When Coffee Certification Becomes the Product part III

Bob Fish and BIGGBY COFFEE offers another interesting example of how different business models can approach coffee sourcing.

As I understand it, through One BIGG Island in Space, BIGGBY has been developing a farm-direct model built around personally vetting producers, visiting farms, building long-term relationships, and tracing coffee back to specific people and places. BIGGBY has reported that 65% of its coffee is Farm-Direct, with a goal of reaching 100% by the end of 2027.

That’s an admirable commitment, and I think there’s some important things to learn from it. I also think it;s really cool.

At the same time, it’s important to recognize that BIGGBY and our company operate under fundamentally different business models. BIGGBY’s franchise structure presents a different set of opportunities and challenges than ours.  Not saying one is better or worse, just a different approach.  While franchise systems can certainly build direct relationships with farmers, they have a bunch of stuff to deal with on the “backside” with also vetting the franchisee.  In may ways their customer is the franchisee while ours is foodservice, distributors, grocery...not saying it's easier, just different.

BIGGBY has also developed its own standards for what qualifies as Farm-Direct. Rather than relying on a third-party checklist, the approach places greater emphasis on taking personal responsibility for knowing the producer: visiting farms, understanding the people behind the coffee, and building relationships over time. 

Relationships are harder to scale than certificates because A certification can be applied across a large supply chain, documented, verified, and communicated relatively easily. Genuine relationships require time, travel, trust, follow-through, and a willingness to stay engaged when things get tough. They are harder to standardize because people, farms, and local economies don’t fit neatly into a checklist. Each relationship must surely be unique.

These things doesn’t make certification inherently bad, or make one sourcing model universally better than another. It means we should understand what each approach can accomplish, what it cannot, and what we’re ultimately trying to achieve.  Which in my mind is a better deal for the farmer.