For several years the Kona Coffee Cultural Festival Cupping Competition was dominated by a judge who insisted that Kona Coffee had to meet a profile he created. He never revealed this profile publically. Farmers entering the contest were not told anything about the profile or how their coffee compared to the profile. No cupping scores were ever revealed and no comments, negative or positive, were ever given to farmers. You could compare those contests to a shooting contest at night with no lights and black targets. Coffee farmers were confused and were not motivated to improve their quality from one contest to the next. Partly as a result of the contest and the failure to improve quality, Kona Coffee lost credibility with coffee roasters and green coffee buyers. It became common to hear coffee buyers say that Kona Coffee was overrated and overpriced.
Finally, the KCCF saw the light and got new judges. The new judges used the Specialty Coffee Association’s coffee cupping standards. They also revealed the scores that farmers received. Since every credible cupping contest in the world uses the SCA standards Kona Coffee farmers for the first time could see how their coffee compared to other high quality international coffees. The effect was that coffee farmers, having a target they could see, began to do better. Kona Coffee scores began to creep up. In addition, the market price for both green and roasted Kona Coffee improved.
This year the KCCF has announced that it has selected a new head judge for the contest. In a series of blogs this judge has announced that he is abandoning the SCA coffee cupping standard. In place of the SCA standards he intends to use a new Kona Coffee profile that he is creating by interviewing farmers and others to get their ideas on a Kona Coffee profile. He is also creating a new scoring system using a mathematical model that he has create.
There are a number of problems presented by the KCCF”s decision:
Coffee sales to roasters and consumers are all about product credibility. The coffee industry has created a rating system that everyone relies upon. A roaster buying an SCA rated 85 point coffee knows what she is getting. However, a coffee buyer looking at this year’s KCCF cupping scores will be confused and suspicious, quite justifiably, of the scores. Even the ranking will be suspect since it is based upon a novel self- created profile for Kona Coffee.
Kona Coffee farmers have been using the contest to test their coffees against other coffees. This has resulted in significant increases in Kona Coffee quality and prices. If Kona begins to use a different rating system then all of the other coffee regions in the world, Kona farmers will not be able to evaluate their coffee against other world coffees.
The KCCF contest is not a sandbox for untested ideas. This new judge has a PhD in agriculture from the University of Hawaii. He knows from his education that you do not create a new agricultural product and then go out and spray it willy-nilly on the crops. Every credible agricultural researcher with a new product beta tests the product against a control group, publishes her results and then waits for peer review. This novel Kona coffee profile and scoring system has never been tested, is not comparable to world standard coffee judging and has not been endorsed by any credible coffee institution,
It is a mistake to use the KCCF contest as a cupping playground. We know from past experience that using a unique coffee scoring system does not benefit Kona coffee farmers, does not stimulate improved quality and exposes Kona coffee to ridicule and disdain from coffee buyers. We do not need to go back to the past.
