Disruptive Innovation: Anticipating Effects of the Single Serve Coffee Market

scaa.org

1 point

deveac

14 years ago

A great article talking about the increased tension between quality and convenience that the single serve market is introducing, and the potential inevitability of single serve erasing the divide between the two.<p>The closest I come to being religious is in how I go about selecting what coffee I brew and how I go about brewing it (locally roasted, fresh ground beans in a french press). I often spend the night at my brother's place when we are heading out for a long-weekend bike trip, and am perpetually <i>fascinated</i> by the convenience of his Keurig (http://www.keurig.com/brewers/special-edition-brewing-system) and inescapable draw that convenience affects on me.<p>As somebody who is downright unreasonable when it comes to skimping on quality coffee, I think the author nails it when he highlights the threat that increasing quality of K-cups pose to cafes selling single cups. A fundamental truth when it comes to brewing coffee is that to get the best cup, you have to grind your beans directly before you brew. This is unassailable, right? But what happens if K-cups whittle down the difference in quality between their method and fresh ground in blind taste tests? Should the perpetuity of this quality gap be dismissed?<p>The mass market is the mass market, but I wonder how many pro-sumers of coffee K-cups could one day lure away, despite their resistance on quality grounds.