EP 1111 Part 1 of 5 | Why Coffee Should Still Taste Like Coffee (George Howell) | Map It Forward
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Episode Description
This is part 1 of a new 5-part series on The Daily Coffee Pro Podcast by Map It Forward, hosted by Lee Safar. Our guest on the podcast for this series is George Howell, founder of George Howell Coffee, returning for the 2026 edition of our annual series, “The Coffee Industry According to George Howell.”
This year marks George’s 50th year in the coffee industry, and we begin the series by asking a deceptively simple question: What does George Howell Coffee actually do?
George traces the answer back to the philosophy behind The Coffee Connection: “In search of the ultimate cup.” That pursuit remains at the heart of his work today, particularly through single-farm coffees, close attention to producers, an uncompromising approach to quality, and the challenge of reconciling that pursuit with the realities of running a business.
But the conversation quickly moves into a much bigger question about how specialty coffee communicates quality.
George explains why George Howell Coffee has reconsidered the traditional handful of tasting descriptors printed on coffee bags. Customers looking at several coffees can quickly become overwhelmed by words like orange, plum, nuts, strawberry, or floral when many of them are simply looking for what George calls a “coffee coffee.”
That realisation has influenced the company’s new visual approach to communicating flavour, giving customers a clearer indication of how much of the experience will taste recognisably like coffee and how prominent the secondary flavour characteristics will be.
George’s argument is ultimately about making specialty coffee easier for consumers to understand and giving them the information they need to confidently choose the coffee they actually want.
We also discuss customer trust, consumer education, brewing, service, the growing home coffee market, and why George believes the performance around making coffee should never become more important than delivering quality in the cup.
Connect with George Howell Coffee:
https://georgehowellcoffee.com/