Coffee – like beef – has risen crazily in price since the COVID crisis ended. We’re looking at record coffee price increases again this year. Is there a price point at which you’ll change your relationship with coffee – or cut it out altogether?
This past week, we posted some dismal news from international coffee market authority and import coffee company chairman Giuseppe Lavazza. He first admitted that he had been dead wrong in his prediction last year, that coffee prices would moderate in 2024. Then he poured whisky on the wound, predicting that prices would continue to rise – even higher – this year.
Outlook dark
Lavazza points out world commodity market prices for coffee rose a full 15 percent last year. And they’re poised to soar up to 25 percent this year.
The reasons are largely beyond growers’ and processors’ control. Climate change has triggered mas-sive crop failures in key growing regions. Transportation issues associated with the Israel-Hamas war have made shipping of Asian and African coffee via the Suez Canal problematic.
“We have faced very, very strong headwinds. I don’t see any reason why coffee prices will go down,” Lavazza says. He notes his company’s profits have plummeted as a result of continuing high raw product prices. Lavazza reported a profit of (US)$101.7 million in 2022. But 2023 profits fell to just (US)$73.6 million.
Evolution inexorable
Inflation marches on as inevitably as the days of the week. And the cost of everything continues to rise. Even in good economic times, everything costs more over time. As Alvin Toffler wrote in his 1970 futurist treatise Future Shock, it’s the rate of change that makes us sit up and take notice.
I remember well when a cup of coffee at the doughnut shop went up from $0.25 to $0.50. That must have been back in the 1970s. Not long after that, I think, it went up to $0.75. Then $1.00. Then $1.25… Most folks didn’t complain to loudly when the price of a ‘standard’ 6 oz. / 180 ml cup of java went up 10, 15 or even 25 cents at a time.
But when it got over $1.00, and started to jump by as much as $0.50 at a time… And the price differ-ential reached $1.25 (with ‘a cuppa Joe’ ranging from $1.25 to $2.50 or more, depending on where you bought it)… There arose a consumer din which has never completely died down.
Always a breaking point
Everyone has their own ‘breaking’, or ‘tipping’ point, at which they will act on a situation that’s been bothering them rather than sit idly by any longer.
I’ve already cut way down on my coffee consumption in the past couple of years. And, after hearing what Signor Lavazza had to say about the future of the market, I’m starting to look seriously at cut-ting coffee out of my life altogether. But I still haven’t been able to pinpoint – or commit to – a specific price point at which I’ll act.
My questions to you:
Have you reached your breaking point with coffee prices, yet?
If not, at what price per cup would you cut back?
At what price would you stop drinking coffee altogether?
Muse on that…
~ Maggie J.