If you were worried that expanding into K-cups and the one-cup coffee market would hurt Starbucks, worry no more. According to a press release by Starbucks, after two months they have shipped over 100 Million kcups. Jeff Hansbury, president Channel Development for Starbucks said “Our [Starbucks] focus with the initial launch has been on Keurig Single Cup Brewer owners. Our next big opportunity will be to attract new customers to the category. We are confident the combination of the Starbucks Experience with the quality and value of Starbucks Coffee K-Cup Packs will ultimately make this a billion-dollar business over time.” In the fall of 2012, Starbucks will begin selling k cup single-cup portion packs in their retail stores.

Currently, Starbucks offers seven k-cup single-cup packs to customers: French Roast, Pike Place Roast, House Blend, Breakfast Blend, Sumatra, Caffé Verona, and Veranda Blend. The Veranda Blend k-cup is the only light roast Starbucks kcup available, while the Pike Place Rost, Breakfast Blend, and House Blend are all medium roast k cups; the French Roast, Sumatra, and Caffé Verona are all dark roast kcups. The Starbucks k-cups are currently available at food, drug, and retail stores nationwide as well as online at www.keurig.com.

Keurig and Nespresso — the two leaders in the one-cup coffee industry — have different approaches to meeting the needs of their customers. Because single-serve coffee requires the coffee beans to be be ground and packaged before distribution, both Keurig and Nespresso are unable to give customers as many options for flavors and roasts as traditionally packaged coffee. To solve this, Keurig partnered with Green Mountain Coffee Roasters to produce k-cups for roasts from a variety of different roasters throughout the United States and Canada. They continue to enter into licensing and distribution agreements with roasters to get even more options into the kcups for their customers. Currently, Keurig and Green Mountian Coffee Roasters offer over 200 different flavors and roasts from many different leading coffee brands.

Nespresso has a more limited selection: there are only sixteen different Grands Crus capsules available. Instead of working with other roasters, Nespresso one-cup coffee works closely with their farmers and buyers to select the beans and roasts for the Nespresso capsules. This farm-to-cup system enables Nespresso to produce single-sourced Nespresso capsules in addition to their blends.

With the New Year comes new resolutions, and a common resolution is to recycle and reuse products more. This is also a common question we get on this blog. An article in the Los Angeles Times gives a solid overview of the state of recycling in the one-cup coffee industry. Unfortunately, there’s no new developments in this department. Currently, the Keurig k-cups are not easily recycled because the k cups are made from three different materials; however, Nespresso has a program where customers can drop used Nespresso capsules off at Nespresso stores and boutiques.

For other tips on recycling and reusing single-cup coffee serving capsules like kcups, youtube users like Madrosed have posted instructional videos on how to use a single k-cup multiple times. But the video is a little dated because  Starbucks k-cups are now available.

Fans of both the Keurig single-cup coffee brewing system and Starbucks Coffee can celebrate this new year because Starbucks k-cups are now available online. The k cups are available at starbucks.com for $19.95 per 24-count kcup box and at keurig.com for $22.49 per 24-count k-cup box (20.24 for club members). You may also be able to buy the Starbucks kcups online at Amazon and the websites of big-box retailers like Wal-Mart and Bed, Bath, and Beyond.

Starbucks and Keurig are offering five different roasts in k cups: Pike Place, Sumatra, House Blend, Breakfast Blend, Caffé Verona, and French Roast. Unfortunately, Tazo Tea fans have to wait until Fall 2012 for the Awake and Zen blends k-cups to be available online by Keurig or Starbucks; however, those Tazo Tea kcups are sold at grocery and big-box stores.

November 29th, 2011

Recently Green Mountain Coffee Roasters — parent company of the Keurig one-cup brewing system — released their fourth quarter and fiscal year numbers, and these numbers show the increasing popularity of the Keurig single-cup coffee maker and Keurig k-cups.  In 2011, Green Mountain Coffee saw an increase of 104% in kcup sales (76% of this due to an increase in sales volume and 18% attributed to the rising cost of coffee and k cups), and an increase of 59% in the sales of Keurig brewers and accessories. We keep you updated as we hear more about the 2011 sales of the Nespresso, Tassimo, Flavia, and Senseo systems.

November 3rd, 2011

Mr. Coffee K-Cup Brewer

Mr. Coffee and Green Mountain Coffee have reached an agreement to expand Mr. Coffee’s line of k-cup compatible, single-serve coffee brewers. Currently, Mr. Coffee manufactures the KG-1 one-cup coffee brewer. The water reservoir on the KG-1 holds enough water to brew one k cup at a time; the new agreement allows Mr. Coffee to manufacture single cup kcup brewers with a water reservoir large enough to brew multiple k-cup servings before needing to be refilled. Neither company has released further details about these new Mr. Coffee one cup brewers, and release dates are unknown. We’ll keep you posted. For more information about the Mr. Coffee KG-1 or other non-Keurig companies licensed to manufacture k cup compatible single-serve coffee brewers, please take a look at the Keurig Brewers section of quick-cupcoffee.com.

November 2nd, 2011

Green Mountain Coffee Roasters, Keurig’s parent company, is expanding it’s roasting and packing facility in Essex, VT and is building a new roasting and packaging facility in Virginia. These two new facilities should help Green Mountain Coffee keep up with rising demand for k-cups — the one-cup coffee plastic cups designed for use with the Keurig single-cup brewing system. Green Mountain Coffee claims that over 2.5 million cups of coffee are brewed daily in homes and offices throughout the United States and Canada using Green Mountain’s k cup one cup system. The new facilities are being built to help meet projected demand as the Keurig system increases in popularity.

For all you Keurig one cup brewer fans looking for an easy way to create lattes at home with your k-cup coffees and hot chocolates, consider a Keurig Frother. In the 90 seconds, this cordless frother steams and froths up to 8.5 ounces of milk (including skim milk), enabling you to make multiple café-style coffee drinks. Check out Keurig’s website to find various recipes (click on the books on the counter) for drinks you can make using the Keurig single cup coffee brewer, kcups, and the Keurig Frother. The Frother is available directly from Keurig, Green Mountain Coffee, Amazon, and other online retailers. If you have any recipes of your own, please leave them in the comments.

Fair Trade USA, the largest certifier of Fair Trade products in the United States, has declared October Fair Trade Month. Use their website and app to identify stores and events in your neighborhood that promote Fair Trade products. In related news, Fair Trade USA recently announced that Green Mountain Coffee Roasters was the largest purchaser of Fair Trade Certified™ coffee in the world. In honor of Fair Trade Month, Green Mountain Coffee has set up a facebook page that provides customers with more details. Green Mountain Coffee also offers 20 different roasts of Fair Trade Certified™ coffee in k-cups for those of you who enjoy the Keurig one-cup coffee system.