You oughta know #25-01
In this week’s issue: the price of coffee has gone bonkers; NZAC 2025 brought to you by ACME; Spotify playlists to keep you cool; I suck at latte art.
Nau mai hoki mai!
If you’re new here, welcome to You Oughta Know - a curated selection of the finest damn coffee news that you can shake a coffee tree at.
It’s semi-regular - but that’s okay cos I’m semi-regular. You, on the other hand, are awesome.
In this week’s issue: the price of coffee has gone bonkers; NZAC 2025 brought to you by ACME; Spotify playlists to keep you cool; I suck at latte art.
A $10 flat-white might be on it’s way
The coffee world is reeling with news that the commodity price of coffee is hitting all time highs. Again.
Sprudge says that the “commodities market is chaos right now.”
A Perfect Daily Grind is calling it “unprecedented.”
Why the panic?
Well, the commodity market for coffee, where the price of the world’s green coffee is determined, is going bananas, with the price of coffee hitting $4USD per pound of green bean.
Around 5 years or so ago, it was under $1USD.
Why is the price going bananas? In a commodity market like coffee, the price is driven by speculation, and there’s A LOT of uncertainly in the world at the moment. Climate change (you might have heard of it) means coffee is harder to grow. Shortages in supply is impacting different markets. Trump is tariffing the shit out of everything - including threats to Colombia (a major coffee producer). All of this noise drives speculation, which in turn drives up the price.
On top of all of this, here in New Zealand the exchange rate has tanked, which means it’s even more expensive for our roasters here in to get the green stuff.
Richard Corney had this great table on the Flight Coffee website which shows the price of coffee, as well as the exchange rate impact:
From $3.76NZD/kg in 2020, to nearly $14. In 5 years. On top of EVERYTHING costing more money - rent, power, wages, milk, cups, water, council rates, interest rates - even the tables on the footpath.
So cafes across the country are looking at their costs and considering pricing their product accordingly and some are considering whether a $10 flat white is on the way.
It sounds expensive. And it is. But once you consider everything that goes into an expertly crafted cup of coffee, it’s really a bargain.
We need to start viewing coffee as a luxury item, a treat, something special - like we already do with wine, going out for dinners, and craft beer. It’s not a massive leap.
NZ AeroPress Champs is coming - thanks to ACME
A sneaky little Instagram post from the World AeroPress Championship, seems to have unwittingly announced that Wellington’s ACME Cup Co is hosting the NZ AeroPress Champs in 2025.
ACME Cup Co may have been a bit surprised by this…
Pretty excited to find out more about this. I’ll be there with my Press in hand, ready to take on the best in the country.
Spotify playlists to drink coffee to
A bunch of cafes and roasters rock Spotify playlists, but I think I found the best - Wellington’s Swimsuit has a playlist that is updated on the monthly. It’s pretty rad:
Also rocking a good playlist is Coffee Supreme with their annual holiday playlist:
Bonus chat
The Milklab Barista Battle kicked off this week. It’s a latte art throw down were 120-odd of the best baristas (and me) throw down some sweet coffee art.
It all happens on Instagram - go check out #milklabbaristabattlenz.
Here’s my terrible entry!! Got to start somewhere… right?
