Buy the Drip - Coffee and Business

One of the first conversations we had in the Panama Producer series, Graciano and Cole go into a deep discussion of terroir, topography and the beauty of Panama.

Are you interested in accessing Graciano Geisha and other specialty coffee Varietals? Cole lives in Panama full time and curates a selection of top Panama Geisha and Varietals, from Graciano and Panamanian producers you see in these videos.

Forward is a green coffee sourcing and exporting company based in Chiriqui, Panama, working with 20+ producers. Cole is one of 22 International Judges for the Best of Panama and is ready to source your next favourite coffee. Forward is a Panamanian registered business and exporter living and working in Panama 12 months per year.

ROSSO COFFEE ROASTERS, since 2007
Anyone can be a specialty coffee drinker, and that means you. Dave and the team at Rosso roasted for the last two World Barista Champions and would love to roast a coffee for you too – try world-class coffee.

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Cole sits down with Karin de la Rosa, the visionary coffee producer at the helm of Mount Totumas. The Geisha from Mount Totumas has been used to win the World Brewers Cup Championship, the Best of Panama and numerous top awards in the Best of Panama. In this conversation, you'll hear the story of how Karin fell into the World of coffee and quickly became a globally renowned coffee producer.

FORWARD COFFEE
Find access to a selection of top Panama Geisha and Varietals. Forward is a green coffee sourcing and exporting company based in Chiriqui, Panama, working with 20+ producers. Cole is one of 22 International Judges for the Best of Panama and is ready to source your next favourite coffee. Forward is a Panamanian registered business and exporter living and working in Panama 12 months per year: ⁠https://forward.coffee⁠
ROSSO COFFEE ROASTERS, since 2007
Anyone can be a specialty coffee drinker, and that means you. We roasted for the last two World Barista Champions and would love to roast a coffee for you too – try our world-class coffees: ⁠www.rossocoffeeroasters.com⁠
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Cole sits down with Daniel Peterson to pull back the curtain on a legacy that redefined specialty coffee. In a historic turn of events, Hacienda La Esmeralda accomplished what many thought impossible: a clean sweep of the podium at the 2025 Best of Panama, taking first place in the Geisha Washed, Geisha Natural, and Varietal categories.This conversation goes far beyond the awards.

Daniel recounts the "accidental" survival of the Geisha variety during a devastating fungus outbreak in 1999, an event that paved the way for the 2004 discovery that shocked the industry. They discuss the "uncharted territory" of the $30,204 per kilo price point and what it actually feels like to produce a coffee that commands $1,000 per cup.

FORWARD COFFEE
Find access to a selection of top Panama Geisha and Varietals. Forward is a green coffee sourcing and exporting company based in Chiriqui, Panama, working with 20+ producers. Cole is one of 22 International Judges for the Best of Panama and is ready to source your next favourite coffee. Forward is a Panamanian registered business and exporter living and working in Panama 12 months per year: https://forward.coffee

ROSSO COFFEE ROASTERS, since 2007
Anyone can be a specialty coffee drinker, and that means you. We roasted for the last two World Barista Champions and would love to roast a coffee for you too – try our world-class coffees: www.rossocoffeeroasters.com

Follow us on INSTAGRAM
Stay updated with the latest: www.instagram.com/buythedrip.coffee
Follow Forward Coffee: https://www.instagram.com/fwdcoffee/
Follow Dave: www.instagram.com/crosbyandcoffee
Follow Cole: www.instagram.com/torodeo

The Reality of Coffee Media, Competitions, and the Industry | Kirk Pearson
Coffee competitions, coffee media, and the online coffee world often look polished from the outside. But behind the scenes, the reality is far more complicated.
In this episode of Buy The Drip, we sit down with Kirk Pearson to talk about the evolution of specialty coffee media, the role competitions play in shaping the industry, and what it actually takes to build platforms that help push coffee forward.
Kirk shares his journey through coffee from competing and working in cafes to helping create some of the most widely followed coffee content and discussions online.
We talk about what works, what doesn’t, and how conversations around coffee are changing as more voices enter the industry.
The discussion also dives into the tension between education, entertainment, and authenticity in coffee media, and why storytelling matters just as much as technical knowledge.
Along the way we explore:
• How coffee media and YouTube changed the industry
• The role competitions play in shaping careers and ideas
• Why transparency and honest conversation matter in coffee
• What it takes to build platforms that people actually trust
• The future of specialty coffee storytelling
This episode is a look behind the curtain of coffee culture — from competitions and cafés to the media that connects the whole industry.
If you enjoy conversations about the people shaping coffee, subscribe and follow Buy The Drip for more episodes.

Coffee competitions are what the industry sees. The lights. The routines. The trophies.
But the real work happens long before anyone steps on stage.
In this episode, Cole sits down with Andrea Tan the first Singapore Brewers Cup Champion, green coffee buyer, judge, and World Coffee Events Representative. They unpack what it actually takes to run fair, meaningful competitions around the world.

Andrea shares her path from waiting tables to standing on the world stage, and how competition shaped her perspective not just as a competitor, but as a judge and now a WCE Rep.
We talk about responsibility, empathy, and the weight of writing a full scoresheet when someone’s poured months of work into 15 minutes.

Beyond competitions, the conversation expands into green coffee buying, trust, and what she learned from recent time spent in Ethiopia from shifting cup profiles to infrastructure changes and the evolution of transparency in origin markets.

This episode isn’t just about competition rules.
It’s about:
• What fairness actually looks like in practice
• The role of feedback in shaping careers
• How reps support national bodies around the world
• The changing landscape of Ethiopian coffee
• Why empathy and people skills matter as much as technical knowledge
It’s a conversation about contributing to coffee beyond the spotlight and about building systems people can trust.
If you care about competitions, green buying, or the long game of this industry, this one goes deeper than the stage.
Subscribe and follow along for more conversations like this on Buy The Drip.