Starbucks Competitor Provides Fair Trade Coffee on Rotation Basis

By MARNI LEFF SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER REPORTER

Getting a fair price for coffee beans means new shoes for local children and vast improvements in roads and other infrastructure, said Denia Alexa Marin and Francisco Escobar, Nicaraguan coffee growers visiting Seattle this week to promote "fair-trade" coffee.

The pair chatted with shoppers, many of them senior citizens from nearby retirement communities, at the Madison Market on East Madison Street yesterday and answered questions as they handed out coffee samples. .

"Our goal and our hope for ourselves and the thousands of others back at home is to increase the demand for fair-trade coffee," Marin said through a translator.

The designation certified fair-trade coffee, which starts at $1.26 per pound, guarantees that farmers who work as part of coffee growing cooperatives receive fair wages for their beans. Typically, growers get at least a $1 per pound and the remaining 26 cents is reinvested in the cooperative.

Although $1.26 per pound wholesale price is significantly higher than the commodity market price for coffee, it's less than most gourmet coffee companies usually pay for their beans, according the Specialty Coffee Association of America.

"It's the nature of coffee in this sector that there isn't an average price," said Mike Ferguson, marketing and communications director for the association. "Most specialty coffee roasters are paying more than $1.26 a pound for most of their coffees."

The Madison Market event was organized by TransFair USA, an Oakland, Calif.-based non-profit organization that certifies and promotes fair-trade coffee. TransFair and two other organizations began a campaign in April to educate Seattleites about coffee.

Marin and Escobar, who arrived here Monday night, will spend the week visiting food co-ops, cafes and churches.

TransFair plans to bring similar programs to other cities, said Jeremy Simer, the group's Seattle campaign organizer.

"Seattle's a real coffee town," Simer said, explaining why TransFair started here. "Coffee's an important industry with Starbucks and Tully's and all of the other coffee companies small and large."

Marin and Escobar met with Starbucks Chief Executive Orin Smith and two other executives at the company's Sodo headquarters Tuesday. "They were here for quite a while," spokeswoman Audrey Lincoff said. "There was a whole lot of interest, and we talked about a number of issues. It was a really good discussion."

TransFair had initially asked Starbucks about making presentations to coffee drinkers in the company's stores, but Lincoff said the company thought that a meeting at the headquarters was a "better forum to have an open and honest conversation."

Starbucks began offering fair-trade-certified coffee last fall in its stores and online.

Starbucks sells bags of the coffee beans for $11.45 a pound, but doesn't serve fair-trade coffee by the cup.

"We are working to secure large enough quantities of fair-trade beans for the future so that we can it as a coffee of the day," Lincoff said.

Tully's began selling certified fair-trade coffee in August and offers it as a rotating daily special.

"It's part of our regular lineup," spokeswoman Kim Novak said. "Tully's loves the concept of fair-trade coffee and the sustainable coffee category as a whole. We think it's a perfect fit for our stores."

Novak said that Tully's will expand its fair-trade selection as demand increases.