Specialty Coffee Association of America
international trade organization
The Specialty Coffee Association (SCA) (previously known as SCAA Specialty Coffee Association of America, pre-2017, founded in 1982) is a non-profit trade association for the specialty coffee industry. With members located in more than 40 countries, SCA represents different segments of the specialty coffee industry, including producers, roasters, importers/exporters and retailers.
In January 2017, the Specialty Coffee Association of America and the Specialty Coffee Association of Europe merged into one Specialty Coffee Association or simply SCA. The SCA has more than 10,000 active members. The stated purpose of the SCA is to foster a global coffee community and support the specialty coffee industry through research, standards, education, and events to create a sector that is thriving, equitable, and sustainable.
International Focus
The SCA operates internationally, serving coffee professional across producing and consuming countries. Regional bodies, such as the National Coffee Association of America, create more geographically focused resources and materials.
Research and Standards
The SCA develops technical standards, research initiatives, and best practices relating to coffee quality, sustainability, brewing, roasting, sensory evaluation, and professional education. The recently released Equitable Value Distribution Report and accompanying How-To-Guide, provides research into access to equity across the coffee value chain. The research provides honest insights into where the industry stands, particularly in terms of inequitable distribution of resources to producing countries. Additionally, the SCA publishes a bi-annual research publication, 25.
The public source identifies “Specialty Coffee Association of America” as international trade organization. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Specialty, Coffee and Association.
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Contemporary correspondence, administrative files and participant testimony can test how later narratives organized the event or institution. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jul 24, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q7574931. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 2017 and 1982.
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This entry incorporates text from “Specialty Coffee Association of America” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.