MWJB fair points. It’s one of those areas where you can’t please everyone.
For our webshop labels, and the physical labels on our boxes, we have space for maybe three or four words with which to try to give an impression of what the coffee might taste like. Although you haven’t ever tried Vimto yourself, I would suggest that a lot of people have. They will have experienced a very sweet drink, that is a mixture of different berries. As such, it makes good shorthand for the fruit notes in the Rocko and only takes up one word.
The other aspect, which is perhaps less well known outside the industry is that this is the language we tend to use when meeting other coffee professionals to evaluate coffee. There is a standardised, recognised ‘lexicon’ which is used to describe flavour in coffee. Maybe as a result of that, this shorthand is used to communicate and help distinguish and separate different lots in our memory.
Anyone interested in that stuff can download the lexicon for free here.
I know this probably sounds like I’m justifying tasting notes but in all honesty, I have plenty of issues with them too. It’s more about not having a good alternative. Take the Colonna approach for instance. Maxwell also doesn’t like using tasting notes. Now this is not critical, I’ve really enjoyed loads of their coffee over the years, but now they’ve moved away from tasting notes, I never buy any as I have no way of making a selection, it’s all too vague - further evidence for not being able to please everyone I think.
As an aside, I was in their shop a few months back, and was chatting to the barista in order to decide what to buy, and we were very much talking about tasting notes then!
