Pursuit: Impact & Sourcing Report

In pursuit of great coffee.

Every year brings new challenges and opportunities in coffee — and 2024 was no exception. This year’s Impact & Sourcing Report, now also available printed for the very first time, carries the name Pursuit — a reflection of our constant motion between producing and consuming countries, between data and relationships, between ambition and responsibility.

 

“In my 25 years in the specialty coffee world, one thing’s for sure: it’s never been boring!


We have seen all kinds of phases along the journey, from discovering and developing at a great pace, to damage control and trying to survive in an unpredictable and fast-changing environment, full of challenges.


But staying true to our DNA and ‘rowing harder when the wind is against us’, has shaped our resilience and power to keep developing. Staying flexible with a dedicated team and exploring opportunities with our suppliers and roasters is what still motivates us every day.”

Menno Simons, Founder

What You'll Discover Inside

This year’s report captures the many sides of our work — from field-level sourcing and direct partnerships to data-driven impact and sustainability in action. Rather than fitting these stories into tidy categories, Pursuit 2024 reveals how they all connect — showing how people, places, and progress shape one another across the coffee chain. Here are some of the highlights you’ll get to know:

  • The Addis Ababa Advantage
  • Sourcing Insights & Market Shifts
  • Operation Cherry Red Returns
  • Origin Knowledge
  • Sustainability in Practice
  • Voice from Our Partners

The Addis Ababa Advantage

A look inside our Ethiopian office — the heartbeat of Trabocca’s sourcing at origin. Here, eight local employees manage sourcing, supplier relationships, sampling, and logistics with precision. Their daily work at the cupping table, in dry mills, and at container loadings ensures that every coffee leaving Ethiopia meets the highest standards of quality and traceability.

At the center of it all is Wolde Tagesse, our Quality Lead in Ethiopia. With years of experience in cupping labs and dry mills, Wolde bridges local knowledge and global quality expectations. In an interview he shares some of the milestones of his coffee career, his ambitions with Trabocca, as well as his favorite micro-regions.

Quality Without Borders

Our quality team is as big as our trade team, reflecting our belief that sourcing excellence begins with taste and consistency. Spread across Addis Ababa, Amsterdam, and Minneapolis, our cuppers work as one unit — sharing data, calibrating daily, and upholding the same high standards across continents.

In 2024, we cupped 3,896 samples from 25 origins, ensuring every lot met our benchmarks for flavor, processing, and integrity. Backed by rigorous quality, food safety, and vendor protocols, Trabocca remains a front-runner in traceable and responsible sourcing. From origin to destination, our quality infrastructure is what keeps Trabocca’s pursuit of great coffee aligned, measurable, and transparent.

Sourcing Insights & Market Shifts

With global markets in flux, 2024 brought new patterns of demand from roasters worldwide. While price volatility affected many producing countries, Ethiopian prices remained remarkably stable — and quality even improved compared to the previous year.

Our Grade 1 volumes grew modestly by 4%, but demand for Grade 2 and Grade 3 coffees rose sharply, with some roasters even replacing entire Brazilian coffee lines with Ethiopian supply. This shift highlights both Ethiopia’s value and versatility.

Among the top 30 Ethiopian coffee buyers by volume, Trabocca paid the highest average price: USD 6.85/kg, more than USD 2/kg above the average paid by all other buyers.

Origin Knowledge

A short, practical guide to Ethiopia’s most celebrated coffee zones. Discover the unique character of Guji, Sidamo, and Yirgacheffe, shaped by their distinct microclimates, altitudes, and processing traditions. We highlight some of the most exciting and emerging micro-regions within each zone and share insights from our cupping tables — featuring the best-performing coffees we tasted throughout the year.

Sustainability in Practice

In past years, our impact was defined by visible projects — from the Stove Project in Kenya to the school at Suke Quto. But 2024 was different. It was a year to strengthen the foundations that make lasting impact possible.

Amid price surges, trade disruptions, and new regulations, we focused on resilience — implementing new due diligence systems, testing prepayment models, securing alternative trade routes, and relaunching Operation Cherry Red to onboard more smallholder producers.

We also launched our first carbon counting initiative, creating a measurable baseline for future reduction, and advanced our EUDR compliance strategy to ensure deforestation-free, traceable sourcing.

Partners Across the Globe

While our local presence in Addis Ababa gives us a strong foundation in East Africa, our pursuit of great coffee relies on equally strong partners across other origins. Together, we drive impact through collaboration, transparency, and shared ambition.

In Rwanda, our partners at Muraho Trading Company reflect on their milestones, innovation in processing, and their vision for quality and community growth.
In Peru, Monteverde shows how organic production preserves nature, tradition, and culture in the Amazonas region.
And through collaboration with Cencoic in Colombia, Selva in Costa Rica, and Comsa in Honduras, we explore seasonality, harvest cycles, and resilience in sourcing.

A Global Team, A Shared Pursuit

Our pursuit of great coffee happens every day — in the cupping labs of Amsterdam, the dry mills of Addis Ababa, the sourcing visits in Peru, and the quality rooms of Minneapolis. It’s a collective effort by traders, cuppers, farmers, and roasters to keep moving the industry forward.

Pursuit celebrates that shared journey — uniting everyone who shapes coffee, from its roots at origin to the final cup.

 

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