About Coffea Circulor
Award-winning coffee roaster, as well as a research laboratory and mentoring. Norwegian Coffea Circulor proves that they takes coffee seriously and tries to understand it as best they can.
History
Since 2010, we are helping coffee growers through our past work in the various branches of the UN and adhering to the Sustainable Development Goals. Our venture did not begin with roasting coffee. It started with fieldwork in Kenya on coffee farms. Coffee growers shared their stories about the coffee trade and we wished to help. Initially, the coffee from our friends was roasted offshore in a unique environment: a lighthouse island named Store Torungen located on the south coast of Norway. However, twice saved by the Norwegian Coast Guard in deep fog on a cold winter’s night in our tiny boat, they suggested moving our odyssey onshore.
Mission
Today, the notion of "transparency", "circular economy", "green economy", "sustainability" among other terminology and statements are widely used. Our inauguration generated a three pillar model that has become standard and what specialty coffee should all be about: Transparency Trade, Transparency Pricing and Grading. Key concepts and mechanisms of this approach are high quality products, socially responsible, environmentally sustainable, impact driven and trustworthy. Collaboration and communication between growers, roasters and baristas remove unnecessary actors and events from the fraudulent value chain. Our approach has set a golden standard in the world of specialty coffee and is continuously being copied. We travel and meet the farmers, millers and exporters as often as possible and vice versa. We do not believe in “fair” trades or expensive non traceable certifications anchored in bureaucracy and should be set to rest. “Fair” accentuates poor efforts for making something “honest”, “genuine” and “proper”.
2019
- Winner, Swedish Coffee Roasting Championship (SCA SCRC, Alingsås), Ivica Cvetanovski coaching Anthony Nguyen
2018
- Winner, Slovakia Brewers Cup (SCA SBrC, Trnava), Ivica Cvetanovski coaching Veronika Galova Vesela
- 1st Runner up, Slovakia Barista Championship (SCA SBrC, Trnava), Ivica Cvetanovski and Veronika Galova Vesela coaching Dušan Pavelka
2017
- Winner, Slovakia Brewers Cup (SCA SBrC, Piešťany), Ivica Cvetanovski coaching Veronika Galova Vesela
2016
- Winner, Italian Coffee Roasting Championship (SCA ICRC, Rimini), Ivica Cvetanovski coaching Rubens Gardelli
- Winner, Italian Brewers Cup (SCA IBrC, Rimini), Ivica Cvetanovski coaching Eddy Righi
2015
- Winner, World Coffee Roasting Championship (WCE WCRC Gothenburg), Storm Constantine Xaron Lunde with Ivica Cvetanovski coaching Audun Sørbotten
2014
- Winner, Norwegian Coffee Roasting Championship (SCA NCRC, Oslo), Ivica Cvetanovski
Interview
Can you please introduce your roastery in a few short sentences?
Coffee roasting is a side effect of our past work in the UN. We are primarily not a coffee roaster. Initially, we wished to help coffee farmers bring their coffee to Norway and our efforts were rejected. Therefore, to showcase the coffee from our friends, we bought a machine in 2010 and started roasting. Coffee for us is innovation, respect, biology, cultivation, payment for ecosystem services, production, processing, roasting, storing and brewing. Additionally serving, presenting and most importantly research.
What is the story behind your name and logo?
Our wish was to establish a collection of people working towards the same goals. Elements of inspiration emerged from the legend of King Arthur and his knights of the Round Table, creating Coffea (coffee) and Circulor (circle), all Latin words. Each “knight” would bring knowledge and experience from various sections in the coffee industry to build a strong team of international coffee professionals. Our logo comprises of an angelic female symbolizing mother nature, embraced by divine wings made up of beautiful coffee branches and leaves. Only through her can coffee be created, as she presents by holding coffee cherries. Our mantra is “Sharing stories that matter” which we have done since 1998 and formally since 2010 while pertaining to “Made by their respective countries. Finished in Scandinavia.”, relating to the fact that coffee belongs to the producers and coffee producing countries. We should all be happy to be able to have their products and not take them for granted.
What is the hardest part about being a roastery?
Roasting is not difficult because it is only 5% of the total work that really has to be done. The remaining 95% are the difficult ones. Today, anyone can be a coffee roaster. The recipe for this: buy a machine, buy green coffee from large traders, sell coffee. If you want to contribute to a better global society, health and research, then you learn where to invest the remaining 95%.
What is the one thing people still don’t get about coffee?
The paradox of coffee as a commodity being sustainable and simultaneously being a finite natural resource.
Which one thing do you wish you’d done differently since starting a roasting business?
Protect intellectual properties.
Is there a person in the industry people should know about?
Storm Lunde, molecular biologist and world champion trainer and coach.
What’s been your biggest failure?
Helping others achieve goals while putting yourself last.
What are you most proud of?
Our background in natural science to be applied in coffee. Processing, roasting, storing, brewing and additionally working from the “other end” of the coffee value chain - namely starting our work on farm-level and not on “final-product-level”/“roasting”. Only then you can understand the coffee value chain, causes and effects.
How will the specialty coffee market look like in 2025?
When the majority is copying and doing the same thing, “special” will not be “special”. It will be “just coffee” - which of course can be a good thing - if “specialty coffee” becomes the “new standard”. Additionally, due to being a finite resource, availability can change based on climate anomalies.
Tell us a little bit about “The Cup” - the best cup of coffee you’ve ever tasted?
There is no such thing as “the perfect cup”. Don’t let yourself grow old to believe there will be. However, there are moments to remember anchored in memory because of the atmosphere and excitement which as a consequence renders “the perfect cup”. Notable moments are just being on location in Kenya walking under the trees of coffee, catching the rays of the sun, the aroma of the trees and feeling the volcanic soil under your feet. World Brewers Cup 2015, calibrating with Odd-Steinar Tøllefsen backstage which produced the winning cup together with Storm Lunde. Additionally, backstage during World Brewers Cup 2017 while Sasa Sestic cupping our roast of Jamison’s Finca Deborah and saying “You crushed the roast” when the roast produced an aromatic score of 9.5 of 10.0. First impressions of our own processed coffee arriving from countries such as Uganda, Kenya, Panama.