UK supermarket shoppers are being warned the price of coffee could continue to rise because of weather chaos overseas, leaving Brits paying even more for their favourite pick-me-up.
The wholesale price of the most popular variety of coffee bean, arabica, hit a 50-year high this week after already scaling up 18 percent this year. The cost of arabica’s cheaper alternative, robusta, has also jumped by record highs.
Experts are blaming freak weather incidents in Vietnam and Brazil, which are major producers of coffee beans Brits consume in their mugs every day. In Vietnam, the world’s largest producer of robusta beans, a dry spell during the growing period and heavy rains at harvest resulted in a drop in production.
This caused the cheaper variety to rise in price and almost match arabica. Companies are now switching to the better quality bean, driving up demand and prices.
In Brazil, a lengthy dry period earlier this year caused panic about future supplies from the South American producer.
This comes off the back of an almost steady but noticeable rise in coffee prices over the past five years. In 2019, a cappuccino at Pret a Manger would set customers back £2.45. Today, unless customers have a £5 monthly subscription, they can expect to pay £4.05 – a 65percent rise.
An americano at the popular coffee shop is now £3.60, which is a 50 percent jump over the past five years. However, Pret has recently reduced the price of its filter coffee to 99p.
Research carried out by analysts Stocklytics, which looked at prices at all the major coffee chains, found the average cost of coffee has increased by 51 percent since 2019. They found prices at Pret had jumped the highest while prices at Greggs had gone up the least.
A large cappuccino at Greggs is now £3 and a large americano will set you back £2.50. In 2019, these cost £2.30 and £1.90 respectively. But it’s Weatherspoons that has the cheapest cappuccino, at £1.56.
It comes as the Office for National Statistics reported the average cost of a hot bevvy of coffee is currently £3.24 – a 5 percent increase over the past year and more than double the official rate of inflation.
Coffee lovers hoping to dodge price rises by making their own at home will also be sadly disappointed after the price of Nescafe Original Instant Coffee in supermarkets went up 15 percent year-on-year, according to The Grocer’s Key Value Items tracker.
In a blow to consumers, Nestle confirmed it would continue raising prices and making packs smaller to offset higher bean prices.
Will Corby, director of coffee and social impact at supplier Pact Coffee, said the increases were not all that bad. He told The Grocer consumers have been getting cheap coffee from supplier countries for “far too long”.
He said: “Huge coffee companies might say that these market highs are bad news, but in reality, farmers are finally being paid enough to live on.”
The last records high for coffee was set in 1977 when unusual snowfall devastated plantations in Brazil. Coffee is the world’s second-most traded commodity by volume, after crude oil and its popularity is increasing.
