Coffee industry

“ Rubber has been the chief cause of the decline of coffee industry in the Federated Malay States. Since the closing years of the nineteenth century coffee has been steadily on the downward path in acreage and production, with the possible exception of parts of Straits Settlements, which in 1918 exported, mostly to England, some 3,500,000 pounds of good grade coffee. ”

“ I was informed by many men that the first crop should pay the expenses of the first three years during which there is no yield. This is a magnificent return, and by judicious combines, capitalization, and concentration, Nyassa coffee should become an important industry. The coffee being of such quality, is only used for blending at present, so that there is little chance of over-production. ”

“ A ten-million bale crop depresses the market. Already experiments have been tried successfully to pay labor in the sugar fields by the tons of cane delivered at the mills for grinding. This is an incident full of auspicious significance. A general feeling is expressed in the current saying that coffee raising is "the coming industry." The confidence that there is prosperity in coffee amounts to enthusiasm. ”

“ Buying Coffee in Netherlands India
In the Dutch East Indies cultivation of Coffea arabica has diminished, the decay of the industry beginning when Brazil and Central America became the dominant factors in the green market. Not so many years ago coffee growing and coffee trading were virtually government monopolies. Under government control each native family was required to keep from six hundred to a thousand coffee trees in bearing, and to sell two-fifths of the crop to the government. ”

“ Whatever may be the origin of the use of coffee, it has become so general up to the present day that it may almost be classed among the articles of the greatest necessity. This extensive use has stimulated{311} the industry of inventors to seek means of rendering it most pleasant to drink, as also its great consumption and high price have awaked both economy and fraud, in order to find a substitute for this agreeable beverage. ”

“ General Outlook in Africa. In the African countries under control of European governments much recent progress has been made in promoting coffee growing and in improving methods of cultivation.
British interests were reported in 1919 as having started a movement toward reviving interest in the coffee growing industry in the British possessions in Africa. The report stated that Uganda, in the East African Protectorate, had 21,000 acres under coffee cultivation, with 16,000 acres more in other parts of the Protectorate, and 1,300 acres in Nyasaland ”

“ The reasons for this are various, partly relating to the mere economy of buying and manufacturing on a large scale, and partly relating to the trained skill that is needed both for selecting suitable green coffees to make a satisfactory blend, and for the roasting work itself. The proportion of consumers (including restaurants and hotels) who roast their own coffee is so small as to be negligible, at least in the United States. The average person who buys coffee today, for brewing use, never sees green coffee at all, unless as an "educational exhibit" in some dealer's display window. ”

“ Since the advent of the wagon-route distributer and the chain store, the independent retail grocer has been faced with the problem of how to regain at least a fair measure of the coffee trade he has lost. The grocer is not only concerned about his profits on coffee sales, but on other goods as well; for a trade investigation has shown that a large percentage of the regular customers of the retailer are held to the store by their purchases of coffee and tea. ”

“ The roasting in cocoa, coffee, and tea is necessary for desirable flavors, the heat developing volatile, aromatic principles, caramelizing the sugar, and causing other chemical changes. The differences in the flavor of coffees are due to the variety, the soil and climate, and methods of production and manufacture. No coffee grown in the western hemisphere has excelled, and scarcely has any equaled, the original Mocha and Java coffees, and these have long been trade names for coffee from other places, because of the popular liking for these brands. ”

“ Distribution of roasted coffees outside Chicago and Kansas City is accomplished [Pg 525] through the medium of more than one hundred stock depots in as many different cities of the United States.
To operate the world's greatest coffee business is no small undertaking; and when this is coupled with an important sugar-refining business and a waterfront warehouse-and-terminal business, plenty of room is needed. So we find the plant along the Brooklyn waterfront occupying an area of a dozen city blocks. ”

“ Lovers of coffee in the United States are in a better position to obtain an ideal cup of the beverage than those in any other country. While imports of green coffee are not so carefully guarded as tea imports, there is a large measure of government inspection designed to protect the consumer against impurities, and the Department of Agriculture is zealous in applying the pure food laws to insure against misbranding and substitution. The department has defined coffee as "a beverage resulting from a water infusion of roasted coffee and nothing else." ”

“ But, on the other hand, unless the roasting be done very carefully, the coffee will not be good. A few burnt beans in a quart will ruin the drink. When careful attention to roasting cannot be given at home, it will be better to buy a supply already roasted, but never ground. A French small mill, which can be regulated to grind coarse or fine, can be bought for about a dollar and a half. With care it will last for ten or twenty years. Some firms put up coffee in tin cans. It costs more, but retains so much of the aroma as to be well worth the extra price. ”

“ It communicates to cheap coffee a good color; and puts Body into it, there can be no doubt of that. It will be a severe blow to the trade in British coffees if intramural interment be forbidden. We shall be driven to depend upon distant planters for what now can be produced in any quantity at home. ”

“ If it is well kept coffee gets better with age, so it can be piled in great warehouses for months or even years and not deteriorate. Nearly a dozen million bags of coffee are shipped from Santo annually and as we are the greatest coffee drinkers in the world about half of the entire crop comes to us. ”

“ It is not to be undermined by representations that ground coffee bought by the package has lost much of its original value with time, and is, furthermore, shamefully adulterated. What your richer neighbors use ought to satisfy you, especially when discontent with it entails worry and labor upon herself. I repeat it: If you must have irreproachable coffee, look to it in person.
Next to this process in excellence is the plan of purchasing, a pound at a time, freshly-ground coffee from a trustworthy grocer, whose mill goes every day ”

“ Despite the low prices, if in those districts where the coffee is not pulped and washed the settlers who grow the bulk of our ordinary coffee were to combine, as they have done in some instances, to obtain pulping machines and hulling mills and to cure their coffee properly, there can be no doubt that the export value of our coffee would be increased by about 25 per cent. ”

“ In view of the fact that the United States imports coffee from more than a hundred different sections of the world, and that there are wide variations in flavor among the coffees produced in each of the hundred, it is easy to understand that the blender has an almost unlimited supply from which to make up a blend with a distinctive individuality. Practically all coffee importers, and most wholesalers, are thoroughly acquainted with the relative trade values of the different coffees, and help their customers make up desirable blends. ”

“ The larger percentage of roasted coffee sold by the average retailer is inferior. The crude and ignorant manner in which roasted coffees are handled by the small dealers is of itself sufficient to depreciate and almost destroy the good that is in any coffee; and, to meet this emergency, the Schnull-Krag Coffee Co., of Indianapolis, Ind., adopted a patent can from which their coffees are sold. These cans are sealed as soon as the coffee is placed in them, and, by the intervention of a trap on the inside of the can, refilling is prevented except at their mills. ”

“ Now the amount roasted in Pittsburgh alone by those who make a business of it, exceeds the entire consumption of coffee of any kind in the United States fifty years ago. It will never pay for small stores to roast if the large manufactories will do the work well, and if they will not, small dealers will add proper machinery, and will eventually become strong competing dealers. By doing the work with proper care they will not only secure a reputation with large sales for themselves, but will command the roasting for other parties. ”

“ The cocoa bean, on the other hand, has not risen to the position of popular favorite in any important consuming country, and so has not aroused the serious opposition of its two rivals.
Coffee is universal in its appeal. All nations do it homage. It has become recognized as a human necessity. It is no longer a luxury or an indulgence; it is a corollary of human energy and human efficiency. People love coffee because of its two-fold effect—the pleasurable sensation and the increased efficiency it produces. ”

“ Nearly all the coffee is ground at home, which is not a bad practise for the consumer; but perhaps works hardship on the dealer, who can mix some grade grinders into his blends without doing them any material harm. Where coffee mills are used in the stores, they are of the Strong-Arm family and of an ancient heritage. To get a growl out of the grocer in France, buy a kilo of coffee and ask him to grind it. ”

“ Green-coffee buyers in the large importing centers of the United States and Europe recognize two distinct markets in their operations. One of these is called the "spot" market; because the importers, brokers, jobbers, and roasters trading there deal in actual coffee in warehouses in the consuming country. In New York the spot market is located in the district of lower Wall Street, which includes a block or two each side on Front and Water Streets. Here, coffee importers, coffee roasters, coffee dealers, and coffee brokers conduct their "street" sales. ”

“ It is not necessary to lay special stress on this main fact, production and consumption; one is the complement of the other, and the development of both our activities and interests are so identified that we cannot talk of coffee without thinking of its greatest consumer, the American people. ”

“ The bankers' committee still held 5,108,000 bags of this. At the highest estimate, consumption had exceeded production by only 4,000,000 bags. Here was a shortage of only a little more than ten percent in supply as against demand, so far as crops go. Yet there had been a rise of more than one hundred percent in two years in the price of coffee on the New York Coffee Exchange.... Upon the merchant's ability to deliver coffee on the New York Coffee Exchange depends the price of coffee in the world. ”

“ Creating a Coffee Trade
Because of steady sales and quick profits, there is keener competition in retail coffee-merchandising than in other food products. But, all things being equal, any intelligent person can create and hold a profitable trade if he follows approved business methods—and works. The best practise among coffee merchants shows that the prime essential is good coffee, freshly roasted and ground. After that comes intelligent and unremitting sales-promotion work.
[Pg 424]
Small German Roasters
On the left is a hand roaster for wood or coal fuel; on the right is a gas machine. ”

“ Every member has to bring his contracts up to market closing every night, either by making a deposit with the Association to cover his balances, or by withdrawing in case he should be over. Members deposit $15,000 at the time of joining as a guaranty fund; and if the surplus is not sufficient to take care of balances, the bylaws provide for the levying of assessments.
The daily quotations on the coffee exchanges of New York, Havre, and (before the war) of Hamburg, determined to a large extent the price of green coffee the world over. ”

“ Indeed, despite the fact that the United States have been the largest consumer of coffee among the nations for nearly half a century, it is only within the last ten years that coffee properly prepared could be obtained outside the principal cities. Even today, the average consumer is sadly in need of education in correct coffee brewing. ”

“ Beyond acquiring a general talking knowledge about coffees, the retailer buying his stocks roasted in bulk or package form does not generally need the intimate knowledge of his goods required by the grocer who roasts his own coffee. If he grinds the coffee for his customers he must know the type of grind best suited to the way the coffee is to be brewed, and must be able to tell the best brewing method. ”

“ Today the commercial growers of coffee on a large scale practise intensive cultivation methods, giving the same care to preparing their plantations and maintaining their trees as do other growers of grains and fruits. As in the more advanced methods of arboriculture, every effort is made to obtain the maximum production of quality coffee consistent with the smallest outlay of money and labor. ”