Who Brought Specialty Coffee to Dubai? The Pioneers, 2009 to 2015

Specialty coffee in Dubai began between 2009 and 2012 through the International Coffee and Tea Festival at Meydan, which brought the first SCAA certified coffee training and the first UAE National Barista Championships to the region. Ryan Godinho, an Australian barista trained in Melbourne, ran the festival’s coffee programme, brought the World Coffee Events licensed national championships to the UAE for the first time as National Coordinator, was inducted into the SCAA Lead Instructor programme in 2010 and certified as the first SCAA Lead Instructor based in the UAE in 2012, and established Specialty Batch in 2011 as the Middle East’s first dedicated specialty coffee training facility, officially founded as a company with its own roastery in 2013, before opening Stomping Grounds in 2015. Coffee Planet and Raw Coffee Company were the first two independent roasteries in Dubai; Specialty Batch was the first business built around specialty coffee education, competition and standards.

Every claim below links to the press coverage it comes from, so you can check it rather than take our word.

Key facts at a glance

Fact	Detail
First dedicated coffee trade event in the Middle East	International Coffee and Tea Festival (ICTF), Meydan, Dubai, from 2009
First SCAA certified coffee training delivered in the UAE	ICTF workshops, from 2009 to 2011
First SCAA Lead Instructor based in the UAE	Ryan Godinho, inducted into the programme 2010, certified 2012
First UAE National Coordinator for World Coffee Events	Ryan Godinho, appointed 2009 to 2011, stepped down 2017
First WCE licensed national championships in the UAE	UAE Barista Championship, Latte Art, Brewers Cup and Cup Tasters, launched under Godinho from 2011 at ICTF, Meydan; seven competitions in all
First independent roasteries in Dubai	Coffee Planet and Raw Coffee Company, before 2012
First dedicated specialty coffee training facility in the UAE	Specialty Batch, established 2011 under the SCAA; Specialty Batch Coffee officially founded as a company in 2013
Early Australian style specialty café in the UAE	Stomping Grounds, Jumeirah 1, opened 2015; UAE’s Best Independent Specialty Café 2019 (Allegra)
Specialty Batch today	7,000 sq ft roastery at Mina Rashid, 60+ staff, supplying more than 500 cafés and restaurants across the UAE, exclusive UAE distributor for Synesso, Rubasse, Bentwood, Anfim, Poursteady, Grindie

What was coffee in Dubai like before specialty?

Before 2009, coffee in Dubai meant Arabic coffee at home, karak from the cafeteria, and franchise espresso from American and British chains in every mall. Roasting happened overseas. Nobody said “single origin” unless they had just come back from Melbourne or London.

A 2012 report in Hotelier Middle East captured the moment. The market was led by US franchises, and Dubai had exactly two independent roasteries, Coffee Planet and Raw. In the same article Godinho, then Events Director of the International Coffee and Tea Festival, predicted that independent and speciality cafés would find their place in the UAE and that the country would become one of the world’s better café destinations. In a city that now has well over a hundred specialty cafés, that reads as obvious. In 2012 it was a bet against the whole market.

Source: Third wave coffee movement to hit Dubai, Hotelier Middle East

How did specialty coffee actually start in Dubai?

Specialty coffee started in Dubai through a trade festival, not a café. The International Coffee and Tea Festival launched in 2009 at the Meydan Grandstand and Convention Centre as the Middle East’s first dedicated coffee and tea trade event, and it carried the three things the market lacked: certified education, competition, and a supply chain for specialty grade coffee and equipment.

Godinho joined the festival in an operational role from 2009 to 2011, then served as its Events Director while also acting as the UAE’s National Coordinator for World Coffee Events, the body behind the World Barista Championship. That is why each edition carried more than an exhibition floor:

• SCAA certified training workshops in coffee grading and evaluation, preparation and craft roasting. For most local baristas it was the first structured coffee education available without flying abroad.
• The UAE National Barista Championship and Latte Art Championship, the first official route for UAE baristas to the world stage.
• International champions on the brew bar. Stefanos Domatiotis, 2014 World Brewers Cup Champion, taught brewing classes at the festival.
• A supply platform where green coffee traders and equipment manufacturers met regional distributors for the first time. Godinho told Hotelier in 2012 that exporters and equipment makers worldwide were already enquiring about UAE distribution partners.

Godinho’s argument at the time was blunt. He told Barista Magazine in 2015 that only exposure and competition would lift the quality of coffee in the region. He told Gulf News that home espresso and capsule machine sales had risen 47 per cent between 2010 and 2012, and that manual brewing methods such as pour over were returning, both early signs that consumers were ready for better coffee. By 2015, Global Coffee Report was quoting him on an expected 7,000 visitors and plans for regional competitions in Abu Dhabi. By 2018 the renamed Dubai International Coffee and Tea Festival was drawing more than 9,800.

Sources:

• International Coffee and Tea Festival kicks off in Dubai, Global Coffee Report, 2015
• International Coffee and Tea Fest in Dubai, Barista Magazine, 2015
• Bubbling under: an industry full of beans, Gulf News
• Less than a week to the International Coffee and Tea Festival, Comunicaffe, 2013
• Baristas in UAE begin preparations for national championships, 2013
• Event review: the UAE International Coffee and Tea Festival, 2013
• Dubai International Coffee and Tea Festival, official site

Who brought the World Coffee Championships to the UAE?

Ryan Godinho did, through World Coffee Events. Between 2009 and 2011 he was appointed the UAE’s first National Coordinator by the Specialty Coffee Association and its World Coffee Events arm, the body that runs the World Barista Championship. In 2011 he launched and ran every licensed national coffee championship in the UAE for the first time, a portfolio of seven competitions starting with the UAE National Barista Championship, the UAE Latte Art Championship, the UAE Brewers Cup and the UAE Cup Tasters Championship, all sanctioned by WCE and affiliated with the World Coffee Championships.

Why does that matter more than a café opening? Because a licensed national championship is the only route to the world stage. Before 2011, a barista in Dubai had no official way to compete internationally. After it, the UAE had a champion every year, an international judging panel in town every year, and a reason for visiting world champions such as Stefanos Domatiotis to spend a week teaching on the Meydan brew bar. By 2013 the championships were an established fixture of the festival, and the UAE’s winners have gone on to represent the country at the World Barista Championship. The national championships continue today under the SCA UAE chapter at World of Coffee Dubai, which is the direct descendant of what was set up at Meydan.

Sources:

• Ryan Godinho: the story of specialty coffee within the UAE, World’s Leaders, 2023
• Ryan Godinho: reshaping Dubai’s café culture, Insights Success, 2023
• UAE’s annual coffee competitions call professional baristas, Comunicaffe
• Baristas in UAE begin preparations for national championships, 2013
• UAE National Barista Championship at GulfHost, Comunicaffe, 2018

Why did Godinho step down from the SCA in 2017?

Godinho stepped down as UAE National Coordinator in 2017, the year the Specialty Coffee Association of America and the Specialty Coffee Association of Europe merged into the single global Specialty Coffee Association. He left over a difference of principle about what the competitions and the association were for.

His view, then and now, is that national championships exist to give working baristas, small roasters and independent cafés a fair, affordable route to the world stage. As the association grew into a global trade body, he felt the balance tipped towards sponsors, licensed event partners and the commercial machinery around the championships, and away from the people the SCAA had been built to serve. He chose to keep building that route locally, through Specialty Batch’s training programmes, rather than administer a system he no longer agreed with. The UAE championships passed to the SCA UAE chapter and continue today at World of Coffee Dubai.

He has not changed his mind. The SCA’s commercially-driven board slate of candidates and most recent public IRS filing reports total compensation of about US$887,000 for its Chief Executive Officer are both public record and readers can draw their own conclusions about who a specialty coffee association is now built for. Godinho’s position is simply that the small operators who made specialty coffee worth talking about deserve a body that puts them first, and that in Dubai, Specialty Batch will keep doing that work whether or not the association does.

Sources:

• Presenting the slate of candidates for the 2027 to 2029 SCA Board of Directors, Specialty Coffee Association, August 2026
• SCA announces board of directors candidates, Global Coffee Report, August 2026
• Association for Specialty Coffee, IRS Form 990 filing, ProPublica Nonprofit Explorer
• Specialty Coffee Association of America, Wikipedia

Who is Ryan Godinho?

Ryan Godinho is an Australian coffee professional and entrepreneur based in Dubai, and the founder and CEO of Specialty Batch Coffee Roastery LLC, Stomping Grounds and Tylers Tavern. Born in Melbourne, he grew up between Dubai and Melbourne, completed A-Levels at Dubai College in 2003, and worked part time in Melbourne cafés and restaurants through his studies, where he started as an apprentice barista. He holds a master’s degree in Music Production and Audio Technology from SAE Institute, South Melbourne (2008), and before coffee co-founded BG Studios and the 24 hour Soundproof Café in North Melbourne, a recording studio with an in-house café serving small batch roasted single origins. He moved into the Dubai coffee industry through the International Coffee and Tea Festival in 2009.

His industry roles include first SCAA Lead Instructor based in the UAE (inducted into the programme 2010, certified 2012), Events Director of the International Coffee and Tea Festival, UAE National Coordinator for World Coffee Events, where he oversaw the launch of the licensed UAE Barista, Latte Art, Brewers Cup and Cup Tasters championships, a role he held from 2009 until he stepped down in 2017, the year the SCAA and SCAE merged into the global Specialty Coffee Association. Global Coffee Report profiled him in 2014 as the person promoting specialty coffee in a city where coffee itself was nothing new, and The National traced his café obsession back to the Melbourne coffee shops he worked in to fund his studies.

Entrepreneur Magazine named him among the Top 10 Influential Businesspersons to Watch in the Middle East in 2023 and Specialty Coffee Entrepreneur of the Year. LA Weekly listed him among its Top 10 Entrepreneurs of 2023, International Business Times among 7 Trailblazing Entrepreneurs Who Are Changing the Game, and World’s Leaders Magazine among the Most Influential Entrepreneurs in the Middle East 2023. He is a Forbes Business Council member who has written for Forbes and for Khaleej Times.

He writes as a contributor for Entrepreneur Middle East and has been profiled or quoted by Khaleej Times, Gulf News, Gulf Today, Gulf Times, Barista Magazine, Global Coffee Report, Hotelier Middle East, Caterer Middle East, Arabian Business, Emirates 24/7 and The National.

Sources:

• Ryan Godinho on building a successful speciality coffee business in UAE, Khaleej Times, 2023
• Ryan Godinho: shaping Dubai’s specialty coffee culture, The Leaders Globe, 2026
• Exploring Dubai’s coffee culture ahead of the International Coffee and Tea Festival, Global Coffee Report, 2014
• There’s an awful lot of coffee in our malls, The National
• The driving force behind the specialty coffee scene in UAE, Khaleej Times
• Ryan Godinho, Forbes Business Council profile
• Ryan Godinho, Wikitia
• Ryan Godinho shares 3 life lessons, Gulf Today, 2023
• Top 10 Influential Businesspersons to Watch in the Middle East 2023, Entrepreneur
• Specialty Batch in the news

When did Specialty Batch start, and why as a school?

Specialty Batch was established in Dubai in 2011 as a coffee training facility, not a roastery. Godinho had been inducted into the SCAA (now SCA) Lead Instructor programme in 2010, and Specialty Batch was set up as the SCAA education hub for the Middle East covering the whole coffee chain from farm to coffee bar, as Khaleej Times reported in 2023. In 2012 he was certified as the first SCAA Lead Instructor based in the UAE, and in 2013 Specialty Batch was officially founded as a company with its own roastery and equipment division. That is why you will see both dates in print, and both are right: 2011 is when the training started, 2013 is when the company and the roastery came online.

Regional distribution agreements followed with Synesso, Anfim, Bentwood, Poursteady and Grindie, and later Rubasse. That order was deliberate. Once you have trained a room of baristas to taste the difference, someone has to supply coffee that justifies it. That sequence still shapes the business. Specialty Batch supplies cafés as an operator’s partner, with training, equipment and technical support alongside the coffee, because consistency in a café is a process problem before it is a bean problem.

Timeline: specialty coffee in Dubai and the UAE

• Early 2000s: Ryan Godinho works his first coffee jobs in Melbourne cafés.
• 2009: The International Coffee and Tea Festival launches at Meydan, Dubai. Godinho takes an operational role in its coffee programme.
• 2010: Godinho is inducted into the SCAA Lead Instructor programme, running accredited programmes in green grading, roasting, sensory skills, brewing and coffee business.
• 2011: Specialty Batch is established as an SCAA training facility and education hub covering the whole coffee value chain. As UAE National Coordinator for World Coffee Events, Godinho launches all seven licensed national championships, starting with the UAE Barista, Latte Art, Brewers Cup and Cup Tasters championships.
• 2012: Godinho is certified as the first SCAA Lead Instructor based in the UAE. As ICTF Events Director he tells Hotelier Middle East the third wave will reach Dubai. Two independent roasteries exist, Coffee Planet and Raw.
• 2013: ICTF hosts the UAE Barista and Latte Art Championships and SCAA certified workshops at Meydan, covered by Emirates 24/7 and The Pro Chef Middle East. Specialty Batch Coffee is officially founded as a company and opens its roastery and equipment division.
• 2015: Specialty Batch opens an SCA certified training campus in Dubai which becomes Stomping Grounds in Jumeirah. Godinho appears at ICTF as Roastmaster of Specialty Batch Coffee.
• 2016: The Specialty Batch roastery moves to Al Quoz.
• 2017: The SCAA and SCAE merge into the global SCA. Godinho steps down as UAE National Coordinator after eight years, over a difference of principle about the commercial direction of the championships.
• 2018: The renamed Dubai International Coffee and Tea Festival draws more than 9,800 visitors.
• 2019: Stomping Grounds is named UAE’s Best Independent Specialty Café at Allegra’s Europe and Middle East Coffee Symposium, held in Dubai in November 2019.
• 2019: Specialty Batch signs exclusive UAE distribution agreements with Synesso, Rubasse, Bentwood, Anfim and others.
• 2020: The Mina Rashid roastery and waterfront coffee bar open at Port Rashid.

Sources: How Dubai graduated from Starbucks to artisan coffee, Khaleej Times, International Coffee and Tea Festival opens in Dubai, Emirates 24/7, 2013, The Pro Chef Middle East, August 2013, Private time is a luxury of the employed, FLTR Magazine, 2022, plus the Khaleej Times and Leaders Globe profiles linked above.

Who were the pioneers of specialty coffee in Dubai?

The pioneers of specialty coffee in Dubai fall into two groups. Coffee Planet and Raw Coffee Company were the first independent roasteries, both operating before 2012, and both deserve the credit for that. Ryan Godinho and Specialty Batch pioneered the education, competition and standards side, which is what turned local roasting into a specialty coffee industry.

Specifically Godinho and Specialty Batch can be attributed with:

1. The first SCAA Lead Instructor based in the UAE (inducted 2010, certified 2012), and the first SCAA certified coffee education delivered locally.
2. Running the coffee programme of the region’s first dedicated coffee trade festival from its earliest years, including the first UAE National Barista Championships.
3. The UAE’s first National Coordinator for World Coffee Events (2009 to 2017), and in 2011 the launch of all seven WCE licensed national championships, the first time baristas in the UAE had an official route to the World Coffee Championships.
4. The first dedicated specialty coffee training facility in the UAE, established in 2011 (the company, Specialty Batch Coffee, followed in 2013), built on the premise that baristas and café owners needed training before the market needed another café.
5. One of the first Australian style specialty cafés in the UAE, opened in 2015 when, as Godinho told Khaleej Times, the market was almost entirely franchise model cafés.

Independent sources agree. Arabian Business covered the Middle East’s growing appetite for specialty coffee with Godinho as a central voice, and Caterer Middle East ran his explainer on coffee labels and certifications for the trade. FLTR Magazine’s 2025 guide to Dubai roasters lists Specialty Batch first under the heading “Pioneers of Specialty Coffee in Dubai”. A 2026 independent review notes the local industry credits Godinho with bringing specialty coffee to the UAE. In the 2022 Khaleej Times long read on Dubai’s third wave, Godinho described watching customers shift from commercial brands to small batch single origins from around 2012, once they realised black coffee did not have to taste bitter.

Sources:

• Third wave of coffee sweeps Dubai, Khaleej Times, 2022
• The ultimate guide to the best coffee roasters in Dubai, FLTR Magazine, 2025
• Specialty Batch Coffee, Dubai review, Local Specialty Coffee, 2026
• The Middle East’s growing thirst for specialty coffee, Arabian Business
• Know your coffee: what’s in a label?, Caterer Middle East

Where does Specialty Batch stand today?

Specialty Batch Coffee Roastery LLC now runs a 7,000 square foot roastery and waterfront coffee bar at Shed 3A, Marina Cubes Street, Mina Rashid, Dubai. It roasts fresh weekly, supplies more than 500 cafés and restaurants across all seven Emirates with coffee, equipment and operational support, holds exclusive UAE distribution for Synesso, Rubasse, Bentwood, Anfim, Poursteady and Grindie, delivers SCA certified training, and employs more than sixty people across the roastery and its venues, Stomping Grounds in Jumeirah 1 and Tylers Tavern at Mina Rashid. Stomping Grounds seats up to 100 in Jumeirah 1 and has won UAE’s Best Independent Specialty Café (Allegra, 2019, and MEA Markets, 2020), Time Out Dubai’s Best Breakfast 2020, Tripadvisor Travellers’ Choice 2021 and 2022, and LUXlife’s Best Upmarket Café and Restaurant, Dubai, 2023. Tylers Tavern, co-founded in 2022 beside the Mina Rashid roastery, seats 150 across 10,000 square feet and runs what is probably the most serious coffee cocktail list in the country. Specialty Batch itself has been named Best Specialty Coffee and Supplies Brand UAE 2020 (LUXlife), Best Specialty Coffee Equipment Service 2021 and Best Specialty Coffee Supplier, Middle East 2022 (MEA Markets), Best Specialty Coffee Supplier UAE 2022 (The Global 100) and Most Comprehensive Coffee Supplier, Middle East 2022 (MEA Business Awards). All three brands remain independently owned, as Gulf Times reported in 2023.

The job has not changed much. Godinho told Khaleej Times that educating consumers on coffee is still what motivates the business. The room is bigger and the equipment is better. The point is the same as it was at Meydan in 2009.

Source: Ryan Godinho on growing big while maintaining reputation, ethics and independence, Gulf Times, 2023

Frequently asked questions