Your coffee is about to get more expensive, thanks to the latest shortage

Your coffee is about to get more expensive, thanks to the latest shortage

Consumers might get more than just a jolt of caffeine when buying their next cup "” high bean prices means that latte drinkers and home brewers alike should prepare for some potential sticker shock. Yes, coffee may be the next good hit by soaring prices and product shortages. According to , arabica "” the bean that's probably powering the cup on your desk at this moment "” reached a four-and-a-half-year high in early June. The commodity soared as high as $1.70 before settling around $1.50 "” well over last year's prices of around $1.13, according to data from . Experts say the cause of this inflation is a record-breaking in Colombia, protests, , and a huge backlog of coffee waiting to be shipped. "It's a big headache," Carlos Mera, an analyst at Rabobank, told the Financial Times. "There is plenty of coffee waiting to be shipped from producing countries, where the protests earlier this year interrupted the coffee flow." German coffee maker Tchibo says it will raise the price of coffee by 50 cents a pound. Typically, coffee buyers have contracts with their suppliers that solidify the price of the beans for roughly three to six months. But when those