Coffee trade

“ The prices prevailing on the New York Coffee and Sugar Exchange are studied by coffee traders in all countries, the fluctuations being reflected in foreign markets as the reports come from the United States. Quotations are cabled from one great market to another; and as each must heed those of the others to some extent, the coffee trade thus obtains a world [Pg 336] price, and the effect on supply and demand is universal rather than local, as would be the case if quotations were not exchanged. ”

“ After thirty years of cultivation, no signs of disease have appeared. At late as 1920, the government was proposing to make advances of fourteen cents a pound upon coffee in the parchment to encourage the development of the industry to a point where it would be possible for local coffee growers to capture at least the bulk of the commonwealth's import coffee trade of 2,605,240 pounds.
Coffee grows well in most all the islands of the Pacific Ocean, and in some of them, as in the Philippines and Hawaii, the industry in past years, reached considerable importance. ”

“ But for the most part, when times are normal, the shift is gradual; for international trade is conservative, and likes to run where it finds a well-worn channel.
[Pg 190]
In recent times, of course, the big disturbing element in the coffee trade was the World War. Whole countries were cut out of the market, shipping was drained away from every sea lane, stocks were piled high in exporting ports, prices were fixed, imports were sharply restricted, and the whole business of coffee trading was thrown out of joint. To what extent has the world returned to normal in this trade? ”

“ 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. ”

“ Several years ago it was estimated that the coffee trees numbered 8,000,000, planted on 32,000 acres.
Peru. Coffee is one of the minor products of Peru, and the country does not occupy a place of importance in the international coffee trade. The larger part of the production is apparently consumed in the country itself. Export figures indicate that the industry is steadily declining. Exports amounted to 2,267,000 pounds in 1905; to 1,618,000 pounds in 1908; and in the five years ending with 1918, exports averaged only 529,000 pounds ”

“ 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. ”

“ In fact nothing affects the flavor of coffee after it has once been dried; but the separation and the polishing give it what is known to the trade as{87} “style.” And in the trade there is as much poppycock about coffee as there is about wine and cigars. When you telephone to your grocer for a mixture of Mocha and Java do you by any chance imagine that you are going to receive coffee from Arabia and the Dutch islands? ”

“ She also grants the United States certain tariff preferentials as a recognition of the continued policy of this country of admitting coffee free of duty. The chief port of entry of coffee into the United States is New York, which for decades has recorded entries amounting from sixty to ninety percent of the country's total. Since 1902, New Orleans has shown a big advance, and in 1910 imported some thirty-five percent of the total. The only other port of importance is San Francisco, where imports have been increasing in recent years because of the growth of the trade in Central American coffee. ”

“ 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. ”

“ The list of coffee-consuming countries includes practically all those that do not raise coffee, and also a few that have some coffee plantations, but do not grow enough for their own use. These countries are listed on page 287. Consumption figures can be determined with fair accuracy by the import figures; although in some countries, where there is a considerable transit trade, it is necessary to deduct export from import figures to obtain actual consumption figures. ”

“ Coffee culture in French Indo-China is a comparatively small factor in international trade, although production is on the increase, particularly from those plantations planted to robusta, liberica, and excelsa varieties. The average annual export for the five-year period ended with 1918 was 516,978 pounds, nearly all of it going to France. ”

“ It is undoubtedly true that most of the large coffee properties formerly in cultivation have been abandoned, or turned to other uses. Coffee requires new land; and the clearance of fifty acres of wood is a Herculean enterprise for coffee planters, among whom want of capital [Pg 85] prevails as much as among sugar planters. But whatever large coffee planters may say about their profits and losses, it is a notorious fact that thousands and thousands of settlers grow the delicious berry to advantage; as any merchant engaged in the trade will be able to testify. ”

“ Consequently, the Central American trade is not a simple matter of buying and selling, but an intricate financial operation on the part of the San Francisco importers. Practically all the coffee coming in is either on consignment, or is already sold to established coffee-importing houses. Brokers do not deal direct with the exporters ”

“ These figures, of course, do not necessarily give an accurate index to normal trade; as in any given year some abnormal happening, such as an exceptionally large crop or a revolution, may affect exports drastically as compared with years before and after. But normally the proportions of a country's exports going to its various customers are fairly constant one year after another, and can be taken for any given year as showing approximately the coffee currents of that period. ”

“ For us, sir, coffee means plenty, prosperity, and perhaps greatness.
It is therefore easy to see how deeply we are interested in the growth of American commerce and civilization. The American people need for their trade nearly eleven million bags of coffee per annum, or almost all of an average crop of the state of São Paulo. ”

“ The progressive wholesaler does not sell a retailer a poorer quality of coffee for any particular grade than his trade calls for, and he does not load him up with more than can be disposed of while still fresh. ”

“ The American trade deals almost exclusively in Coffea arabica, although in the latter years of the World War increasing quantities of robusta and liberica growths were imported, largely because of the scarcity of Brazilian stocks and the improvement in the preparation methods, especially in the case of robustas. Considerable quantities of robusta grades were sold in the United States before 1912, but trading in them fell off when the New York Coffee and Sugar Exchange prohibited their delivery on Exchange contracts after March 1, 1912. ”

“ In the early days, every wholesale grocer was selling coffee; the wholesale grocer controlled ninety percent of the trade in the country. It did not pay the coffee roaster to have men on the road selling coffee in those days. Such being the case, seventy-five percent of the roasting done by the coffee roasters was job roasting, at one cent a pound. ”

“ The other market is designated as the "futures" market; and the trading is not concerned with actual coffee, but with the purchase or sale of contracts for future delivery of coffee that may still be on the trees in the producing country. Futures, or "options" as they are frequently called, are dealt in only on a coffee exchange. The principal exchanges are in New York, Havre, and Hamburg. New Orleans and San Francisco exchange dealers trade on their local boards of trade. ”

“ The actual selling is done by competitive cash bidding, the highest bidder becoming the owner. Two classes of brokers do the bidding, one for home trade and the other for exporters.
Home trade takes about a tenth of the coffee, the remainder being sold for export. If the coffee is bought for re-export, it can be transferred to the shipping port, still in bond, and shipped out of the country without paying duty. During the World War, auctions were held about twice a week; but after the signing of the armistice in November 1918, the London traders resumed the four times a week practise. ”

“ For a long time New York was the only important entry port for green coffee. Before the rise of New Orleans and San Francisco, many inland coffee roasters and grocers had their own buyers in the New York market. The coffee district that still clings about lower Wall Street is rich in memories of by-gone merchants who once were big factors in the trade, and whose names, in many instances, have been handed down from generation to generation in the businesses that have survived them. ”

“ However, with the good work done in recent years by organized trade effort to correct this abuse of our national beverage, signs are plentiful that the time is not far distant when a lasting reformation in coffee making will have been accomplished. ”

“ Since the prohibition of the admixture of chicory with coffee, when sold to the public, and the compulsory sale by Treasury minute of the two articles in separate packages, a large and rapid increase in the consumption of coffee has taken place, and the trade is now placed in a healthy position. Whilst the increase in the consumption of coffee from the 1st of January, to 5th September, 1852, was but 142,267 lbs. ”

“ Coffee can be grown in practically every island of the West Indies, but owing to the state of civilization in many of the lesser islands, little is produced for international trade, excepting in Jamaica, Guadeloupe, Haiti, the Dominican Republic, Trinidad, and Tobago. In past years a considerable quantity of good-quality coffee was produced in Cuba, the annual export in the decade of 1840 averaging 50,000,000 pounds. ”

“ He should see that the coffee is roasted properly, and that it is always fresh; that the selling effort is not expended on the lowest-priced blend, but on a grade that can be recommended for cup merit. This should be a leader, but a lower-price coffee could be carried to suit the trade that buys on price. Persistent efforts should be made to educate the last-named class of customers to use the better grades, which in the end are cheaper and give better satisfaction. In short, the grocer should work consistently to establish a vogue for his leader blend on the basis of merit. ”

“ Most of the retail enterprises in other lines of trade have built up their business on the penny-change plan; and many coffee men believe this should become the universal merchandising method among retail distributers of coffee. ”

“ The government has now entirely given up the business of coffee production.
The total production of coffee in Java, Sumatra, and Celebes, in 1920, in piculs of 136 pounds, was as follows:
Straits Settlements. Trade in coffee is a transhipping trade, Singapore acting as a [Pg 284] clearing center for large quantities of coffee from the neighboring islands. In 1920, the imports were 25,914,267 pounds; and the exports, 26,856,000 pounds.
Federated Malay States. The acreage in coffee in the Federated Malay States is steadily declining. In 1903, coffee plantations covered 22,700 acres ”

“ They keep hot milk in one of the large cans, and coffee, tea, or cocoa in the others. They supply bread and butter, or currant cake, in slices—ham sandwiches, water-cresses, and boiled eggs. The price is 1d. per mug, or 1⁄2d. per half-mug, for coffee, tea, or cocoa; and 1⁄2d. a slice the bread and butter or cake. The ham sandwiches are 2d. (or 1d.) each, the boiled eggs 1d., and the water-cresses a halfpenny a bunch. The coffee, tea, cocoa, and sugar they generally purchase by the single pound, at a grocer’s. Those who do an extensive trade purchase in larger quantities. ”

“ 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. ”

“ 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 ”