kind of like thread back

47:27

to where this coffee came from. But

47:29

the way that we've been doing it, and it's just

47:31

very clumsy, you know, like it's a

47:33

very

47:33

immature, I mean, it's an immature industry

47:36

as far as a specialty. I mean, the term

47:39

didn't come out, come about until like the mid

47:41

seventies. And so, you know, like

47:43

wine has hundreds of years

47:45

underneath it, you know, like it's, we're only

47:47

borrowing from it because it's established and

47:49

doing well for itself. I think,

47:51

you know, we're in that painful and

47:54

frustratingly slow moving period

47:56

of change in this industry. And

47:59

of course, humans only have one lifetime,

48:01

so we're really impatient about it. You

48:03

know, we want it to change and change now and give

48:05

us the answers. And of course, that's a natural

48:08

sort of predisposition. But at

48:10

the same time, we have to back away and realize, Oh,

48:13

for this one change in the industry

48:16

like the Castillo variety in

48:18

Colombia that we so easily cast

48:21

off and dispel. That took like

48:23

30, 50 years of development

48:25

before we even tasted one cup of it.

48:27

And so just to think on those timelines

48:29

is frustrating for people like us. You

48:32

know, and I accept that. Human

48:34

behavior is what it is. But at the same time,

48:36

we can also push back at it a little bit.

48:39

Tell people to take a chill pill. Be

48:41

reasonable. Be reasonable. That's

48:45

going to be on my tombstone.

48:49

So is there anything, I mean, I have so many other

48:51

things that I want to ask you about, so we'll definitely do

48:53

another part when I'm like more

48:55

together or prepared, but is there anything that you wanted

48:58

to talk about specifically? Anything you wanted to share

49:00

on this? Like intro casual,

49:02

man, I'm just like, I'm so stoked

49:05

that I don't know. I just

49:07

kind of want to sing the praises of how open

49:09

and awesome this industry is

49:11

because we can kind of.

49:14

look over the fence at each other online

49:16

and be like, Oh yeah, there's, there's somebody

49:19

who I want to pay attention to. And

49:21

then we meet in person and then we hit it off.

49:23

And then it's like, it's super

49:25

rad that that experience

49:27

has never happened to me in any other

49:30

kind of format or industry wherever

49:33

I was working before. I think

49:35

there's something special about the coffee industry.

49:37

Well, and I think it also lends itself

49:39

well to both of our types of Like

49:42

how we make a living, that

49:45

it isn't just a job, like for both of us, it

49:47

is so enmeshed in like our life

49:49

and our personality, like what we do. So

49:52

it's hard to listen to a podcast episode

49:54

and not know who I am as a person. Right,

49:56

right. Exactly. It's not a surprise.

49:58

Yeah. We're not looking for work

50:00

life separation, we're looking for balance

50:02

and work and life can be

50:05

the same thing, but as long as it's balanced.

50:08

And

50:08

even like the work that you put into

50:10

writing your blog posts, it's, it's

50:13

so much of your thoughtfulness distilled

50:16

that you, you don't, you don't

50:18

read that and come away not knowing who you are.

50:20

Yeah. At least for me, it wasn't like I, the

50:23

first one I read, I was like, we're already friends,

50:25

you know? And then we've, we've

50:27

spent this entire week hanging out you know,

50:30

sharing meals and just doing

50:32

all kinds

50:32

of. Talking so much not

50:35

coffee, which I love, too.

50:36

So much not coffee. Well, you know, I actually did that

50:38

on purpose because I

50:41

really wanted to save our coffee conversation

50:43

for here. Oh, yeah. Cause I'm like, he's gonna say something awesome

50:45

and I'm not gonna be able to record it.

50:47

So, I so

50:49

I would not be able to bring it back. I'm

50:51

very much an in the moment content creator.

50:54

And that's why I need someone like Kel to be

50:56

there to capture it and help me remember

50:58

things.

50:59

So it was really nice to spend this week just,

51:01

like, not talking coffee.

51:03

It's been great. I wish we could, like, hang out

51:05

all the time, because it's, like I said,

51:07

instant friends is a cool feeling.

51:09

I don't get it super often. Yeah,

51:11

Nick was like, how can we get them to move to Guatemala,

51:14

and you're like, how do you get them to move to Vietnam?

51:18

I think we just need some sort of exchange program.

51:20

We'll come up with it. We need a wormhole. Or

51:23

we need one of the listeners who's got

51:25

access to some sort of organization.

51:27

A private jet? Does anyone have a private

51:29

jet?

51:30

We need a private jumbo jet.

51:34

What I want to do is a reality

51:36

show where we bring a group of Guatemala's

51:39

best pickers here

51:41

to Vietnam and then we

51:44

team them up with local pickers

51:46

and have some sort of competition. About

51:49

who can do the highest quality cherry picking

51:51

and then we do the same thing in

51:53

Guatemala with Actually,

51:55

before we move on and I know that was a joke

51:57

But do you have some insight into kind

51:59

of the labor force like you do work with but

52:01

you're not a producer yourself But you do work with a lot

52:03

of them.

52:04

Yeah, I work with produce I I mean them

52:06

I think even I want to take away that

52:08

that last sentence Yes, I work

52:10

with some producers, but I talk with

52:12

a lot of producers and I think that that's more

52:15

important than working with a few.

52:17

And labor is a huge issue

52:20

for them. I mean, like everywhere in the coffee

52:22

world, like

52:24

it's an aging farming

52:26

population that we're starting

52:28

to see some younger folks get interested

52:30

in farming, but we also know young

52:33

people are a little fickle and they get interested in

52:35

something for a couple of years and they're off to something else.

52:37

And you know, coffee farming is a

52:40

10 year minimum investment. If

52:42

you just want to see one thing happen. So

52:45

I'm really hoping that that becomes, you

52:47

know, like a little more stabilized. But

52:49

the labor costs in Southeast Asia,

52:52

I think are significantly higher than a lot of places.

52:54

And so that's why you'll see many people

52:56

are familiar with the cost of Sumatran

52:59

coffees just being much higher than

53:01

a comparable coffee from somewhere else. Brazilian

53:04

coffees are very cheap compared

53:07

to other coffees. And so

53:09

I think that, you know, the, the local

53:11

labor costs have a lot to do with it.

53:13

Brazilians in this Brazil's industry

53:15

is highly mechanized, and so they

53:17

can keep those costs down through volume.

53:20

But in Vietnam, the

53:22

standard of living and incomes

53:24

are rising rapidly, and

53:27

the competition for this

53:29

labor is getting pretty fierce,

53:32

especially in a place like Da Lat, for example.

53:36

There's a lot of cut

53:38

fresh flowers industry working

53:41

there and they pay nearly double for

53:43

very basic labor that

53:46

a coffee farmer can pay a picker. And

53:48

so now we're starting to find this labor crunch

53:51

is, is happening here. So that's like,

53:53

I think that's a major, a major challenge

53:55

and a consideration to make when we're kind

53:58

of balking at a coffee

54:00

because of its price. We have to think about those

54:02

other things as well.

54:04

So do you think that's where some

54:06

of the, I mean, in

54:08

a scenario like that, it's either

54:11

coffee is going to start disappearing because it's not the

54:13

best crop that has the

54:15

most return? Or does any part of you

54:18

want to save coffee? Or do you feel

54:20

like, hey, if there's something better to grow, grow

54:22

that? Well, I'd say it changes

54:25

whether we're talking on the individual level

54:27

or on the industry wide level. Industry

54:30

wide. I mean, I think

54:32

we need a wake up call, but I also want

54:34

to save this industry because I love it so much.

54:36

But individually, when it comes to

54:38

a farmer having to make a decision, it's

54:41

totally theirs to make.

54:43

Like, I can't, I, I don't even want to be seen

54:45

having any influence in that decision. Like,

54:48

do what's best for you. If you can make a hundred

54:50

years worth of income by selling your

54:53

plot of land, sell

54:55

it. Like, you can start another

54:57

garden somewhere else. You know, like. Or

54:59

if you really love your land, hang onto

55:02

it, be stubborn, right? But, like, that's

55:04

not a decision I can have any influence

55:06

in whatsoever. I don't have any business

55:09

with that. So, all I can

55:11

do is just kind of help and encourage

55:14

people, but I need to meet them where they're

55:16

at. I need to figure out, like, what

55:18

their goals and their values

55:20

are, and what they really want

55:23

to accomplish with what they're doing in

55:25

coffee. And if that just means getting

55:27

out of coffee altogether, then I

55:30

want to help them do that, you know,

55:32

as, as much as that kind of makes

55:34

me a little sad, at the same time I have

55:36

to like face the reality that

55:39

coffee might just be a luxury item in

55:42

the future.

55:43

It's interesting that that's been kind of a

55:45

refrain in some of the more recent

55:48

episodes is this idea of You

55:50

know, the escape velocity or trying to grow something

55:52

else or just reducing for producers

55:54

and reducing how much coffee they're

55:56

growing and diversifying into just

55:58

other.

56:00

I will say like the, the

56:02

light at the end of the tunnel or whatever,

56:04

the treasure chest, the

56:07

treasure chest at the end of the rainbow is

56:10

agroforestry. I think that if

56:12

I can say one thing will help save

56:14

this industry, it's that.

56:17

Not organic, not. Whatever

56:20

else we can come up with, like agroforestry,

56:22

some sort of mixed use of

56:25

the land, produce less volume,

56:27

but have a healthier, more long term

56:30

kind of approach to coffee farming. I think

56:32

that that is where the hope in

56:34

the future is, is if

56:37

we can get people to reforest their land

56:39

just a little bit, enough to

56:41

kind of interplant things, diversify,

56:44

grow other crops. But keep

56:47

the coffee trees that that would be the

56:49

advice I would give if I felt it was my place

56:51

to give that advice

56:52

I I totally agree. I think that a

56:54

lot of the times most of the conversations

56:57

I'm having are Focused

56:59

on like saving coffee in a lot

57:01

of different ways whether we're talking about mechanization

57:04

or we're talking about Different

57:06

prices and I don't feel like often

57:09

enough. We're talking about that Agroforestry

57:11

and yeah going back to Just

57:15

helping, helping the

57:16

growth. Yeah, I think monoculture,

57:18

the, the, the, the age

57:20

of monoculture is dying.

57:23

It is actually killing, but it's dying

57:25

too. And we need to think

57:27

in, more in those terms in

57:29

general. Like the way we grow corn

57:31

and soybeans and rice, all of that. The

57:34

whole thing needs to go back to diversity.

57:36

Yeah, I totally agree. You

57:39

can wrap it up here. Yeah.

57:40

I feel like we can just keep talking all day

57:42

about this stuff. I

57:43

know! And we will! Because

57:46

I have way more questions for another

57:48

time. I need to like, put them together. It's

57:50

just been...

57:52

Yeah, and maybe I'll synthesize a few more thoughts and experiences

57:54

for that. Yeah! Yeah.

57:56

Awesome. Great. Thanks Will.

57:58

Thank you. It's been great.

58:00

Well, once again, before I end this episode,

58:03

I want to share my relief at finally

58:05

having a better word. Something to

58:07

replace terroir and origin. Origin

58:10

is problematic because coffee is a

58:12

colonial crop. Coffee is not original

58:15

to Guatemala, or Colombia, or Brazil,

58:17

or Kenya, or Hawaii, or Thailand.

58:20

And terroir is a problematic word, because

58:23

it carries within it a dark side, an

58:25

unintended consequence of locking in

58:28

a certain profile of stifling innovation

58:30

and creativity in an industry all about

58:32

pioneering and charting new territory. Terroir

58:36

makes sense for tea in China and wine

58:38

in France. But not for coffee anywhere

58:41

outside of Ethiopia. But

58:43

provenance, provenance is

58:45

able to capture what the other two words

58:47

cannot. Provenance is

58:49

defined as a record of ownership of

58:52

a work of art used as a guide

58:54

to authenticity or quality. And

58:57

this is exactly what we are trying to capture

58:59

about coffee. This is what makes it feel

59:01

special. This is the thing that we search

59:04

for and incorrectly want to call terroir

59:06

or origin. The record

59:08

of ownership, the guide to quality.

59:11

I think this is also what is attempted

59:13

when we use words like sustainability or

59:15

traceability. But those words

59:17

have been so abused that they have lost most

59:19

of their meaning and power. When I

59:21

see something labeled as sustainable, I can't

59:24

help but roll my eyes and look away. Provenance,

59:27

the record of ownership of coffee, acknowledges

59:30

the chain. The farmer was the owner,

59:33

and then the producer was the owner, and

59:35

the roaster is also an owner.

59:38

The passing along of a coffee, how it

59:40

got from point A to point B, that

59:42

journey tells us a lot about quality.

59:45

And I argue that it tells us much more

59:48

than some bad theories on soil.

59:50

Like the mineral content on some volcanic

59:52

soils or the average annual rainfall

59:55

don't tell you as much about the quality and

59:57

ethics of a coffee as the chain of ownership

1:00:00

does. So now that we have this new word

1:00:02

in our vocabulary, I hope that we can begin

1:00:04

to transition from, This

1:00:06

old model that we've had because

1:00:09

I get it that was the only thing

1:00:11

that was there It was what we could

1:00:13

work with thanks to

1:00:15

will we have a much more thoughtful

1:00:18

and More importantly a more accurate

1:00:20

word to describe the thing that we're trying

1:00:22

to point to Thanks to Will

1:00:25

for, coming up with this concept.

1:00:27

I'm so grateful to have it and thanks to

1:00:30

both him and Kel for being excellent hosts

1:00:32

and making our time in Vietnam so wonderful,

1:00:34

so magical. And thanks to the patrons

1:00:37

who make it possible for me to make new episodes.

1:00:40

If you want to join our coffee community and

1:00:42

join the Office Hours Live to ask me a question

1:00:44

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1:00:46

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1:00:49

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1:00:51

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1:01:13

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