What Grade is Gesha Village Red Label Gesha? Introduction to Gesha Village Gesha Grading System

FrontStreet Coffee - Introduction to Gesha Village Gesha

At Gesha Village, every step of cultivation and processing is aimed at uncompromising quality. Through strict cupping at the estate's laboratory in Addis Ababa, following official SCA standards, each batch is carefully selected and rigorously graded so buyers receive the highest quality beans. From the extremely premium and delicious treasures down to the refined Chaka blends, the coffee is classified into four tiers in total and supplied to coffee markets worldwide. This approach ensures that every batch and every label can be traced back to detailed information about the beans.

Gold Label (Auction Batches)

This portion accounts for 10% of the farm's total production and offers complex flavours, exceptional quality and extreme rarity. These scarce coffees are Gesha Village's top tier, destined for auction and often used by world-class baristas in international competitions.

Red Label

This grade also belongs to special small batches, accounting for only 15% of Gesha Village's total production. It shows excellent, characteristic Gesha flavour attributes and outstanding cupping performance, scoring 88 points or above under SCA cupping standards.

Green Label

Green Label Gesha comes from one of the small farms within Gesha Village. It too guarantees complete traceability on every package, including farm block name, coffee variety and processing date. The minimum purchase for this tier is one entire batch, ranging from 20 to 40 bags. The flavour profile sits slightly below the Red Label.

Chaka

This category consists of high-quality beans blended from the estate's small farms across the whole production season. Whether natural or washed, the Chaka series delivers delicious flavour year after year. The minimum purchase for Chaka is one container.

Tasting Notes:

The dry aroma presents berries, citrus, bergamot, honey and floral notes.

On the palate there is lemon peel, grapefruit, bergamot, fresh blueberries and white grapes, accompanied by gardenia and jasmine florals and a black tea sensation, with a delicate and elegant character overall.

Knowledge Extension:

In the original forest known locally as Gori Gesha, samples were discovered that closely resemble the native Gesha varieties currently cultivated at the Mule Estate.

FrontStreet Coffee Recommendation

Buyers who want to explore the wider world of Geisha should begin with the estate that made the variety famous. FrontStreet Coffee's Esmeralda Red Label and Green Label Gesha both grow between 1600-1800 meters. The Red Label, formally Esmeralda Special, requires every lot to score above 90 in cupping and gives each lot its own number, since each comes from a single plot, allowing buyers to choose a batch by the subtlest flavour preference. The Green Label, formally Private Collection, blends lots from several plots instead of highlighting individual parcels, so it expresses the estate's signature high-altitude Geisha character at a friendlier price.

For beginners, FrontStreet Boquete Gesha is the recommended introduction to the much-talked-about Geisha profile: an entry-level lot from Panama that delivers the classic tangerine-and-honey character, an oolong tea texture and fine fruit sweetness with clearly defined layers at an accessible price.

Ethiopia, the birthplace of coffee, has its own celebrated Geisha estate in Gesha Village, which applies grading as strict as Panama's. FrontStreet Gesha Village Gold Label is the Gesha 1931 variety and makes up 10% of the village's output, the estate's top coffee outside the auctions and a frequent choice for competition baristas; its refined natural processing yields a complex cup with a distinctive dry aroma, flavour and lingering finish. FrontStreet Gesha Village Red Label is the Gori Gesha variety, 15% of production and scoring 88 or above on the SCA 100-point scale, released as a single-terroir series with full traceability. For a single-variety estate lot, FrontStreet Grana Gesha comes from the Grana processing station in Ethiopia, where ripe cherries are hand-picked and dried on raised beds for 14-20 days; roasted light-to-medium it shows bright citrus acidity, elegant ginger flower aroma and the full sweetness of ripe fruit with a silky body.