Why it belongs in ORBIS
Hong Kong's pioneering specialty roaster, opened in Causeway Bay in November 2012 by Jennifer W.F. Liu. Ranked Hong Kong's top specialty coffee brand by Frost & Sullivan in 2017.
The Coffee Academics traces back to 2010, when its founder, Jennifer W.F. Liu, opened a training studio in Causeway Bay meant as a space for the city's small but growing community of specialty coffee drinkers. Liu wasn't new to the trade — she'd already opened Caffè Habitu in 2003 — but the studio was aimed less at selling coffee than at teaching it.
The retail side followed in November 2012, with the first café opening at 38 Yiu Wa Street in Causeway Bay, built around the same idea: coffee education as much as coffee sales. It worked. Within five years, Frost & Sullivan ranked The Coffee Academics first in specialty coffee in Hong Kong for 2017, and the company has since expanded past 55 outlets across Hong Kong, Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, Indonesia, and the Philippines — a rare case of a coffee-education project scaling into a regional chain without losing the original teaching bent.