How To Order

Purchasing from Mercanta for the first time?

Mercanta was founded in 1996 to supply the rapidly growing community of specialty roasters in Europe and beyond. Since then, we have expanded across 3 continents, working with a range of operations worldwide and have been delighted to see these businesses prosper!

Placing your first order may be a nerve-racking thought, but we have a team of experts located across the globe to guide you through the process. Our team have countless years of experience in building coffee portfolio’s for all types of models, so please get in touch via the Enquiry Form below to hear more!

Enquiries
Vila Boa 1

FAQ

Please find below some of our frequently asked questions.

  • How can I sign up to receive a price list?

    You can request a Price List for the warehouse(s) from which you intend to order here.

     

    Our specialty coffee catalogues are constantly changing to reflect availability, new arrivals and seasonal offers. As a result of this regular change, we update our Price List weekly and share it via email. Please be sure to sign up to receive the pricelist each week to ensure that you have the most up to date information on availability, pricing and future arrivals.

  • How do I taste your delicious coffees first before I place my first order?

    When you have taken a look at our Offer List and you’ve discussed your needs with one of our Account Managers, they will happily send you green (100g) or roasted (50g) samples of the coffees that you are interested in.

     

    Some of the very high valued coffees that we stock cannot be sampled as they are often packed in smaller units and/or vacuum sealed.

     

    Please talk with one of our Account Managers here about exactly what you would like to sample, and they will make it happen!

  • How do I become a customer?

    Please take the time to fill out our New Customer Registration Form here and an Account Manager will get in touch shortly.

  • Interested in Direct Trade?

    Many specialty roasters are looking for ways to trade directly with producers, with the aim of helping to improve equity in the industry. We are not a commercial middleman. Mercanta has long been at the forefront of decommodified coffee and we specialise in direct trade, having worked with most of our producers for many years. If you would like to foster individual relationships with producers and you would like to buy from them each season, we can help you build these relationships, using our 26 years of experience in exactly this, to ensure viability and support for both you and the producers.

  • Do you share traceability and marketing info?

    We have a close working relationship with every producer or producer-organisation that we buy from. We can provide you with information for the origin of every coffee, seasonal updates from producers, photos and information pertaining to each coffee.

     

  • What are you doing to enhance your traceability program?

    We are always working harder to integrate more robust traceability systems that are accessible to our roasters and their customers. We currently partner with Assure+ and Oritain, two fascinating and important organisations that help us improve supply chain visibility. We really encourage you to read more about them at the links provided: Assure+

  • Do you share cup scores and taste profiles?

    We have quality labs at all of our offices worldwide, and a team full of Q graders and extremely experienced cuppers. Because we only import Speciality coffee, we are pretty tough on coffees. This reflects our clientele, and we stand by our scores – at least in the sense that we are calibrated internally, and that our customers also value the coffees we end up buying and selling.  But scores for us work more like an internal benchmarking mechanism rather than something we think to be an objective ‘quality’ of the selected coffee.

     

    We cup our offering on a regular basis in order to ensure the quality we sell, and we are more than happy to share our notes!

  • How do I find out about coffees afloat or recent arrivals?

    Our specialty coffee catalogue is constantly being updated. Our warehouses regularly turn over stock and we constantly have shipments arriving from origin, throughout the year.

     

    This means that there are always exciting new coffees to look forward to! Updates on incoming coffees can be requested from your Account Manager at any time. They have their fingers on the pulse!

     

    As for reserving quantities of coffee for later delivery, we are happy to do this on a discretionary basis. You can chat directly to your Account Manager about this process.

  • Shipping and logistics?

    Clear and efficient logistics is a backbone of our industry. From our 7 warehouses in the UK, North America, Singapore, Dubai and Hamburg, we deliver worldwide to specialty coffee roasters in over 50 countries across 6 continents. We are happy to consider new routes and markets wherever feasible. If you decide to order and wish to use your own transport partners, that is no problem.

     

    We provide all required export documentation at the time of shipping. If you have questions about your particular region’s requirements, please get in touch – one of our logistics specialists will find the answers for you.

  • What payment terms do you offer?

    We require payments in advance for the first purchase and on a discretionary basis. As we continue to work together, we will certainly be open to discussing credit terms. We want to support our partners and help them grow.

  • Minimum orders?

    Usually there is no minimum order. However, the associated costs per kg for the coffee can be higher when buying less coffee at a time, due to transport costs. The quantities that we are able to supply may vary slightly from one warehouse to the next. Please get in touch with one of our Account Managers in your region and they will be able to tell you exactly what is possible where you are.

  • Where can I learn more and grow my expertise?

    We strongly encourage roasters and coffee professionals who would like to learn more and up-skill to contact our sister company, the London School of Coffee. The school offers a diversity of accredited professional courses and seminars and has helped countless coffee professionals to reach new levels in their careers.

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