While most of us don’t have a home compost bin in our backyard or apartment, it was an important decision to package Strange Bird Coffee in a vessel that could fall apart relatively quickly, no matter where it ended up. A product that is simply a momentary holder of beans, before disappearing back into the ether (just like the coffee; just like us). Not to mention: micro plastics, and greenhouse emissions.
PLASTIC POLLUTION: AN INTRODUCTION
The environmental impact of plastic is devastating, with many animals (especially marine wildlife) at a high risk of ingesting plastic items, choking, suffocating, and getting entangled in plastic pollution. The Environmental Protection Agency reports that 3.4% of global greenhouse emissions come from plastic throughout their lifecycle, and 90% of these emissions come from the production and conversion of fossil fuels into new plastic products. With that number looking to double by 2060. These greenhouse emissions contribute to global warming, ocean acidification (which contributes to killing entire ecosystems), and smog.
Just like many of you, I do my best to recycle as much as I can, but somehow plastic items end up more-often-than-not in the ocean. They end up polluting water sources that are then used for producing food. The same plastic killing wildlife, are also creating unprecedented amounts of microplastics that are finding their way into our food.
The United Nations Environment Programme reports microplastics have also been found in human livers, kidneys, and placentas. The International Union for Conservation of Nature finds that carcinogenic chemicals found in plastic products can leach into tap water, which may cause developmental, reproductive, neurological, and immune disorders. Not to mention much of the food found in grocery stores are packaged in plastic, which leeches into our food.
SPECIALTY COFFEE: ELEPHANT IN THE ROOM
Roasted coffee is best stored in a cool, dry, and dark place. When coffee is left out in the open, it will begin oxidizing, which will slowly-but-surely lead to a degradation of perceived quality. Any moisture that comes into contact with coffee can create off flavors due to bacteria growth, and mold. Sunlight will degrade the roasted coffee further via UV degradation, which will break down the aromatic volatile compounds that make up the perceived flavor of coffee. These are the primary reasons why coffee roasters sell their beans in plastic bags. Although plastic is a nightmare for the environment, and our bodies, it is one of the best tools to keep roasted coffee beans as fresh as possible, and shelf stable.
The specialty coffee industry is making a compromise choosing to package coffee in plastic. That compromise is catching up to us, and we need to rethink how we package our delicious products. Although plastic is a great way to scale a coffee roasting business, it goes against many principles that specialty coffee stands for.
One principle used in specialty coffee marketing is coffee that is roasted to order, and intended to be brewed as soon as three days after it is roasted. This makes sense, because when coffee is roasted it goes through the Maillard Reaction, and develops many volatile, and soluble compounds that are what we perceive as flavor when we brew the coffee, and drink it. After coffee is roasted, it begins to degas the carbon dioxide that formed during roasting, and as that gas releases from the coffee beans, it takes with it many of those volatile compounds (this is why coffee bags have a one-way valve, so that gas can release, but no oxygen can get in). So the longer a roasted coffee sits, the more it will lose the volatile aromatics, and become oftentimes perceivably flat or stale.
Although a roasted coffee packaged in a plastic bag will retain more volatile aromatics for a longer period of time, it still calls to question why that coffee isn’t being brewed as soon as possible (once you open the bag, many of the compounds will escape all at once). Although the plastic bag has done a great job of getting high quality, specialty grade coffee to more-and-more coffee lovers, it is time for something new.
ETHICAL COMPROMISE
Strange Bird Coffee abides by what we call Ethical Compromise. We roast your coffee fresh, and ship it to you right away. By the time it arrives, it will have degassed perfectly, and ready to brew. If you want to keep it fresh longer, store it in a glass jar or metal tin. Brew it right away, and if you want to ensure you have fresh coffee on hand at all times, sign up for a subscription.
The Ethical Compromise is your coffee will not be packaged in an airtight plastic bag. Your box of coffee will be shipped in a 100% recycled, recyclable mailer.
If you are a coffee aficionado, you will have to get used to the fact that your plastic vessels are no longer serving you; matter of fact, they are poisoning you, and the planet. You will have to suspend your disbelief that maybe the coffee that is not packaged in a plastic bag is just as delicious as a coffee in a cardboard box. That a plastic free future is inevitable, and important. We will all have to take a few steps back, in order to heal ourselves, and the environment. An easy ask in the shadow of the alternative.
We love delicious coffee. We deserve delicious coffee. But we do not need to poison the planet and our bodies in the search for deliciousness.
No matter where your box ends up, in the trash, recycled, or composted, it will disappear without a trace. It will fall apart, and have served its glorious purpose: to hold fast your delicious Strange Bird Coffee.