Hoping to take a bigger bite out of Europe's $8 billion single-serve coffee market, Mondelez, the No. 2 coffee maker, will start producing coffee pods compatible with its rival Nestle's Nespresso machine.

This isn't the first time that rival brands have tried to collect some profit off of Nespresso's single-serve brewer, which requires special, premium-priced pods. Nestle has filed patent-infringement suits against several companies for producing the copycat pods, but hasn’t had much success in stopping distribution. In fact, in some markets, Nespresso-branded pods have lost 10 to 20 percent of market share due to more competitively priced alternatives, Bloomberg reports.

The issue lies within Nespresso's distribution model, which still relies on a direct-to-consumer format, leaving grocery store shelves vacant for competitors' offerings. While the system has seen sustained success in Europe, Nespresso is looking to expand further into the US, where single-serve competition is even more intense.Continue reading...

Green Mountain Coffee is in a pot of trouble. And that's even before Starbucks introduces Verismo, its own single-serve brewing system for consumers that's rolling out in October (and already available on Verismo.com), to challenge the iconic K-Cup system by Green Mountain that features its Keurig pods. 

The brand has been a darling of consumers for several years, on a continued growth tear as K-Cups led a revolution in how Americans consume much of their coffee by making the single-serve system de rigeur in homes and offices. The company fed strong double-digit sales growth by continuing to proliferate the types of pods, to include "iced" drinks and juices as well as coffees and teas.

Green Mountain also had been a darling of investors seeking to cash in on a boom that, for the six years after the Vermont-based company acquired Keurig, managed to thrive without attracting the competitive interest of Starbucks.Continue reading...

Talk about vertical integration! Starbucks is taking the concept to new heights — er, depths — with its announcement of the imminent introduction of its own machine to make single cups of coffee.

The product, named Verismo, will be launched soon and sold at some Starbucks stores as well as specialty retail locations right away and then more heavily marketed and sold in the fall. The machine was developed with Krueger, a German-based company, and it "combines Starbucks signature Espresso Roast and drink recipes with precise Swiss engineering and a patent-pending high pressure extraction capability," Starbucks said in a press release.

The move is yet another bid by Starbucks to broaden and deepen its franchise over the last couple of years. The company also today, in Amsterdam, was scheduled to open its first "concept shop" laboratory meant to imbue its retail outlets with more "local flavor." Inspired by concept stores in its hometown of Seattle, the new Amsterdam store features in-house-baked cookies, for instance, and will test other ideas. It's housed in an old bank vault in the city's historic Rembrandt square.Continue reading...

Single serving coffee brand Tassimo is taking a page from the Old Spice Guy's well-thumbed viral playbook with its 2011 Mother's Day promotion.

In a series of YouTube videos, Tassimo singers reply with personal Mother's Day messages for consumers. The videos address Julie, Jennifer, Elizabeth and other moms whose digi-kids get a kick out of this kind of thing.Continue reading...

Starbucks wants to KO the K-cup.

Only six weeks after its vigorous launch of Via instant coffee, Starbucks has announced a new at-home brewing option in partnership with Bosch and the Tassimo beverage machine: T-Discs, available online starting today and in stores Dec. 1, adding two flavors: Starbucks Latte Primo and Starbucks Cappuccino Primo. The T-Discs have been available in Europe since March.

Starbucks promises consumers the same level of quality as the in-store experience, thanks to the Tassimo machine’s ability to read “each encoded disc and adjusts the temperature, brewing time and amount of water to guarantee a great latte or cappuccino.” The retail price for a package of eight beverages is $10.99.Continue reading...