STiR coffee and tea magazine

40 STiR coffee and tea / Issue 6, 2018 (December / January 2019) I Sudden Coffee was initially created from hand-pulled shots of arabica dehydrated in a vacuum. The coffee was then freeze-dried in small batches. Fans pay $120 for a 48-cup box or $40 a month for 16 doses pack- aged in recyclable tubes. Cost per dose: $2.50. Superior Solubles nstant coffee is produced at industrial scale. Millions of pounds of green coffee are continuously loaded into massive tangential roasters with a capacity of 11,000 pounds per hour. The coffee is then brewed in vats holding thousands of gallons and dehydrated. Since its invention in 1890 ever-more-sophisticated technology is applied to reduce energy and expand production capacity with occasional breakthroughs that improve taste. The basic business model depends on capital-intensive production that requires large quantities to keep prices low so that volume sales stimulate de- mand. Everything is predicated on a shared goal: a $0.10 to $0.25 dose (sold in multi-dose packets, often with creamer and sugar). Those little doses add up. The global market for instant coffee is ap- proaching $30 billion. Convenience points the way A few years ago some convenience-obsessed premium coffee roasters pro- posed an alternative and somewhat audacious business objective: the $4 to $6 dose. Mixing soluble coffee, typically freeze-dried crystals, with roasted ara- bica that is micro-ground to speed infusion, reversed a long downward trend. Starbucks VIA Ready Brew awakened consumer interest, reaching $100 million in sales in 2010 within 10 months of its launch. VIA quickly achieved 30% share of the US market and remains a top seller, now available in seven varieties (including three flavored coffees). It is priced $1.20 to $1.25 for a 3.3-gram dose ($7 to $7.50 per box). Last year Nescafé Malaysia 3-in-1 instant coffee sticks were the best-selling instant coffee on Amazon. But Nestlé and Starbucks enjoy tremendous advantages. Starbucks serves 100 million coffee drinkers a week, generated a record $6.3 billion in revenue in the latest quarter, and operates 28,000 outlets. It was nonetheless hesitant to introduce VIA precisely because it tasted very much like its barista pre- pared brew. The concern was that VIA, on sale at the front counter, would cannibalize sales of brewed coffee. A year later, after surveying its customers, Starbucks found that 55% pur- chased VIA Ready Brew to drink at home; 25% bought it to drink at work and 20% on the go. Nearly 40% of those surveyed said VIA was added to the beverages they are currently drinking, rather than a replacement to existing products. This discovery led a number of roasters to exploit a specialty coffee niche previously ignored – specialty, single-origin and even farm-level direct trade drinkers with no interest in caramel, peppermint, or similarly flavored coffee used in the past to conceal flaws. Brands including Intelligensia Cof- fee & Tea, Sudden Coffee, Stoked Coffee, Alpine Start, Joe Coffee Co., Swift By Dan Bolton Cup Coffee, and Viola believed that once recon- stituted their 8 oz. instants will stand their ground against a comparably sourced ground roast. Batch quality at scale Proprietary freeze-drying at scale is costly. Drying times run to 30 hours. Sourcing superior beans is incremental and custom roasts are labor-intensive but retaining the great taste of freshly roasted cof- fee requires a bit of magic. The key is to keep tem- peratures low (in a near vacuum) and devise meth- ods to capture aromatic compounds that are later reintroduced during final processing. Sublimation requires temperatures as low as minus 80 degrees Fahrenheit (-62 0 C). San Francisco-based Sud- den Coffee packages its crystals in easily recycled three-inch glass tubes. Intelligensia relies on Sud- den's skills which offers the advantage of selling Intelligensia's signature coffee to those who prefer instant. A four-pack sells for $13. Viola Coffee was funded on Kickstarter, re- ceiving $27,000 from donors. Founder Kent Sher- idan describes the coffee as pre-extracted in solu- ble form. The recommended temp is 155ºF/68ºC but these coffees brew equally well in hot, warm, or cold water. Like Sudden, Viola currently part-

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