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Sometimes called "gourmet" or "premium" coffee, specialty coffees are made from exceptional beans grown only in ideal coffee-producing climates. They tend to feature distinctive flavors, which are shaped by the unique characteristics of the soil that produces them.
The phrase "specialty coffee" was first used by Erna Knutsen in a 1974 issue of the Tea & Coffee Trade Journal. Knutsen, then a coffee buyer for B.C. Ireland in San Francisco, coined the term to describe beans of outstanding flavor produced by special microclimates. Take a virtual "visit" to specialty coffee farms around the world via the SCAA Producer Map!
With the proliferation of cafes and gourmet coffee retailers in the 1990s, specialty coffee has become one of the fastest growing food service markets in the world, netting an estimated $9.6 billion in the U.S. alone in 2004. For more facts about specialty coffee, see our SCAA Fact Sheets.
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