Sustainable coffee roasters named Best of British with prestigious Queens Award

Origin Coffee – one of the leading and progressive speciality coffee roasters in the UK and Europe – has been named Best of British by winning a Queen’s Award for Enterprise.

Awarded for industry-leading achievements in Sustainable Development, the prestigious honour celebrates Origin Coffee’s environmental and social ethos which sits at the heart of the organisation. As well as developing a market-leading coffee buying program which is underpinned by direct trade, ethical supply chains, provenance and traceability, in 2020 Origin Coffee certified as a B Corporation demonstrating its deep-rooted commitment to building a sustainable business model and ‘doing business better’. From how coffee is grown to how it is roasted, packaged and finally disposed, Origin is renowned for its triple bottom line vision and is credited with leading the charge for sustainability in the coffee industry.

As part of this, Origin Coffee supports coffee farmers by paying a premium for coffee, which allows them to become upwardly mobile and sustain an improved standard of living. In 2021 Origin moved to their new roastery in Porthleven. The site was constructed in an ecologically sensitive way, with in-built energy saving solutions, including an air source heat pump, a heat exchange system, and 10 EV charging points. At micro level, waste nutrients are carefully recirculated using a state-of-the-art industrial composter installed in 2022. Waste is also being reduced via partnerships with companies including First Mile and Too Good to Go, who redivert rubbish from landfill. Plastic has also been eliminated across the company’s cafes in Cornwall and London by replacing takeaway cups with 100% compostable alternatives.

Based in the Cornish harbourside town of Porthleven, Cornwall, Origin Coffee roasts, brews and offers professional barista training. The award-winning company have seven owned and operated locations in the UK and Cornwall and work with over 480 wholesale partners across the UK and Europe. In 2021, the 80 strong company reported a turnover of 7.8 million.

Tom Sobey, founder of Origin Coffee says: “It is with enormous pride that we have been recognised by Her Majesty the Queen for our commitment to sustainable development.

“When we talk about sustainability at Origin Coffee we talk about it in terms of each and every aspect of business operations – nothing escapes scrutiny. Asking how we can do things better, for people and the planet, is ingrained in our thinking and seeing the impact of our actions and inspiring other businesses to follow in our footsteps is a fantastic reward. It is a huge privilege to receive this award and is to the credit of the whole team.

“This is a journey of continuous improvements we have a number of initiatives in the pipeline to boost our efforts further.”

Most recently, Origin Coffee has announced an ambition to be NetZero by 2030 through a series of pioneering approaches.