Coffee Stories 21st April 2026

Every Day is Earth Day

In pursuit of the world's best coffee with every decision made to protect the planet that grows it.

From the very beginning, Kiss the Hippo has been built around one pursuit: creating and crafting exceptional coffee experiences, and doing that through offering the very best coffees we can find. But from that very first decision which roaster to buy, how to source, what to serve in sustainability has always been part of the thinking. Not as a separate agenda, but as the natural way to do things properly. As we've grown, that thinking has grown with us. This Earth Day, we wanted to share more of what that actually looks like.

It starts at origin

In 2025, we sourced coffee from 17 countries, selecting 109 individual lots, each chosen for its character, complexity, and the quality of the people behind it. That number changes every year, because we're always looking, always learning.

We work directly with our producers, visiting them at least once a year. That's how you understand a farm, build real trust, and make better decisions together. On average, we paid 1.26x the Fairtrade price for our coffees in 2025, because exceptional coffee starts with properly valuing the people who grow it.

27% of the coffee we sourced was certified Organic. But that number tells only part of the story. Many of the farms we work with, particularly smaller producers and cooperatives, implement organic and biodynamic farming techniques without holding formal certification. The process can be expensive, bureaucratic, and take years. Our commitment has always been to the practice, not just the paperwork.

"Some of our favourite coffees come from farmers who farm organically in practice, just not on paper. They're growing incredible coffee and taking care of the land while they do it. Our job is to recognise that, pay fairly for it, and make sure it ends up in your cup.”

- Kane, Head of Coffee

We also invest in the research and conservation that keeps specialty coffee's future alive. Climate change is one of the greatest threats facing coffee-growing regions today, bringing shifting rainfall, rising temperatures, and shrinking growing windows to some of the most important origins in the world. Our contributions to Kew Gardens and World Coffee Research are part of how we take responsibility for that, because the varieties we rely on today need active protection for tomorrow.

How we roast

In 2025, we roasted 116,334 kg of coffee, enough to make over five million cups. Every kilogram of it was roasted in the UK's first carbon neutral coffee roastery, powered entirely by renewable energy, and certified Organic by the Soil Association.

We roast using the Loring Smart Roaster, the most environmentally friendly roaster in its class, operating with up to 80% fewer emissions than conventional roasters. As we expanded our roastery last year, we added a second, larger Loring to our setup. Growth was always going to mean more roasting capacity. We just made sure our values scaled with it.

“The Loring changed how we think about roasting. The consistency batch to batch, the control, it raises the quality bar, not just the environmental one. We never saw those two things as separate ambitions.”

- Kane, Head of Coffee

What happens in our cafés

651,555 drinks served across our cafés in 2025. Whether enjoyed in one of our ceramic cups in-café or taken away, we've worked to make sure that every layer of the experience is considered, from our 100% compostable takeaway cups, lids, straws, and cutlery, to where everything goes once it's been used.

Used coffee grounds don't go to landfill. They go to bio-bean, where they're converted into advanced biofuels. Through our partnership with First Mile, we recycled 26,860 kg of material in 2025, saving 39.22 tonnes of CO2 in the process. And through Too Good To Go, 2,594 meals were saved rather than wasted.

Compostability and zero waste have always been the intention across everything we do in our cafés. These numbers are where that intention has got us so far.

The bigger picture

Since 2020, with the help of our guests, Kiss the Hippo has planted 70,630 trees through the #KissTheHippoForest, in partnership with On A Mission. In 2025 alone, that meant 21,615 new trees and 1,652 tonnes of CO2 offset. Every quarter, On A Mission measures our total emissions so we can offset more than we produce, keeping us carbon negative across every product we make.

From day one, we've partnered with organisations that share our values, from conservation and reforestation to literacy and community. Because caring about the world we operate in has never stopped at the roastery door

What does 'every day is Earth Day' actually mean when you're making decisions day to day?
"It means it's not a conversation we have once a year. It's the question that's already in the room when we're deciding what to source, how to roast, what to use in the cafés. It's just part of how we think."

- Kane, Head of Coffee

The coffee in your cup

Every bag on our shelves, every cup across our cafés, is the result of all of the above. Not as a badge, but as a way of doing things. We started with the belief that crafting exceptional coffee experiences was worth pursuing. We still believe the only honest way to pursue that is with the planet in every decision.

Thank you for being part of it.
EXPLORE OUR RANGE