Coffee may be the most democratic of luxuries—served in porcelain at gilded resorts, pulled as espresso shots in corner cafés, or savored slowly at the kitchen table. But in 2025, the story of coffee is also one of volatility. Climate change and global trade disputes have made this morning ritual more fragile—and more meaningful—than ever.
The Global Picture: Climate on the Edge
In Brazil, the titan of arabica, drought and wildfires have stripped harvests by more than 10%. Vietnam, the leader in robusta, faces scorching El Niño conditions that parch fields and strain yields. Across East Africa—the cradle of coffee itself—farmers are cautiously hopeful after years of drought, though forecasts suggest harsher seasons to come.
Coffee is not a crop that bounces back quickly. A damaged plant can take years to recover, if at all. The result: a fragile global supply that ripples through the entire chain.
Trade and Supply Shifts
Overlaying climate pressure are new trade barriers. Tariffs on coffee imports—50% on Brazilian beans and 20% on Vietnamese—have disrupted long-established supply routes and driven up costs for roasters around the world. For cafés, the math grows increasingly unforgiving: absorb the higher prices or adjust menus to stay sustainable.
Palm Beach in the Picture: Common Grounds
All of this global drama—droughts in Brazil, tariffs on imports, ships idling in distant ports—eventually percolates down to the cup in your hand. And in Palm Beach, that cup is often poured at *Common Grounds*, the community-minded roaster that began in Lake Worth Beach in 2014 as a nonprofit hub for artists and entrepreneurs.
A decade later, with three thriving locations and a wholesale division, Common Grounds has proved that resilience can be brewed as surely as coffee itself. Its largest outpost, the café and roastery at the Plaza at CasaMara on Dixie Highway, opened in 2022. With a 40-seat indoor lounge and breezy al fresco patio, it’s more than a place for espresso; it’s a gathering space where the global story of coffee distills into something intimate and local.
“Community is the heartbeat of our business,” says co-founder and operating owner Justin Olive. His path to entrepreneurship—shaped by travel, ministry, and nonprofit work—infused Common Grounds with a culture rooted in listening and connection. “I’ll always listen to my employees, my customers, and my peers,” he reflects. “It’s a simple yet profound way to stay grounded in purpose.”
Luxury Meets Resilience
In Palm Beach, luxury has always been about provenance: the vineyard that produced your Bordeaux, the atelier that stitched your jacket, the orchard that yielded your olive oil. Coffee is no different. To sip a cappuccino is to experience a blend of stories—Brazilian droughts, East African resilience, and the steady hands of local roasters who refuse to compromise on quality.
And that’s why, in this climate of uncertainty, supporting local roasters matters more than ever. Independent cafés like Common Grounds invest in relationships with growers, roast with care, and build community at the neighborhood level. Corporate chains may move commodities at scale, but local shops keep the human story intact—the story that connects a farmer in Kenya, a roaster in Palm Beach, and the cup in your hand.
For Olive, the challenge is not just weathering uncertainty but reframing it. “Every bag of beans now carries a saga of resilience,” he says. “It’s not just coffee—it’s the lives of farmers adapting to harsher climates, the logistics of getting crops across oceans, and the determination to preserve quality in uncertain times.”