Coffee News Roundup: Week Ending June 7th

Another weird week in coffee. Here’s the scoop:

• There’s a Starbucks in Korea run by hundreds of little robots. Well, they’re not running the place, but they deliver the coffee around a multi-floor tech headquarters—they even have their own elevator.
• The green coffee consolidation trend continues, as financial services group StoneX buys up bankrupt coffee trader Mercon’s specialty arm.
• Enjoy your coffee. . . on toast? That’s the pitch from an outdoorsy Swiss startup which is selling a tube of coffee paste for campers. New Atlas calls it a “dissolvable paste that can be mixed with water in a cup, spread onto breakfast pastries or simply gobbled straight out of the tube.” Delicious.

Read more about these stories, plus a whole lot of unionisation news, over at Fresh Cup Magazine:

In case you missed it, you can read my latest (very) long-form article on FairWave Coffee Collective and its local-focused approach to private equity investment in specialty coffee:

Could a Private-Equity-Backed 'Collective' Offer a Template for Specialty Coffee’s Future?

FairWave Specialty Coffee Collective is acquiring coffee brands across the Midwest, promising a localised approach to growth. Is this a model for the industry—or just another consolidation strategy?

The PouroverFionn Pooler

Thanks for reading the Pourover! Until next week, it’s goodbye from a snoozing Merlin: