Coffee for One

by KJ Fallon

  Intelligentsia follows the coffee process every step of the way, from the very start to the coffee shop. Atkinson’s main focus at Intelligentsia is retail in new markets but he is also a green coffee buyer for the company, so he does green coffee buying in El Salvador and so on. Intelligentsia’s green coffee buying is set up so that no one person is a full-time coffee buyer but rather they pull people from different parts of the company to focus on one country, build relationships within that country, and then bring that coffee along its journey into their respective department.6

  It is a lot about building and maintaining relationships, and Intelligentsia then selects the best lots of coffee from these relationships. “For example,” Atkinson said, “when I start working with a coffee farmer, I’m down in El Salvador during the harvest process and you know we’re there watching the harvest, working with the farmers, kind of understanding. All right, well, what were your difficulties this year? What are you hoping for this year? What are your goals and ideas? Okay, here are my goals and ideas. Let’s collaborate together. Let’s work together so that we can together create this really awesome product and kind of hold each other accountable and support each other in creating successful goals.”

  Intelligentsia at one time acted as its own importer. “We still coordinate all of our own international logistics,” Atkinson said, “though at this time we do contract some logistics companies third party to handle the heavy lifting, but we are in constant communication with everybody who has our coffee at every single point and helping guide it along the process until it shows up here. So we really are there when the coffee’s in its fruit and we guide it all the way to our retail stores.”

  Atkinson thinks that one of the things in the coffee business that has changed quite a bit is that there are a lot more resources, especially, he said, when you start looking at the past decade or so and the small businesses that have started. It has become very, very popular to be an entrepreneur, creating your own business, and using technology to do so. “Coffee as far as the purchasing side, has really kept up with that,” he added. “You know, there [are] all sorts of resources that are available to make buying great coffee easier.”

  Atkinson thinks that there is also a risk with all of the technology and information people have at their disposal. For instance, he said, “I can go onto Coffee Shrub (a micro-seller of coffee that serves shops that roast) or Sweet Maria’s (Sweet Maria’s Home Coffee-Roasting) and I can say, ‘Oh. I want that lot, that lot, that lot.’ I know exactly where they’re coming from. I can go down to the farm and take some pictures almost like kind of ecotourism and I can call it direct trade.”

  Before, much of the risk with coffee was on the buyers choosing the best coffees. Now, according to Atkinson, a lot of the risk is on the farmers because they are dealing with smaller companies, and sometimes the farmers have no real guarantee that anyone’s going to buy anything.

  “There has been a shift in large-scale operations where farmers kind of know that they have an outlet for their coffee to the small-scale operations where it’s a little bit more up in the air,” Atkinson said. Adding to that is the constant reduction of crop yields and “the fact that every year it gets a little bit harder to actually grow coffee, especially quality coffee . . . and we need to start sharing some of this responsibility.”

  Do you like your coffee cold but you’re not too thrilled by the usual selections of ready-made coffees in bottles and cans? Not overly fond of the mountains of ice that are dumped into a cup to make your request for an iced whatever? A solution exists, my friend. La Colombe Coffee Roasters is offering Draft Latte, a brainchild of CEO and Travel Channel coffee explorer Todd Carmichael, a canned latte with a twist born out of the cold lattes on tap that his stores are known for.7 The secret is in the valve and the gas. A tiny hole covered by a plastic seal is on the bottom of the can. Using a patent-pending process, when the can is opened a rush of foam rises to the top. The result is a cold, café-style latte.

  Cold coffee in a can is part of reason for coffee’s global growth.8 According to Jonny Forsyth, Global Drinks analyst at Mintel, a market intelligence firm:

  The global coffee industry continues to experience healthy growth, driven by Asian markets in particular. Asia has far more growth potential as traditionally tea drinking consumers are converted slowly but surely into coffee drinkers . . . In terms of local tastes, currently Asia Pacific leads the way in launches of ready-to-drink cold coffee. In 2016, 29% of all coffee launches in Asia Pacific were ready-to-drink cold coffee products, compared to just 10% in Europe . . .9

  But you want your coffee quick and you want it hot. If you want another way make a cup of hot coffee, there is always the throwback to instant coffee. Instant coffee, however, with a bit more panache. Starbucks VIA offers single serve using a different method. Ready-brewed instant coffee? Is it instant or brewed? Or both? Does it have more in common with single-serve brew cups or with Maxwell House coffee singles? Starbucks VIA, introduced in 2009, seemed to eliminate any lingering “stigma” of instant coffee. In fact, instant coffee has become quite popular throughout the world.10

  According to Euromonitor International, the world’s leading independent provider of strategic market research, instant coffee is very popular in some areas. Global Trends in Instant Coffee, a report by Matthew Barry and Virginia Lee, reports that instant coffee, as of 2015, is a $28 billion industry and has risen 7 percent from 2010 to 2015, and is the second largest category of hot drinks (after fresh coffee, of course).11 As for who is drinking instant coffee, their research shows that Asia seems to be leading the way, with Iran second. This follows a natural pattern. According to the report, specialty coffee shops created a coffee culture in traditional tea-imbibing markets. The report stated instant coffee can grow at the same time as single-serve coffee pods grow in these areas. As more instant coffee becomes more inspired by specialty coffees, this type of coffee will continue to be a popular option. In the United Kingdom, instant coffee is the most popular way to consume coffee, the report concluded, but instant will be surpassed by fresh brewed in that area by 2020. China remains an untapped market full of possibilities.

  According to Jonny Forsyth, Global Drinks Analyst at Mintel,

  “Instant coffee still dominates the retail market in Asia. Two in five (42%) coffee launches in Asia Pacific were soluble coffee granule products, compared to just one in five (20%) launches in Europe and a mere 6% of launches in North America in 2016.”12 Coffee pods, though, are not sitting out the race. Forsyth said:

  Globally, it is coffee pods which are causing the biggest stir. Pods accounted for over one quarter (26%) of all global coffee retail innovation in 2016, up from 11% of launches in 2011. Although still in its early stages in Asia Pacific, pod innovation is still showing strong signs of growth in this region. Around one in eight (13%) coffee products launched in 2016 was a coffee pod, up from 4% of launches in this region in 2011.13

  CHAPTER 14

  What’s Next for Coffee for One?

  Ensuring Quality Control

  Nothing stays the same and this is certainly true of how coffee drinkers brew their coffee and the form that coffee can take. Ensuring that the quality of single-serve coffee continues to improve is something that Coffee Enterprises’ Spencer Turer knows about firsthand. “I think over the years we’ve probably tested dozens of brands in the single-serve category,” he said. He referred to a project that Coffee Enterprises did for the National Coffee Association. They tested a 100 percent Colombian product in every single-cup brewer that was on the market at that time, doing a compare and contrast. Every month, Turer commented, there are new products coming online. There are numerous roasters getting into Nespresso-type pods and Coffee Enterprises has been doing a lot of testing for products in that platform. “I would be surprised if there’s any respected brand or respected coffee brewing platform that we have not tested in the past,” he said.

  As for different uses that could be in the fu
ture for single serve, Turer said they are under confidentially agreements, but he can say that advancements are being made in brewing technology on the single-cup platform. “There [are] new developments in different types of brewers,” he added, “and there’s also a lot of interest in the single cup for high quality tea as well as cold brew products and trying to figure out how to capture the iced coffee, cold brew coffee trends, into consumer appliances and single cup machines.”

  An Unexpected Side of Single-Portion Coffee

  Just because something is a bit unusual or unfamiliar doesn’t mean that someday it won’t be a part of everyday life. Remember all the gadgets that seemed preposterous in any number of movies about the future? For example, enough of the then-futuristic devices seen in Back to the Future are now in use that we should keep an open mind about ideas or breakthrough products that might seem too wacky at the moment.1 Sometimes the outlandish prototype evolves into something more manageable, like how designers view what they show in fashion shows as being more directional than what will actually be worn.2 Sometimes, a translation is involved. There are, of course, always exceptions. Here is a look at some coffee- centric products in various stages. How about chewable coffee? Not those dry, chalky coffee tablets. The Mintel 2017 Trends Report said: “For those who are extremely short of time in the morning, Go Cubes are gummy coffee bites made with real cold-brew coffee.”3 As the chewable coffee option’s website says, “GO CUBES are the future of coffee. GO CUBES combine the kick of coffee with the relaxation of green tea. And instead of putting your coffee in a cup, you can put it in your pocket, for performance on the go.”

  Each single GO CUBE has a half a cup of coffee (50 mg caffeine) and nootropics, so you know how much caffeine you are getting. Each pack comes with an assortment of three flavors: Mocha, Pure Drip, and Latte.4, 5

  How many GO CUBES should you eat at a time? The site recommends going by how many cups of coffee you usually drink at a time, and over time. The caffeine charge from a serving should last between four and five hours.

  For another take on coffee as a beverage, there is Cafe from Soylent™ (Yes, like the portmanteau word—from soy and lentil—that appears in Harry Harrison’s Make Room! Make Room! But Soylent Green, the film adapted from that novel, has a more sinister definition of the concoction).

  This Soylent is a food technology pioneer that produces “convenient, complete foods designed to provide maximum nutrition with minimal effort.”6 In the case of Soylent Cafe, you can have your breakfast and drink your coffee, too, all at once—in one bottle. Their Cafe Coffiest and Cafe Vanilla, for example, contain real, lightly roasted coffee, according to their website.

  A new venture by the name of Goat Story has designed a smart coffee brewer that combines traditional coffee brewing methods with the newest technology. The Gina has a built-in smart scale that ends the impreciseness of getting just the right amount of ingredients. This coffeemaker is connected to a mobile app. It tracks your brewing data and pilots you through the brewing routine. When you have finished, you can save your brew recipe and share it with your friends and family and other coffee lovers.

  With Gina, you can choose from three different brewing methods—pour over, immersion, or cold drip. All you have to do is point the control to the correct amount of water flow. They also have an unusual-looking vessel, shaped like a goat horn, for carrying around and drinking your coffee. The company’s website says this is in honor of the goat that discovered coffee.7

  Here is a bit of an unexpected coffee-centric product from the United Kingdom, courtesy of the 2017 Trends Report, the Barisieur. Try to envision this. It is an alarm clock, yes. But it is an alarm clock designed to wake up the sleeping individual with the soothing sound of boiling water and the invigorating aroma of coffee (or tea, if you swing that way). The product is still in the design stage but it seems like it could definitely be an option for those who want to open their eyes and other senses along with the much-needed preparation of coffee. Everything would, of course, have to be prepared the night before, but that is not so difficult. There is a place for the beaker of water and siphon, the coffee cup, and the coffee-filled filter, all atop a timepiece that looks something like a clock radio from the 1970s.8, 9 Sounds like a very pleasant way to wake up. As long as you don’t absentmindedly try to hit a snooze button. Ouch!

  As if automated coffee brewers weren’t enough, there have recently been several stories about Robot Baristas. There they were in January 2017 at the Consumer Electronics Show, a Bosch cappuccino robot and a Denso coffee robot rivaling at a battle of the barista robots to see which could make the best coffee drinks. They did rather well. These do not seem to be electronics show gimmicks. San Francisco has a Robotic Café, Café X, which was started after the now CEO realized that much of the work that baristas do could be done by a robot.10 It all seems to be working.11

  Reconciling Single Serve with Brewing by the Pot

  But back to the human way of brewing coffee. There seems to be a place for many brewing methods. After all, who has the luxury of a completely controlled or set-in-stone day or night? Sometimes we need and/or want one option for brewing coffee, and other times we need or want another method. Sometimes you feel like a single serve, sometimes you feel like a pot. Sometimes you want a quick fix and other times you want to be immersed in a more complex preparation.

  For coffee drinkers who want a brewer that gives them more of a choice about not only what constitutes single serve, but also adjusts to the way they want to make coffee on any given day and in how large a quantity at a time, there are different types of brewers, from lower tech to ultra tech. Some brewers are giving coffee lovers the option of what method to use to brew a cup of coffee. Or a pot of coffee. From the same machine.

  Spinn and BUNN coffeemakers offer a choice of brewing methods, serving coffee pods or ground coffee. These are two very different types of brewers, even just considering price point.12

  BUNN’s Single Cup My Café brewer takes single pods of various forms, yet it also allows the coffee lover to use ground coffee.13 The brewer comes with separate drawers that work with either ground coffee, pod, or plain hot water for any other type of beverage, such as tea.

  Spinn, which invites you to “Elevate Your Coffee,” is a bit more complicated. And, according to their website, a lot more rewarding. The brewer grinds the beans, makes a pot of coffee, a single cup, or an espresso, and uses Wi-Fi so the coffee drinker can control everything with their phone. According to their site, Spinn has connected features and a worldwide network of coffee roasters. The proprietary app allows users to precisely control every aspect of the brewing process or they can allow Spinn to handle the details with preprogrammed recipes and brewing methods recommended by professional roasters and baristas around the world.

  When it comes to coffee, some folks like to make a pot of coffee because there is the potential for more people to enjoy it and it is available if someone else stops by. That same person will have a single-serve brewer and can honestly tell guests when one asks for regular coffee, and another has to have decaf, and still another can drink only tea, that it is no problem—they can have any of these selections and it is no bother.

  As long as the people behind the single-serve method keep working toward a balance with the environmental issues, and everyone makes the conscious decision to choose fair trade, direct trade, and any other means of providing fairness to the coffee producers as well as the environment, choosing how we brew our coffee can safely and simply be a matter of personal preference.

  The National Coffee Association’s 2017 Coffee Drinking Trends report indicates that the coffee market is responding to the needs of a new generation and the impact of advancements in technology and coffee brewing. Keep finding new ways to brew and enjoy coffee. Life happens, as the adage goes, but coffee helps.

  Tom Squitieri is an award-winning foreign correspondent, educator, father, poet, and star gazer who has enjoyed, brewed, been fueled by, and deligh
ted many with coffee on all seven continents.

  “One of the favorite stories I wrote from the Bosnian war was when the coffee houses of Sarajevo started coming back to life,” he said. “Then the people knew the war was over.” As one person told him:

  Coffee without fear is the best in the world.

  Acknowledgments

  This book was a long time brewing and there are a lot of people to thank, starting with Skyhorse Publishing and my editor Caroline Russomanno. Thank you to E. R. Fallon for being an inimitable first reader and offering insightful suggestions.

  People who may have been in the background but whose help proved invaluable, who helped either gather statistics or put me in touch with people to interview: Kate Kaplan, executive director at Oakland Coffee Works; Marissa Bosler, communications executive at Euromonitor; Jim Zelinski at Zelinski PR; Tara Smith, director of marketing, and Heather Ward, market research manager at the Specialty Coffee Association; Joe DeRupo, External Relations & Communications director of the National Coffee Association; Katharine Olsen, account executive at Weber Shandwick; Kate Buerba at Laughing Man Coffee; Kevin Gaydosh at Obrien Et Al. Advertising; Karen Noonan, Global Corporate Affairs manager for Mars Drinks; Jennifer Traegar at Traeger Communications; Nicole Myers at Soylent; Brian Kubicki at Massimo Zanetti Beverage; and Stefan Kanfer for his helpful feedback.