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The Glasgow Coffee Festival Returns This Week

Glasgow Coffee Festival 2020 Glasgow Coffee Festival 2020
Glasgow Coffee Festival 2020 Coffee to go? Glasgow Coffee Festival will be the first in the world to take to the streets. The Festival pivots to drive footfall to local coffee shops during a challenging time. Picture shows L-R Erin More from Dear Green, Lisa Lawson founder of Dear Green, Danny Gorton - Spitfire, Kyle Henderson - Dear Green, Sidhean Barlow - Riverhill, Tom McDermott - Sprigg, Danny Ormond - Dear Green, Gillian MacIntyre - Mayze and Adele McPhee - Willow Grove Coffee. This year’s Glasgow Coffee Festival is set to be the biggest ever as it takes to the streets for the very first time, in a bid to encourage Glaswegians to visit local, independent businesses. The annual event, initially scheduled for May, was postponed due to lockdown, and next month’s rescheduled two-day event can no longer take place indoors due to current restrictions. Instead, organiser Lisa Lawson, Dear Green’s founder, has announced her plans to transform the festival into a ten-day-long citywide celebration of the city’s baristas, roasters and coffee shop owners In its five years, the event has become a must-visit for coffee fans from Glasgow and beyond. In 2018, it became the first coffee festival in the world to ban disposable cups. Now it’s the first coffee festival to take to the streets. A ticket, which costs just £5, will provide unlimited deals and discounts in Glasgow’s best cafes from October 16-25. Glaswegians are encouraged to visit not only their local coffee shops during the festival, but to discover the uniqueness of independent businesses and all of the knowledge, passion and technical coffee skills on offer across the city. The event takes place at an incredibly challenging time for coffee shops, as the furlough scheme, something which has been of vital support to owners, staff and customers, draws to a close. The mission of the festival is to show Glasgow the true meaning of supporting local, and encourage coffee drinkers to swap their vi

The pandemic has wreaked havoc on coffee events—all events really—worldwide. Pretty much the entire roster of 2020 coffee events has either been postponed, canceled, or moved to the digital space. And in Scotland, as in the rest of the world, cases are climbing headed into fall (while still being far less than the daily case count in the United States).

So what’s to be done for the Glasgow Coffee Festival? Is there a way to still celebrate a city’s coffee culture—and provide much-needed business and support to small business owners—while still being safe and mindful of COVID? In years past, the Glasgow Coffee Festival has been a weekend-long extravaganza, bringing coffee lovers and companies from across the United Kingdom, but for its sixth year, GCF organizer and and Dear Green Coffee founder Lisa Lawson is shrinking the scope but sprawling the execution. Now a 10-day event taking place between October 16th and the 25th, the festival has transformed into a “choose your own adventure” coffee tour of Glasgow.

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50 shops, 10 days, and a handful of online events, the Glasgow Coffee Festival is celebrating and supporting some of the area’s best independent coffee companies, while staying safe and epidemiologically mindful. A £5 ticket grants access to “unlimited deals and discounts in Glasgow’s best cafes,” per the press release. Along with Dear Green, participating shops include Spitfire Espresso, Black Pine Coffee, It All Started Here, Canary Girl Coffee, and many, many more.

The goal of the new GCF, according to Lawson, is to get folks to support not just their local coffee shop but “to discover the uniqueness of independent businesses and all of the knowledge, passion, and technical coffee skills on offer across the city,” all of which have been hit hard during COVID-19. “Your local coffee shops and roasters have been fueling your home working whilst fighting their own survival battles,” Lawson says. “Let’s show support to the amazing people behind all of these wonderful local businesses which enrich our communities and boost our local economy, by serving and roasting great coffee.”

To supplement the coffee crawling, the Glasgow Coffee Festival will be hosting a handful of online events across the 10-day timeframe, and sponsors Dear Green, La Marzocco UK, Safe2Go, and Indy Coffee Guide will be doling out prizes and giveaways.

For more information the the slate of events and the participating companies or to purchase your ticket, visit the Glasgow Coffee Festival’s official website and follow them on Instagram. Stay safe, drink coffee.

Zac Cadwalader is the managing editor at Sprudge Media Network and a staff writer based in Dallas. Read more Zac Cadwalader on Sprudge.

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