Between stages, roasting and competitions
In the past months we’ve moved between very different stages, the World Food Forum in Rome, Host Milano and the 2026 Italian Barista Championship regionals.
Events like these bring together colleagues, professionals, competitors, but also everyday coffee drinkers. Talking with consumers is often the most revealing part, people are curious, open and excited to taste something new.
Specialty coffee in Italy is still small, but it’s growing. More cafés are offering higher-quality coffees, more roasters are emerging and even the home-brewing market is maturing.
Yet with this growth comes a question: what message is the industry communicating?
Competitions: innovation and repetition
The World Barista Championship is one of the biggest platforms in the coffee industry. Every year it showcases ideas, techniques and extraordinary coffees.
But something seems to repeat itself: Panama Geshas and Colombian fermentations often dominate the stage. The same pattern appeared at the Italian regionals: amazing coffees, often Panama Gesha and Colombia from few and well-known producers.
There is nothing wrong with this. These coffees are iconic and they perform beautifully. But as baristas, I believe we also have a responsibility: to broaden the horizon, to give visibility to exceptional coffees that don’t necessarily have a name yet, but offer incredible stories and flavour experiences.
Innovation doesn’t happen only through processing techniques or equipment, sometimes it happens through choosing to represent producers who aren’t already in the spotlight.
A few days ago, during the 2026 Italian Barista Championship regionals, I shared some of the work we’ve been exploring at Peacocks Coffee over the last two years. It was inspiring to see so many young baristas compete with passion and talent. The future of the Italian scene looks bright.
We competed with our Don Alexis Catuai from Costa Rica, it helped us secure a place in the finals at Sigep in January, something I’m truly excited about!
Training: the foundation that still matters
As the industry grows, I feel strongly that training remains one of the most important factors.
Not only technical skills in brewing and extraction, but also the ability to communicate, to tell the story of a coffee, to build hospitality around it.
Quality coffee alone is not enough, it needs someone prepared and confident to give it context.
This is why we offer training modules and keep investing in education: to help baristas and enthusiasts prepare coffee well (either at a coffee shop or at home), understand it deeply and communicate it with intention.
We’ll share more soon from upcoming travels and new projects.
For now, thank you for being part of this journey, whether you brew our coffees at home, meet us at events, or simply follow our story.
Explore our current coffee selection, the last roast before Christmas ships on December 18th.
Matteo Pavoni