 An exciting and dynamic set of public and cultural events relating to coffee and foodservice will take place during UK Coffee Week™ to further increase public awareness and knowledge of coffee quality, preparation and ethical sourcing.
The London Coffee Festival, being held from 27-29 April, is UK Coffee Week's flagship event and the nation’s most inspiring and dynamic celebration of coffee and food culture. This year, over 12,000 coffee and food lovers will attend the event being at The Old Truman Brewery, Brick Lane. 50% of all ticket sale proceeds will go directly to Project Waterfall. Book your ticket now!
Coffee shops participating in UK Coffee Week are also encouraged to develop their own internal and external activities to showcase their coffee expertise and ethical credentials as well as further engage with the local community.
UK Coffee Week 2012 was once again filled with exciting fundraising activities and events.
Highlights included:
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Kicking off UK Coffee week 2012, a traditional Ethiopian Coffee Ceremony was held at Ground Control (Ethiopian Coffee Company). We saw coffee beans being roasted over hot coals, which were then ground, stirred into a clay pot and served in china cups to all those watching. |
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We spent Monday, Wednesday and Thursday evenings with Ozone Coffee Roasters learning how to make the perfect cup of coffee at home and sampling some of Ozone’s premium coffees during roastery tours. On Sunday we visited their scrumptious bake sale. More information and photos can be found here.
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Nude Espresso had tastings every day during the week, where customers made their way through a selection of Nude Espresso’s single origin filter coffees. We also attended their London Coffee Festival after-party on Saturday and sipped delicious espresso martini cocktails. |
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Old Street coffee shop Look Mum No Hands hosted an energy-filled, high drama Roller Racing Challenge on Tuesday 24th April. Competitors representing coffee shops across London battled it out on stationary racing bikes over a 500m distance to be crowned Rollapaluza champion. More information and photos can be found here. |
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Tuesday and Wednesday evenings also saw events at the Make Believe Ideas Café in Hertfordshire. They were an opportunity for coffee lovers to learn the coffee story, with Apsley based coffee roasting company Smiths. There were various coffee samples to try and taste profiling skills tests. |
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The London Coffee Festival (Friday 27th April - Sunday 29th April), the flagship event of UK Coffee Week 2012, was a resounding success for a second year. Twelve thousand coffee lovers, foodies, professional baristas, coffee shop owners and industry experts united for the UK’s most inspiring and dynamic celebration of coffee and food culture. Guests grazed their way through The Street Food and Artisan Markets, learnt about coffee through tastings and demonstrations, watched the UK Barista Championships and enjoyed live music throughout the uniquely themed zones. This included the Growing Community where visitors were able to learn more about Project Waterfall and UK Coffee Week. |
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Friday also saw two coffee mornings held in pubs: The Prince Albert (Camden) and The Adam & Eve (Mill Hill). Baristas from Illy Coffee held demos while guests enjoyed coffee and muffins provided by the venues. |
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Golden Brown Coffee held a coffee cupping afternoon on Friday giving customers the opportunity to sample some rare speciality coffees and take home bags of shop roasted coffee, all while enjoying delicious cakes and scones. An exciting raffle took place with local artists donating pieces of their work. |
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Saturday meant an exciting musical tour of London's original and best coffeehouses courtesy of Unreal City Audio. From the first ever coffee shack in a muddy City churchyard to the establishments that laid the foundations of the modern world. Featured in Time Out, the Londonist and the Daily Telegraph. It was a walking tour like no other with free 18th-Century coffee included! |
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The final day of UK Coffee Week saw local musicians showing off their talent at an open mic night at Refresh Café in Sheffield. There was singing, poetry and music and all entrants were treated to a delicious lunch courtesy of the café. |
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Carvetii Coffee Roasters arranged a pop up coffee shop at Dearham Primary School where pupils ran the show, serving coffees to their parents and staff (with a little help from some trained grown ups!) They then marked the final day of UK Coffee Week by hosting a coffee tasting event. Customers were able to try a range of quality coffees, learn how to brew great coffee and got a fantastic going home present of a bag of their freshly roasted coffee. |
UK Coffee Week 2011 was jam-packed with fundraising activities and events.
Highlights included:
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Smashing the official and unofficial world record for the most espressos made in an hour at The London Coffee Festival on Saturday 9 April. A team of more than 100 UK baristas produced a staggering 12,003 espressos in one hour. That’s an incredible 3.33 espresso shots per second. Click here for full details, photos, participants and footage.
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The London Coffee Festival (Friday 8 - Sunday 10 April), the flagship event of UK Coffee Week 2011, was a resounding success in its first year. The festival was attended by 7,500 people over the three days who together consumed over 70,000 coffee samples! Visitors were treated to a wide array of coffee, gourmet food, tea, cocktails, live music and a thought-provoking seminar and debate programme. The Allegra Foundation hosted a space at the festival to educate visitors about Project Waterfall and UK Coffee Week.
Check out the festival photos and visit the website for more information.
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Old Street, EC1 coffee shop Look Mum No Hands hosted an energy-filled, high drama Roller Racing Challenge on Wednesday 6 April. Competitors representing coffee shops across London battled it out on stationary racing bikes over a 500m distance. See the full results and photos here.
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Coffee shops in Darlington in the North East of England collaborated to organise the first ever North East Coffee Festival organised by Afternoon Tease. During the week participating coffee shops held barista workshops, in-store coffee roasting and coffee tastings. Coffee lovers were encouraged to follow a coffee treasure map of all participating coffee shops with a prize for the winner.
Click here for Festival photos on Flickr
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The official UK Coffee Week launch at the beautiful Hempel Hotel on Monday 4 April sponsored by Tchibo Coffee Service. German artist Wolfgang Riegelsberger exhibited his stunning coffee art at this invite-only event.
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The glamorous red-carpet Gala Event was hosted by United Coffee on Tuesday 5 April at the Langham Hotel. We were blown away by the first live performance of the official UK Coffee Week song “Coffee” (performed by Sam Smith). |
Find a fundraising activity or event in your local area for UK Coffee Week 2012.
To launch UK Coffee Week in April 2012, a sponsored 10Km (6.2 miles) walk carrying up to 10L of water for 5Km along the River Thames will take place in aid of Project Waterfall. The Big Challenge being held on 15 April, represents the difficult daily task of fetching water by women and children in Africa.
More than 1,000 participants are expected to complete The Big Challenge. Collectively this will cover 10,000Km (6,214 miles), the distance from London to Tanzania where Project Waterfall is currently providing communities with clean water.
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Sunday 15 April 2012 |
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| Registration: |
09:00 - 10:30 |
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10:30, 11:00 and 11:30 |
The walk will take approximately 2 to 3 hours to complete and will start at The Scoop at More London, the amphitheatre situated beside City Hall and next to the iconic Tower Bridge on South Bank. Participants will head west along South Bank, over Westminster Bridge, east along Victoria Embankment and over Tower Bridge, to finish back at The Scoop. Maps will be provided and marshals will guide participants along the way.
At the half way point, marshals will give participants up to 10 litres of water to carry for the remaining half of the journey.
There will be prizes for the individuals and teams raising the most funds, for example a Modo Mio Lavazza coffee machine will be given to the highest individual fundraiser.
Imagine a life without water flowing freely from a tap. Imagine waking up at dawn and spending six hours fetching water for your family. One in eight people worldwide do not have to imagine this – it is their reality.
In rural Africa women and children often travel for hours to fetch water. The real tragedy is that, having spent so much time and effort reaching a water source, the water is often dirty, polluted and unsafe to drink.
The distances that we will cover as part of The Big Challenge are reflective of the long distances walked to collect water every day in developing countries and will give us a small taste of what daily life is like for the people we are fundraising to support.
The daily burden of collecting water prevents children from going to school and adults from working. Worse still, diseases like diarrhoea and dysentery caused by unsafe water and poor sanitation result in the deaths of 4,000 children every day.
There is a set fundraising target of £50 per person, but there is no limit on how much can be raised! A £10 registration fee will be required, to contribute to administration of the event. Once registered, participants will receive a fundraising pack, with details about how to maximise sponsorship.
Funds raised will support Project Waterfall to deliver sustainable clean water projects in African coffee-producing countries.
- £50 could pay for a technician to train a village pump attendant for three days on pump maintenance
- £175 could pay for a technician to install a hand pump to 10 meters or the cost of facilitating a community to acquire the land containing a legal water point
- £250 could pay a technician to install a hand pump to 45 meters
- £650 could pay for the cost of a plastic water tank of 10m3 capacity
The Big Challenge information sheet is available for download. |
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Coffee@Work is bringing UK Coffee Week into your workplace!
Coffee@Work provides an easy way for workplaces to get involved in UK Coffee Week by encouraging coffee and tea drinkers to donate a minimum of £1 for beverages made at work during the week. Donations raised will go to Project Waterfall.
Coffee@Work, working to provide clean water
to those in need.
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Businesses and organisations of all sizes are invited to participate in Coffee@Work.
Participating workplaces will receive:
- Promotional material and creative ideas on how to encourage involvement within the workplace
- Donation boxes
- A dedicated donations page for online payment
It is recommended that a workplace champion co-ordinates the fundraising initiative and invites those that drink hot beverages at work to donate £1 or another suitable amount.
There are lots of additional ways to get staff involved, for instance, workplaces could host special coffee or tea events like a ‘Tanzanian coffee tasting’ morning or a High Tea gathering where donations can be collected.
Many of us would agree that we enjoy a coffee or tea at work. Coffee@Work provides an opportunity to give something back to African coffee-producing countries where many do not have access to clean water.
Funds raised will support Project Waterfall to deliver sustainable clean water projects in African coffee-producing countries.
- £50 could pay for a technician to train a village pump attendant for three days on pump maintenance
- £175 could pay for a technician to install a hand pump to 10 meters or the cost of facilitating a community to acquire the land containing a legal water point
- £250 could pay a technician to install a hand pump to 45 meters
- £650 could pay for the cost of a plastic water tank of 10m3 capacity
A Coffee@Work information sheet is available for download. |
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Hold your own fundraising event for UK Coffee Week and showcase your expertise and ethical credentials as well as enable further engagement with the local community.
Ideas could include:
- Coffee tastings and talks
- Barista demonstrations
- Local art and cultural exhibitions
- Host community engaging fundraising events (e.g. ticketed events held out of normal opening hours), such as open mic night, coffee speed dating, performances by local musicians or a coffee quiz
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Do you have a great idea for a UK Coffee Week fundraiser? Register here
We’ve got lots of hints and tips to help make your event a success:
Planning your event
Order or download posters, leaflets, press release and more |
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