Thursday, October 26, 2006

Trademarking Joe

This past Sunday the Ideas section ran a piece by Gregory Dicum on fair trade coffee, which, depending on who you ask, is either hitting its stride or losing its meaning. The debate centers around whether the adoption of the fair trade logo by big corporations like Dunkin' Donuts and Starbucks is a good or bad thing for fair trade. It's good in the sense that these companies are buying a very large volume of beans. But some purists argue it's bad because these companies are not committing themselves to selling 100 percent fair trade coffee -- and are just using the logo as a marketing tool.

Today brings an interesting, and related, story about Ethiopian coffee. As the AP reports:

Ethiopia wants Starbucks to sign a voluntary licensing agreement saying the country owns the rights to the coffee names. Seattle-based Starbucks said Wednesday that it wants instead to work with the country to establish a geographic certification for the coffee bean names, much like is done with Washington apples or Kona coffee.

Ethiopia has also applied to the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office to get the rights to three coffee names, a move the National Coffee Association (Starbucks is a member) opposes.

Ethiopia believes these efforts will help its coffee growers get a better price for their beans, which is of course one of the goals of the fair trade label. The NCA disagrees.

Hat tips to the BBC and to Starbucks Gossip, maintained by Jim Romenesko, he of the eponymous media news site.

Posted by John Swansburg at 12:42 PM

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