World Coffee Roasting Championship Heading to Rimini in January

From the 2017 World Coffee Roasting Championship. World Coffee Events photo.

Now in its sixth year, the World Coffee Roasting Championship (WCRC) for 2018 is heading to Rimini, Italy, in conjunction with the Sigep hospitality industry conference on Jan. 19-23, 2019.

The WCRC was originally scheduled to take place in Dubai this year, before the Specialty Coffee Association announced its intention to relocate all Dubai world championship events after backlash from numerous parties in the global specialty coffee community.

According to world championships event organizer World Coffee Events, the goal for future WCRCs will be to return to a normal 10-to-12-month competition schedule, despite the scheduling changes this year.

“World Coffee Events (WCE) and the Specialty Coffee Association (SCA) wants to acknowledge the communities and partners that have helped with championship location considerations, and the time those considerations have taken,” WCE said in an announcement released today. “We are deeply appreciative of everyone’s support and patience as we coordinated with many partners, and we are very grateful and excited to be working once again with The Italian Exhibition Group to produce a world coffee championship.

WCE said there will be more than 20 national champion roaster competitors at the event in Rimini, where the WCRC was held in 2014. Tulsa, Oklahoma’s Topeca Coffee Roasters Director of Coffee and longtime volunteer roasting educator Ian Picco was named the US Roaster Champion in April.

2018 WCRC sponsors include Giesen (production roaster), Cropster (roast analysis software) and Urnex (cleaning products.