Hello Highwire Customers,
My name is Steve Ford, and I have the wonderful job of Director of Coffee for Highwire Coffee Roasters, which means it's my job to select the coffees that we serve and sell in all of our locations. I get to lead a talented roastery team in their efforts to roast, blend and pack some of the best coffee coming out of the East Bay. In some cases, I get to build the relationships with the producers of these coffees, which helps us bring delicious offerings every year from returning favorites like Benjamin Paz, Yulissa Chambi and Rosalba Cifuentes.
It's also my job to manage the prices of our coffee products. Over the past year, the world has experienced an incredible rally in the commodity price of coffee. It begins with a forecast of poor harvest in Brazil (the world's leading exporter of Arabica coffee) and is made worse by a forecast of a bad harvest in Vietnam (the world's largest exporter of Robusta coffee). When the two leading exporters of coffee are having a bad year, the price of coffee goes up. With the forecast of another bad year of harvests in the air, and some panic buying to sweeten the deal, just yesterday, the market hit an all-time high of $4.30lb.
And while Highwire buys and roasts coffee well above the commodity level, the commodity cost is used as the floor price in most negotiations. I've been able to secure a fair amount of delicious coffee before this most recent spike in costs, but we are faced with the reality that our coffee costs are much higher than they once were, and for the sake of the financial health of the business, we necessarily have to raise prices on all of our coffee products.
Starting Saturday, February 16th, the prices for all of our year round products will go up to align with costs. I am hopeful that this will be the end of our price hikes for the year, but with climate change and the threats of tariffs on many coffee producing countries, the future of coffee prices is hazy at best.
Though some things remain uncertain, please count on us to continue to source, roast, grind, brew and serve some of the best coffees available.
Thank you for your continued support of our community and our business.
Steve Ford