A wholesale coffee minimum order quantity (MOQ) is the smallest amount of coffee a roaster will supply on wholesale terms, set per order, per week or per month. For a small café, the right minimum is one you can clear within two to three weeks of normal trade, so beans stay fresh and cash is not tied up in stock.
A wholesale coffee minimum order quantity is usually the first number a roaster puts in front of a café owner, and it is often the one that causes the most hesitation. On paper it looks like a simple figure. In practice it decides how much cash sits in your storeroom, how fresh your beans are on a Tuesday afternoon, and whether your quietest week of the month turns into an awkward phone call.
For a small café, the trick is not finding the lowest minimum. It is finding a minimum that matches the volume you genuinely pour, with a little room for the weeks that surprise you. Here is how to read those numbers properly before you sign anything.
What a Minimum Order Quantity Actually Is
A minimum order quantity, or MOQ, is the smallest amount of coffee a roaster will supply on wholesale terms. The figure itself is simple. What sits behind it is not, because roasters express minimums in several different ways and they are not interchangeable.
You might be quoted a minimum weight per order, a minimum weight per week or per month, a minimum number of bags per delivery, or a commitment across a set period. A minimum of 5 kg per order is a very different arrangement from a commitment to 5 kg every single week. One lets you buy in a busy month and skip a quiet one. The other is a standing obligation of about 20 kg a month, whether or not you sell it.
When a figure is quoted to you, the useful follow-up question is always the same: minimum per what?
Why Roasters Set Minimums in the First Place
Minimums are not usually designed to shut small cafés out. They come from the way coffee moves through a roastery.
Green coffee is bought in bag lots, and for many origins those bags run from 60 to 70 kg. Roasting happens in batches, on set roast days, with cooling, packing and dispatch built around them. Delivery has a real cost attached, and a single 1 kg bag sent across town carries the same handling as a much larger order. Coffee is also a fresh product, so a roaster would rather sell you 20 kg you will actually use than 60 kg that sits in your back room going flat.
Those pressures are why minimums exist, and they are also why minimums vary so much between roasters and are worth asking about directly.
Work Out Your Own Volume Before You Compare Minimums
The only way to judge whether a minimum is reasonable is to know your own number first. Coffee usage is easy to estimate once you settle two inputs: how many espresso-based drinks you make on an average day, and how many grams of coffee go into each one.
Take an 18 g dose as a working figure. A café pouring 100 cups a day at 18 g will move 1.8 kg of coffee a day, which comes to about 54 kg over a 30 day month. That is before dialling in, before waste, before staff drinks and before any trial batches. A practical estimate always adds a margin on top.
| Espresso drinks per day | Coffee per day (at 18 g) | Coffee per 30 days |
|---|---|---|
| 30 | 540 g | About 16 kg |
| 50 | 900 g | About 27 kg |
| 100 | 1.8 kg | About 54 kg |
| 150 | 2.7 kg | About 81 kg |
Two adjustments matter here. First, many milk coffees in Australia are pulled as doubles, so your real dose per drink may sit above the single-shot assumption. Second, a new café should run this estimate on a conservative sales figure rather than an optimistic one, because the first three months rarely match the plan.
How a Minimum Looks From a Small Café's Side
For a café doing 100 or more drinks a day, a minimum is usually cleared comfortably inside a fortnight. The maths gets tighter at the smaller end. A 20 seat café pouring 30 drinks a day uses roughly 16 kg a month, which is still workable against many wholesale arrangements, but it leaves very little tolerance for a slow fortnight.
Minimums can sit anywhere along a wide range, and that is why comparing them without comparing your own usage tells you very little.
The Costs a Minimum Hides
A minimum that exceeds your real usage costs you in ways that do not show up on the invoice.
- Working capital sits in the storeroom instead of the till.
- Storage space disappears, and coffee is bulky.
- Beans age past their best before you open the bag, which shows up in the cup.
- A menu or blend change leaves you holding stock you no longer want to serve.
- Quiet months force orders you did not need, which distorts your cost per cup.
Pricing structure matters too. Not every supplier rewards volume in a straight line, which is why the only fair comparison is cost per kilogram at the tier you will actually buy, with delivery costs counted.
Questions to Ask Before You Commit
Bring these to the conversation and the arrangement will be clearer than any brochure makes it.
- Is the minimum per order, per week, per delivery or per month?
- What bag sizes are available, and am I paying for retail packaging I will only throw away?
- What is the price per kilogram at each tier, and does it include delivery?
- How soon after roasting does the coffee reach me?
- Can I trial the coffee in my actual drinks before committing, and calculate my ingredient cost per cup from that trial?
- What happens if I fall under the minimum in a slow month?
- Does the minimum count across the whole range, including decaf, or only against the house blend?
A supply arrangement that cannot answer those questions is not ready for a café that is still finding its feet.
Reordering Rhythm Matters as Much as the Number
Most businesses should reorder wholesale coffee every one to two weeks if they serve high daily volume, and every two to four weeks if volume is lower. That cadence tells you more about a minimum than the headline figure does. If your usage supports a fortnightly order and the minimum is comfortably below that, you are in a healthy position. If you would need to order monthly to clear the minimum but your coffee goes stale in three weeks, the arrangement is working against you.
Reliability sits alongside it. A minimum quantity means little if delivery dates move around, so ask how orders are scheduled and what happens when something goes wrong.
Where LygonCoffee Fits
LygonCoffee is an Adelaide based specialty roaster, roasting the OmniSoul blend along with single origins and a decaf. We supply cafés, hotels and coffee vans with wholesale beans and custom blends, and offer office coffee setups for workplaces. Private label and the no-fee Brand Partners stockist program are also part of what the roastery does, and the same team runs the mobile coffee van hire.
LygonCoffee café wholesale is from $42/kg. Your price depends on weekly volume and is confirmed in a quote. There is a 9kg minimum order. Ask about bag sizes and delivery when you enquire about wholesale coffee and custom blends. Bring your daily cup count with you. It makes the conversation much shorter.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is a wholesale coffee minimum order quantity the same as a contract?
Not necessarily. An order minimum simply sets the smallest purchase a roaster will accept. A contract usually adds a commitment across weeks or months, sometimes with pricing held for that period. Ask which one you are being offered, because a per-order minimum gives you flexibility in quiet months while a standing weekly commitment does not.
How much coffee does a small café use in a month?
It depends on daily volume. As a guide, 30 drinks a day is about 16 kg a month and 100 drinks a day is about 54 kg, before waste, dialling in and staff drinks.
How often should a café reorder wholesale coffee?
It depends on volume, but the right rhythm is the one that keeps beans inside their best window without tying up cash in stock you will not pour. Match the reorder cycle to your minimum before you sign.
Does a bigger minimum get you a better price?
Not always. Pricing structures differ, so compare cost per kilogram at the tier you will genuinely buy, with any delivery cost counted, rather than assuming the largest minimum delivers the best value for a small café.
