"Local Coffee Education"

Siel over at Green LA Girl has a series that she calls Tuesday Questions. In this weeks edition, she is asking about coffee education: Ric of Groundwork Coffee's said he's looking for ideas on how Groundwork could help educate the LA community about sustainable coffee practices. Some of the ideas I've had so far: 1. Holding occasional in-store coffee seminar type things where people can taste coffee and also learn a lil something about sustainability issues. 2. Organizing reality tours for people to visit countries of coffee origin. This could actually be done in conjunction with Global Exchange, for ex, which organizes these types of tours. 3. Making brochures about organic and fair trade issues avaliable in store. 4. Offering to do an educational seminar for local nonprofit groups like Sustainable Works. Other suggestions? I am interested in this discussion (please go to this post and leave your thoughts for them) because at Cafe Evoke, we are putting a very strong emphasis on coffee eduction. I like the idea of customers understanding why it is important to purchase coffee from a fairly traded coffee house and the importance of the few cents more a pound is to coffee farmers. The idea of Fair Trade Certified Coffee is not just an advertising tool for coffee shops across this country (at least it should not be) but how many shops really explain what that sign in their window really means? We are also very interested in teaching coffee as a process -- the history of coffee, the ways it is processed and roasted, and the best ways to serve it. An educated consumer is a long lasting consumer (if the shop sticks to what they preach). We have a passion for coffee and I think I could talk about it all day every day. My goal is to teach people about coffee so they can better appreciate what they are drinking. I will be following the comments on this post over at Siel's site so if you have anything to add, leave a comment here or -- better yet -- head over to Green LA Girl and join in. ..be bold Tagged: greenlagirl, cafe evoke, bozeman, montana, Fair Trade