Overlooked, A look at regional lots.

Regional lots hold the keys to a future in coffee for the majority of producers and the greater coffee community alike. 

Over the years we’ve had the pleasure of featuring many producers whom had been fortunate enough to have their coffees reach the home coffee enthusiasts across the globe in bags adorning their name or that of their farm. 

Our very first feature, November 2019 perfectly captured the transition from regional lot to selling coffee on the producers own merits.

Guatemalan producer Rene Perez, a 4^th generation coffee farmer had met a coffee buyer while selling his coffee to the local mill some 5 years earlier. After 110 years in the family, coffee from La Reforma was recognised as a stand alone producer. 

For many producers, regional lots are the only avenue for selling their coffee, for a magnitude of reasons, not all of which will apply to everyone and are simply too complex and diverse to detail here.

A sum of their parts, these lots provide a vital income to some of the industry’s rising stars who lack key infrastructure or opportunity to market themselves as individuals. 

For us as consumers, regionals offer a flavour profile that we can drink day after day, which is perfect as they’re more readily available than single farm lots due to the volume produced. 

I think I speak for many when I reflect upon enjoying a the first sip of a coffee that has commanded a high sell price and having it knock my socks off, but soon realising that I just couldn’t enjoy it day after day. 

Confession time. 

We are as guilty as the next guy for having delved deep in to the wormhole of single origin coffees, single farm lots, micro-lots, macro-lots. All the while sidestepping regional lots with the misguided notion of them somehow being a lesser coffee not worthy of our delicate palate. Let’s not get hung up on talking cup score either.

It was some time ago we realised just how misguided and conflicting with our values this really is. 

Upon this revelation, we patiently waited for the right regional lot as context to share this blog 

Quite by chance the coffee reached us via Fifteen shades of South America, Shade 11 to be precise. Read the full collaboration feature from June 2020 here.

In a box full of single farm and experimental coffees, it was a regional lot that perfectly summed up what we had tried to achieve with Shades. Breaking the mould of what we expected from Brazil, comprised of perfectly blended coffees from a variety of Fazendas across multiple regions.

In summary, let us consider a parallel scenario to that of regional lots vs single farm lots.

Your local cafe, across their shifts have multiple baristas. You have your favourite, you also have the one who if they’re on the machine, you’ll take a Pepsi and a few others who make a reasonable cup. To be clear, we are in now was endorsing this level of inconsistency by the way, but thats not the purpose of this blog.

The cafe’s reputation is the sums of its parts, out of 10 coffees, 9 are great, a 90 percent cup score if you will. 

Now imagine, your favourite barista, the who lives and breathes coffee. They’ve got hopes and dreams of opening their own cafe one day and you know it will be the best in town. Behind the scenes they’re working away tirelessly perfecting their craft and waiting for the stars to align to they can sell their coffee under their own brand, they’re your local Rene Perez and untold other producers around the globe. 

Want to get up close and personal with some of our other favourite regional features? Check out December 2021 and March 2021 and try your luck on the roasters website, they might just be available.