Kona coffee paves way for
new specialty brews

By Trish Moore
Star-Bulletin

NUMILA, Kauai -- Hawaiian coffee is special.

And it has to be to justify the super-premium prices the growing statewide industry must command to compete with coffee producers in developing countries like Indonesia, Latin America and Africa.

"Everybody needs to sell their coffee two to three to four times higher than the rest of the world's coffee," said Mark Magers, vice president of sales and marketing for Kauai Coffee.

The international reputation of Kona coffee as one of the world's best "has plowed a big bow wave that everybody follows behind," he said.

Trying to tap into the growing demand for high-end specialty coffees, coffee growers have sprouted on Kauai, Maui, Molokai and Oahu.

A&B-Hawaii subsidiary Kauai Coffee's 3,400 acres on former McBryde Sugar lands is the state's largest grower, last year producing more than half of the 7 million pounds grown in Hawaii.

Like fine wines

The Kauai Coffee Estate is the site of the Hawaii Coffee Association's third annual conference that begins today, gathering growers, processors, millers, wholesalers, roasters, researchers and retailers to share insights on improving Hawaiian coffee.

Conference keynote speaker Ted Lingle, executive director of the Specialty Coffee Association of America, will address the growth of the specialty coffee industry by comparing it to how wine is promoted.

According to Lingle, demand for premium coffee is created by building its image, providing rules for its enjoyment and promoting a wide array of choices to consumers.

Says Magers, like wine, coffee's flavor and quality reflects the different growing conditions, how it's picked and processed, how it's roasted.

"You can be as thorough as you want to be in telling the story," he said.

Magers sees specialty coffee as an affordable luxury.

"A cup of Kona, the best in the world, for two to three bucks a cup. Try to get a glass of Dom Perignon for that."

Still, with high-end green coffee beans from Africa and Latin America selling for $2 to $3 per pound,Hawaii growers and marketers have to capitalize on the special nature of Hawaii and focus on consistent high quality to fetch even higher prices.

Kauai Coffee's unroasted beans sell for $3 to $4.50 per pound, and Kona Coffee prices reached an all-time high last year of $12 to $16 per pound.

Kona Coffee grower Norman Sakata said the furor created when a California coffee broker was charged with passing off millions of pounds of cheaper Central American coffee as Kona Coffee has actually helped things by drawing more recognition to the coffee's value.

"It was lucky for the farmers," Sakata said.

"After the fraud they were all shaken up, thinking this was the doom. All of a sudden more people started to hear about Kona coffee."

Hawaii coffee now certified

A third-generation coffee farmer, Sakata remembers when Kona coffee sold for 15 cents a pound. Last year farmers got $1.75 a pound.

"I never dreamed the prices would go this high."

The state Department of Agriculture is helping to keep Hawaii-grown coffee special and prevent future fraud by a new certification process begun last year.

The department has three trained coffee cuppers -- two in Kona and one on Kauai -- who grade the coffee and certify the origin of the beans.

"Our inspectors are looking to make sure the defects are taken out and that the coffee doesn't have any bad flavors," said Sam Camp, the department's quality assurance administrator.

"Good flavor is subjective -- that's up to the people that are buying it, but there's a minimum quality within standards set for the different grades," he said.