K-Cup creator John Sylvan regrets inventing Keurig coffee pod system (2015)

I&#x27;m not surprised by their popularity.<p>I&#x27;m going to set aside coffee <i>quality</i> for a second - because the truth is, the average consumer doesn&#x27;t seem to care about this beyond a certain threshold, which judging by the popularity of these Keurig and Keurig-like products, the options clearly meet - and I want to focus on what it delivers.<p>What it delivers is <i>consistency</i>. You put a pod in, fill up the water as needed, and press a button. Rinse and repeat, and you always get the same specified amount of coffee. Its precision consistent. No making a big pot of coffee only to waste it.<p>Not to mention, its simple to clean up. Just throw the pod away. No grounds, no coffee filters, just pop the pod, and on to the next one.<p>As far as convenience goes, it hits all the notes.<p>It may not for <i>you</i>, of course, but the average consumer is still buying these systems and its only growing.<p>Given how cheap it is to make these systems, I&#x27;m really not shocked it went to the consumer relatively quickly and didn&#x27;t settle as an office only thing.<p>Now, they are an environmental catstrophe, that is true, and thats a great reason to transition away from these systems

I did some research recently on K-cups vs Nespresso pods. One thing I found was that none of the official Keurig machines heat water to the optimal temperature for brewing coffee (around 195-205 F).<p>There are a few third party brewers that will hit that level, but I’m very curious why Keurig itself doesn’t offer one. Maybe safety&#x2F;liability?<p>Also, whereas every Nespresso machine brews the pods basically the same, the Keurig machines vary widely in terms of brewing temperature, so you have to be careful which one you buy.<p>Honestly, I started biased towards Keurig but came away with the conclusion that, if you really want capsule coffee, the only reasonable choice is Nespresso. The original Nespresso pods are an open ecosystem with third party pods so that would be my recommendation.

I just wish we never would have stigmatized instant-coffee.<p>I drink a pot of coffee a day from my Moccamaster, but when I&#x27;m travelling I would much rather have instant coffee than use one of those flavorless, stale pods.<p>Instant coffee stores better and is better for the environment. Snobs let the perfect be the enemy of the good.

Yeah I don&#x27;t get it, I have used a pour over for like my entire adult life. Can do a single cup or pot. Takes a few minutes to grind the beans and heat the water.<p>The only way this sort of stuff stops if you hit all plastic production with a hefty tax to reflect the actual true total-cost-of-ownership including recycling and the inevitable failure to recycle.. The externality cost is near infinite - once it hits the ecosystem it isn&#x27;t really possible to remove and causes long term health impact to all future civilization but I&#x27;d settle for like 10xing the price..

[2015]

Is it crazy to think that there should be some kind of governmental review process for _new_ products that generate tons of plastic waste? I&#x27;m imagining a consumer product version of the FDA. They&#x27;d look at something like Keurig and argue that maybe home and office coffee production is solved problem and maybe we don&#x27;t need this new &quot;innovation.&quot;<p>I understand that people have strong feelings about government in general so maybe some other process?

Why is the popularity baffling? Nespresso had already been around for over a decade, and at the time the Keurig came to be, was making inroads to the consumer space. Granted this wasn&#x27;t in the US market, but still there was precedent for a similar concept gaining consumer traction.<p>Also the article does a massive disservice to Sylvan, making it sound like he was an employee. He was primary founder of Keurig that divested shortly before it went to market.

No doubt these are an environmental abomination, however there are a growing number of recycling services. In the UK&#x2F;Europe at least they can be collected at the same time as your kerbside recycling. The scheme is paid for by the coffee manufacturers themselves.

I enjoy good coffee and don&#x27;t mind to occasionally use a proper coffee machine at the office, but at home K-Cups are perfect for me in terms of convenience-to-quality.<p>Bought $7 reusable pods on Amazon which make it slightly less convenient but environmental friendly and cheaper

Bad coffee, terrible for the environment. The title should have the (8 year old) publishing year appended.

An alternative is teaching people how to make simple chains of byproducts. Maybe even incentivizing doing so.<p>I make a shot of Ristretto every morning from fresh beans in a hopper that&#x27;s sealed by double layer gaskets. From that I get pucks of coffee grinds which I feed to my worms. 3 months layer with some nitrogen sources I get fresh compost for my plants. I have some ornamental plants, but the ones in my greenhouse grow things like tomatoes, lemons, basil, thyme, etc... To be frank, you don&#x27;t even need a greenhouse for most of these; adding light and water to counter top plants will often do.

He can&#x27;t understand explain their popularity.<p>He then immediately goes on to entirely understand and then explain their popularity.<p>&quot;Sylvan said he thought the product might have some limited appeal to people who would normally go Starbucks, Dunkin Donuts or other coffee chains in the morning, because now they could get a cup of coffee at work that was cheaper, faster, and no fuss.&quot;<p>Yea.. you _nailed_ it. So, what&#x27;s the problem? Oh:<p>&quot;As the man who invented them, Sylvan might have been pleased with their popularity. But he left the company in 1997, selling his ownership of the product for $50,000.&quot;<p>Ah.. this isn&#x27;t so much a &quot;lack of understanding&quot; as it is a defense mechanism against sour grapes.<p>Then they both go on to wring their hands over this &quot;unsolvable&quot; issue. Meanwhile, reusable K-Cup pods exist, work just fine, and entirely eliminate the &quot;problem&quot; here.<p>This article isn&#x27;t designed to inform, it&#x27;s designed to fruitlessly whine.