Every autumn, America undergoes the same ritual. Supermarkets stack cinnamon-scented candles, Instagram grids fill with orange foliage, and coffee chains roll out the pumpkin spice latte (PSL). Starbucks’ Pumpkin Spice Latte, first launched in 2003, is its most popular seasonal drink of all time. It drove a 24% jump in store visits on launch day last year. Even as tariffs push up costs of coffee and spices, Starbucks says 10% of sales now come from “returning favourites” like PSL.| Coffee Intelligence
For years, coffee’s giants have been cast as villains. Their dominance, critics argue, squeezes farmers, depresses quality, and cheapens a product whose cultural cachet has soared in the past two decades. Producer countries’ share of commercial retail coffee prices has barely budged in the last 20 years, even with prices declining. Meanwhile at the upper end of the specialty market, prices rose by more than 75% – to whose benefit? Big roasters often run on thin margins balanced by scal...| Coffee Intelligence
Many of the world’s coffee traders are now running on fumes. After a decade of relatively benign markets, the past five years have been a blur of price shocks, shipping snarls, rising labour costs, and now the extra burden of US tariffs. Smaller exporters and cooperatives face the sharpest strain, raising the question of who survives and how.| Coffee Intelligence
