World of Coffee San Diego Recap: Perspectives from A First-Timer 

Hundreds of booths, thousands of people and more genuine conversation per square meter than most events can claim. Nobody was miming interest. As someone relatively new to the coffee industry, I was struck by how engaged this community is. The stakes were real because the people behind coffee have given to it, in many cases, their entire working lives. I had seen dedication before, but this was a different species. 

From what I gathered talking to Serena Robert and Sarah Spaletta, two of our NA traders, the mood this year in San Diego was markedly different from last. With the market volatility rattling everyone last year, there was a tension running through the industry that people are still talking about. This year felt lighter, more grounded. The anxiety has not disappeared entirely, but it has shifted and you could feel that in the way people were talking to each other. I’ve discovered that coffee people are exceptionally good at finding solid ground… unsurprisingly.  

What got people talking 
I caught a few of the conference lectures, but the ones I heard about through the team were the ones that stuck. Producers speaking frankly about their markets, with roasters and traders going deep on EUDR, AI, supply chain realities: the questions the industry is collectively figuring out how to answer. But the talks were the spark, not the fire. The real conversation happened in the booth, in the halls, between sessions, with people who had just heard something that made them think differently and needed to talk it through. The lectures pose the communal challenges we all face; it’s in the conversations afterwards that problems get solved.  

The ultimate dream team 
I will be honest: watching our team show up for this show left me in awe. Seeing our international team and the relationships they’ve developed over the years reinvigorate on that show floor? Absolute magic. People noticed the booth, noticed the energy. A colleague spotted her mentor across a crowded hall and cried (literal tears) out of happiness. Roasters moved to tears by the words of a producer from South America, an absolute force of a woman, speaking about what it means to push for women in coffee. That kind of vulnerability does not happen by accident, only when people care so much about something and so deeply that they can’t pretend otherwise, even if it means going with red eyes to the next sit-down.

The ultimate dream community 
I lost count of how many times I was introduced to someone whose story started the same way. “We met in college. We worked at a tiny café together”. The nostalgia was sweet, but what lingered was the pride of having grown inside this industry together, of having learned its language side by side, of still being here and still caring this much... I realized that coffee give people a common tongue that they never stopped speaking, and it’s a beautiful thing to see. 

I was warned by everyone, and I mean everyone, that once you are in coffee you are never out. Standing in that room, watching years of shared history play out in a single handshake, I finally understood why anyone would say that. And why it is, without question, a good thing. I wouldn’t want to leave either. 

I hope to have the honor of being back for the next one. Where an entire industry shows up with this much intention, this much history and this much genuine care for what they are building together. That is not something you walk away from unchanged. 

And the goats. If you saw them, you know. If you did not, I am sorry for your loss. 
 

^{Juanita is a Content Marketer on Sucafina's marketing team, based in Colombia. With only 18 months in the coffee industry, she comes from a background in creative communications and music marketing. She came for the industry, stayed for the people and has been finding ways to write about both  since.}