I'm an SF-based digital strategist, writer & photographer in the specialty coffee industry. I have a penchant for cake donuts & global travel.
Intellectual Property In Coffee: Who Really Owns The Story?
Stop me if this sounds familiar.
“This coffee was grown in fertile soil, amid a lush landscape known for producing bright, fruity notes with a hint of chocolate. We believe in sustainability and transparency throughout the supply chain. Our team travels the world to responsibly source the best coffees, taste them, and carefully roast them for you. We partner with producers who practice traditional farming methods, but aren’t afraid to try new techniques.”
If you’ve read enough coffee roasters...
Intellectual Property In Coffee: A Global Game Of Clones
I remember when I visited my extended family in Taiwan in 1998. Lining the streets were vendors doling out the latest movie on DVD, before it even left the theater. A few years later, the girls around school were all sporting bags with the Chanel-style C patterned around them. I bought a pair of C-patterned heels for NT$100 (US$3 at that time). They were such a steal and people fawned all over them.
What I didn’t know was that pirated movies and counterfeit products were intellectual property...
Intellectual Property In Coffee: Imitation Is No Longer Flattering
“Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.”
Writer Charles Caleb Colton must have never met an intellectual property lawyer. But when does imitation become outright copyright or trademark infringement?
Intellectual property (IP) covers a lot of ground and is found in every aspect of the coffee value chain. From patenting coffee makers to trademarking blend names to granting plant breeders’ rights, IP’s reach is far and influential in coffee history.
In this three-part series, we’ll take a ...
Stop Calling It “Geisha” Already
It’s been 14 years since the Geisha coffee variety dropped into the specialty coffee scene on the 2004 Best of Panama auction stage. Since then, the variety has broken records on auction prices multiple times, helped secure wins at barista competitions, and astonished palates for people around the world.
But here’s the issue: it gets confused and punned with geisha, the Japanese entertainer, which leads to many problematic interpretations. What some might consider a delightful homophone has b...
Mental Health In The Service Industry: Confronting The Stigma
Mental Health In The Service Industry: Confronting ...
Impostor Syndrome Is Real—And It's Happening In Coffee
Examining feelings of imposterism while working in the coffee industry.
How to Create Achievable Social Media Goals
Here, we’ll outline why you need to set goals and how to go about setting them. We’ll follow that up with some of the most common social media goals.
7 Creative Ways to Use Social Media for PR
There are many ways to use social media in your PR strategies. Whether or not you write press releases is not the key focus. The purpose of PR is to have as much positive coverage on your company as possible and as often as possible.
Social Media Automation Rules No Brand Should Break
Automation gets a bad rap. Usually when you hear about social media automation, you picture the cringe-worthy automatic direct message that sometimes happens after you follow a new account. “Thanks for the follow, Bob! Check out our new product at this yourwebsitehere.”
Jenn Chen - Coffee Marketer — Bossy Like Me
Providing open lines of communication, including education in bite-sized pieces, is key to making your marketing stand out.
Instagram vs. Snapchat: Which Is Best for Business?
Since the launch of Instagram Stories in mid–2016, Snapchat and Instagram have been competing at break-neck speeds to release hot new features and keep customers on their own platform.
Top 5 Facebook Trends and How to Implement Them
These Facebook trends aren’t the shiny new features that may or may not take off. Instead, they’re trends that we see brands using on Facebook to reach new audiences and set themselves apart from the crowd.