In the tenth year of the event that we kickstarted way back in 2014 we achieved more than we could ever expect!
From bringing the UK Latte Art Championships north of the border to give Scottish baristas a better opportunity to compete, to creating a community event for Scottish roasters! Roast Hero, allowed roasters to showcase their skill and to come together to cup and score coffee together. We not only hosted the biggest, busiest and most dynamic version of the Glasgow Coffee Festival to date but we also ensured that we were representing Dear Green and our great coffees to anyone who was keen to engage with our many festival antics!
Here are our highlights including a sensory experience on our stand, cupping of our seasonal coffees, showcasing our wholesale coffee partners, our sustainability talk, our women's breakfast, our cocktail collaborations and all of our stories from ten years of this incredible Scottish coffee party!
Immersive sensory experience:
We created a sensory experience to guide you through our coffee range and our methodology for creating tasting notes for our coffees. You queued up to sniff and slurp and test your olfactory and you left us with a smile, a coffee and a contribution to our wall of sensory slogans!
Meet the importer
Forest Coffee were in town and we were showcasing their Gesha Marcela. A match made in heaven! We invited Alejandra and Roosa to our stand to chat to our customers about this very special coffee!
Cupping
When a cupping room is busy you know you've done something right! From our long time favourites like Ethiopia Odaco to new releases such as our newest Kenyan coffee from Gititu; our full range was on show at GCF in the Cupping Room. Hosted by our Head Roaster Anna Plain and our Marketing and Brand Ambassador Kris Sandlan. Did you miss out? You can always join us at one of our regular cupping events at our roastery.
Cocktail Collaborations
Our B Corp friends at the Lind and Lime Gin distillery came up trumps with not only one but two cocktails, including a lush coffee Negroni made with our Guatemala Red de Mujeres organic certified coffee.
We also invited our friends from Liquid Oats to the festival to bring their contemporary take on a whisky cream liqueur. Later in the day to be enjoyed as a top up to our festival special, our coffee slushie! Thanks Fraser and Harry!
Customer Showcase
Getting our customers involved in all of the action makes for a better festival experience for all! This year we invited Dreamy Goat, Isle of Bute Coffee and Gilmartins to speak on the building communities panel hosted by our pal Fraser of EH9 in Dundee. We had Meadow Road cranking the Meadow Road blend on the True Artisan Cafe and we were of course serving Pasties Lisboa natas on our stand!
Women's Breakfast
Not that we didn't know it already, but when we brought women in the Scottish coffee industry together for International Women's Day last year, we knew from the energy in the room that we had to make this happen again. What better place than GCF. The perfect time of togetherness, a safe and inclusive place for discussion and celebration of womxn in our industry.
Sustainability - Talk
With Martha Bytof, our resident environmental activist being available straight from her Masters in Climate Justice, it was a perfect opportunity for us to share our passion for sustainability together with Karina Poveda Coto who has first hand experience of the challenges faced by small holder coffee farmers in Costa Rica.
The True Value of Coffee - Panel Discussion
Bringing together some industry greats, Becks from Oatly asked us to join her for a varied and informative discussion involving the intricacies of all points of our supply chain. Martha our Sustainability Coordinator was able to contribute from our perspective as a B Corp and Organic certified roastery. We also heard insights from Fabiana Carvalho of the Coffee Sensorium, Ana Luiza Pellicer of Miò Fazenda in Brazil and Jordan O'Shea from Assembly Roast.
WBC Showcase
When Roosa Jalonen asked if she could brew her World Barista Championship coffee at GCF, we obliged of course! Coming directly from her trip to Busan where Roosa represented the UK on the world stage, we were delighted to get to sip on these incredible espressos on our stand - an experience usually only reserved for competition judges!
Roast Hero
Following our trip to the Nordic Coffee Festival this year, we were inspired by the Best Roaster competition so much so that the cool Nordic crew approved of us bringing the concept to the Scottish roasting community! We enlisted some help and we made it happen! And the best bit... Our roaster Anna came second in the competition! What a result!
Ten Years of Glasgow Coffee Festival
It's true, we've launched, nurtured, expanded and like all small businesses we pivoted through some tough years, but GCF is still here and is stronger than ever!
Bigger and better, the Glasgow Coffee Festival was discussed by Ben Booker (La Marzocco UK), Devin Blackie (Minor Figures), Gregor Hollerin (Story Shop) and hosted by Dear Green founder and founder of the GCF, Lisa Lawson. From competitions (UKBC, UKBrC, UKCRC, UKCTC, UKLAC, Roast Hero) to our 'To the Streets' event and endless fringe events, we discussed the early days, our pioneering single-use cup free stance, our evolving audience and exhibitors and coffees right through to the progression of specialty coffee and the successes of our 2024 event! What a ride! Sign up to be the first to know about next years event!
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