19 ms·
Launch HN: Sudden Coffee (YC W17) – Instant coffee that doesn't suck
Hey HN! I’m Kalle, one of the founders at Sudden Coffee (https://www.suddencoffee.com https://www.suddencoffee.com). We make instant coffee and sell it through our website as a subscription.
I started working on this almost two years ago after my cafe business failed. I was frustrated by how unscalable and inconsistent selling good coffee is.
In 2015 I placed 9th in the World Barista Champs in Seattle. On the flight back to Helsinki I was desperate for caffeine and ordered a coffee which was horrendous. I started wondering what would be a better way than Aeropress + hand grinder combo to have great coffee on the go.
Instant coffee is liquid coffee that’s been dehydrated. It’s normally made with the worst beans that are roasted really dark and extracted up to 6 times at temperatures up to 180C and 15 bar pressure. As a result, they can reach 60% extraction yield. Next, the liquid is boiled down and finally dehydrated by spray drying it with hot air. This process results in the gnarly bitter, woody, rubbery instant we all know.
We start with good beans: currently from a co-op called Biftu Gudina in Ethiopia, roasted by 49th Parallel in Vancouver, BC. In the beginning we brewed the coffee by hand as espresso — I would literally spend 12 hours per day pulling shots. At one point we had a full-time person doing this.
Eventually, we developed our own fully-closed centrifugal brewing system that doesn’t allow for any aroma to escape. We extract the coffee at low temperatures (85-90C) to 21-23% extraction yield. As a result, we only get the good stuff — sweetness, fruitiness, acidity — and none of the bad stuff.
Also, we’ve developed our own freeze-drying technique that’s kind of equivalent to a server farm. Instead of having one enormous machine we have a bunch of small freeze dryers. This allows for greater control and shorter iteration cycle.
This might be too long already so I'll stop here. Looking forward to discussing the coffee business and great coffee in the thread!
- ryduh 10y agoHi Kalle, I love my daily pour over, so I might not be your target market, but I'd definitely be interested in purchasing a few coffees without a subscription. Have you thought about offering that?
- baldeagle 10y agoI second this. I've been burnt too many times by burnt instant coffee to subscribe without a sample.
- freese 10y agoHappy to get you a one-time order - just email me
- m_x_m 10y agoI agree...Looks great but I would want to try a few before I subscribe.
- 33W 10y agoSame here - I'd pay $20 for a 5 count sample without a subscription.
- rhaps0dy 10y agoWhat prevents you from subscribing and then unsubscribing just afterwards? (I don't know, maybe the webpage does, but there's no mention of minimum times anywhere and recurringcheckout has let me unsubscribe without problems in the past)
- komali2 10y agoNothing, but it's annoying, because it takes 2 transactions instead of 1.
- paulcole 10y agoYou have to call the New York Times to cancel your digital subscription. Why would I trust that some online coffee merchant I've never heard of isn't up to the same tricks? https://www.nytimes.com/content/help/account/purchases/subscriptions-and-purchases.html#digital-sub-cancellation-policy https://www.nytimes.com/content/help/account/purchases/subsc...
- farorm 10y agoThats the first thing they teach you at YC, always be having that recurring revenue.
- giarc 10y agoThey probably also teach you that any customer can turn into a recurring customer.
- abeyer 10y agoIt's also one of the first things to turn off a new consumer thinking about taking a chance on an unknown brand. You're fighting the reputation of generations of scammers who promised "cancel any time" and either weasel-worded the small print or just outright ignored cancellation requests to charge as much as possible to recurring bills.
- username223 10y agoAutomatic recurring billing is a "dark pattern" from back before anyone made up that term. The only reason it makes more money than one-time purchase or an honest subscription (where customers have to explicitly pay to resubscribe every month or year) is that people will forget or get frustrated when it's time to cancel. Do you want to run that sort of business? "Fun" fact: I bought a used car, only to discover that it apparently has free XM radio. I would not be surprised if someone unsuspecting person's card is being charged for it every month.
- freese 10y agoIf I wanted to start a scammy business running on recurring subscription I wouldn't have gone into all the trouble of developing new instant coffee ;) Obviously, we want to build a product that we and our subscribers love and choose to keep subscribing. Right now we have a lot of them. The biggest thing with the subscription is clear CAC vs. LTV. With our current model this equation works and we can profitably acquire new customers. This allows us to grow, make the product better and bring the cost down.
- CrackpotGonzo 10y ago+1 would love to sample before kicking in for subscription
- startupdiscuss 10y agoSometimes the market speaks REALLY clearly! (1) I, too, would love to try it out. This does mean that if it is not much better than my Keurig (wasteful) single use, I may not re-up. Would be interested to see. (2) Also, would be great if the trial packets were available someplace that already had my credit card (like Amazon). (3) Do you have half-cafs?
- giarc 10y agoRegarding your Keurig comment. I really hated the amount of plastic waste going into landfills so I bought one of those plastic reusable cups. I wasn't impressed with the output or the work needed. I recently found Presidents Choice (large Canadian brand) has K cups for $0.50 a piece. They are compostable and made of spent coffee beans and other plant based material. If you are in Canada, go to your nearest superstore to test it out.
- mark-r 10y agoCostco carries San Francisco Bay coffee, which replaces the bottom 3/4 of the plastic K-cup with some kind of cloth filter. They claim it's less waste.
- startupdiscuss 10y agoThanks for the tip. I am not in a large city so if I can get it on Amazon in half-caf, I will definitely buy that.
- zloof 10y agoCo-founder here - love the idea of having trial packets some place that's easier to buy, like Amazon. Will think on that. We do want to make it a lot easier to try (see my comment above) - figuring out the best ways to do that.
- danielvinson 10y agoUse the same model as Soylent... they have a very good system.
- zloof 10y agoCo-founder of Sudden here. This question comes up a lot. We have tried offering one-time purchases and it didn't work very well/ wasn't sustainable for us. 3 reasons we believe in a subscription model: 1) A big reason we started this company together was our shared belief in making customers feel good through hospitality. It's more than just the coffee itself. We want to build a better experience - if you are a Sudden subscriber, the experience should evolve over time, you'll learn more about coffee, try new things, have fun with it. To us, this wasn't about making something to have once a year on a road trip, but a way that we could connect with customers and create a larger community. A subscription is the best way for us to build a lasting experience at our current size. 2) For a lot of folks out there, it is super easy & convenient and they wouldn't have it any other way. They like that Sudden Coffee just arrives and they don't have to think about it. It's something they can add into their life. 3) Subscriptions mean we can offer the same product at a much cheaper price. We can spend a lot less time & money making ads or sending emails to remind you to buy again. This is the reality of what most CPG companies do - think about how often you see a toothpaste ad for a toothpaste you already own, even if you love it. We pass the savings directly on to customers. We ran the numbers, to offer the same coffee without a subscription, we'd have to charge $4-5/cup. To clarify 2 things: A) You definitely can still be in the target market for us. Our most popular subscription is 8/cups a month. This is meant to ADD-TO not REPLACE your existing coffee ritual. We find Sudden works best as your 'second-cup' of the day (at least as you try it out). We have plenty of customers who make a daily pour over and then use Sudden in the afternoon. B) We recognize that giving people a way to TRY before subscribing is a big gap in our service and we are actively experimenting with the best ways to do that. It may come in the form of referrals from other customers or special sales. We just brought on someone last week to think through the experience and were brainstorming about it this morning.
- mark-r 10y agoA subscription also doesn't allow for any fluctuation in demand. If you're having a bunch of people over and want to offer them great coffee, how do you do that without depriving yourself for the rest of the month?
- 10y ago
- bgun 10y agoI'd love to try this, but minimum $19/mo subscription as the only "Buy Now" option?
- hablahaha 10y agoI'm with you. I'd only want this sporadically, like when I'm camping and traveling or to give as gifts. I don't need it on a monthly basis and I feel conflicted about having to sign up only to cancel (and how easy is that?) within a month.
- donw 10y agoSame here. From where I sit, Starbucks Via Instant is the competition. It's a notch above the urns of Folgers Freeze-Dried in the grocery store, but like all things Starbucks, still too bitter to really enjoy on its own. Okay, so I'm not a coffee snob. I'll brew at home in the morning with water at the right temperature, but I'll use pre-ground beans from a vacuum pack. Sure, freshly roasted tastes way better, but as long as I can avoid the bitterness from over-extraction, I'm generally happy with what ends up in my mug. Because it doesn't need sugar. That was a revelation to me: that properly brewed coffee does taste pretty damn good on its own, maybe with a bit of milk to smooth out the rough edges. But the point is, I have no shortage of coffee options at home: aeropress, coffee press, pour-over, good old drip machine. And when I travel, I would struggle mightily to care less about my coffee. That all said, I would spend $20 for a sample pack to try while backpacking -- especially if it's truly epic coffee. Bringing milk along on the trail is... difficult at best, and it would be a nice little luxury to start the day with a cup of something genuinely tasty. But starting off with a subscription, for a product I've never sampled? Unlikely. Maybe I'm not the target market, and I could be drastically underestimating the number of coffee snobs in the world, but I suspect that this company struggle with the current offering.
- freese 10y agoReally appreciate the thoughtful feedback - thanks!
- toss1941 10y agoDoes anyone know how this compares to Starbucks Via?
- fiftyacorn 10y agoi was thinking the same - via is definitely the best instant ive tasted
- aquilaFiera 10y agoI like it better than Via, personally. I used to use Via before I drank Sudden.
- always_good 10y agoThough it looks like Via comes out to $0.60/cup while Sudden is $2.50/cup. That's pretty steep.
- crispyambulance 10y agoYeah, that's a serious obstacle, I think. Via makes a decent cup of coffee which is good as "back-up" for situations where you can't make coffee in a normal way. It's cost/serving is comparable to what you would pay for good beans. I am thinking something like 12oz of La Colombe Corsica ($12) @ 20g/dose => $0.70/serving. $2+/serving for Sudden seems "out there" for a subscription service which, by definition, is intended for regular use.
- zloof 10y agoCo-founder here - it's miles better than Via. Sometimes we include a packet of Via in our shipment so you can do a taste comparison (thinking about making this standard). You'll definitely notice the difference side by side.
- abeyer 10y agoThat's a fun marketing idea, though maybe not necessary for the people who are already dedicated enough to have signed up for a subscription.
- mrkurt 10y agoI _actually_ subscribed, 8 cups for ~$19 seems pretty decent to me. Keep selling subscriptions ... it's a better business. How do your yields compare to cold brew?
- subpixel 10y agoKeep selling subscriptions...to corporate clients, to whom you can give volume discounts. You can sell a shit-ton of this (if it's great) at half the price. But almost $2.50 per cup is more than Nespresso, and the customers willing to spend that month-in and month-out are already going to have Nespresso, etc.
- freese 10y agoWe're making ≈35% margins by selling it as a subscription. More about the price here: https://blog.suddencoffee.com/transparent-pricing-what-goes-into-every-cup-of-sudden-coffee-6ed4a76b91c2#.s9xy53vkz https://blog.suddencoffee.com/transparent-pricing-what-goes-...
- freese 10y agoMuch higher than cold brew. Cold water is not great for extracting coffee - it has much lower extraction potential and creates a different flavor profile. It usually ends up tasting pretty oxidized because of the long brew time.
- yomly 10y agoThis is super interesting! I had always assumed coffee was made via liophilization at scale, any insight on why it's not? On the subject of extraction, how are you measuring yield? What are the main differences in the 40% coffee yield you're leaving on the table?
- freese 10y agoIn normal conditions you can only extract up to ≈30% of the coffee beans mass, ie. no matter how fine you grind and long you brew you'll only get 30%. The rest are insoluble solids: cellulose so basically wood. When the big boys brew the coffee in really high temp and pressure (165-190C, 15 bars) the structure of the bean changes and previously insoluble parts of the hemicellulose become soluble. This means you get a higher yield but what you get are nasty, woody, heavy bitter compounds. Here's a diagram explaining more: https://goo.gl/dJTsxM https://goo.gl/dJTsxM
- yomly 10y agoAh ok, with you now! Are you guys mainly a hardware company then? Anything cool going on software-wise for you guys?
- freese 10y agoYeah, mainly hardware now. We just hired our first dev (and are still looking for a VP Eng!) and have some software stuff coming up. First we're working on making the ordering process better and building tools for our subscribers. Here's the job posting in case you're interested: https://jobs.lever.co/suddencoffee https://jobs.lever.co/suddencoffee
- yomly 10y agoOk cool, thanks for sharing! A big part of artisanal coffee is that it uses high quality water (usually magnesium enriched after filtering via reverse osmosis iirc) - is there anything you can do to control for this / shitty water at the customer side? If you're brewing with Mg-water then, most of it will be left behind when freeze drying, of course, but water used to rehydrate the coffee will be a big one...
- mdesq 10y agoSatisfaction Guaranteed section typo: "If your are ever unsatisfied, we are unsatisfied and will work to remedy the situation." your -> you
- freese 10y agoThanks for pointing that out! Will fix it.
- tekklloneer 10y agoI get the desire for recurring revenue, but I really want to buy and try once; pledging easy cancellation near your call to action would really massage a lot of the complaints in here.
- freese 10y agoTotally get it - thanks for the feedback. You can cancel anytime simply by emailing support@suddencoffee
- apsdsm 10y agoOooh... Ouch... Cancelation by emailing somebody is really not cool... That should be the sort of thing that can be done automatically with the hit of a switch. If you could get your programmer to set that up it would be a good step. Also, no shipping to Japan? I'd like to try this out but without shipping to my region I suppose that's me out.
- aquilaFiera 10y agoI've been a subscriber for Sudden Coffee since Christmas and I love it. The coffee is definitely as good the corner cafe here in San Francisco. I love it because it takes me 1/10 the time to make a great cup of coffee in the morning. I just upped my subscription so I can get more every month. On top of that the customer service has been top notch so far with Kalle himself answering my questions. My initial worry was that it was too pricey but they released this blog post which I found enlightening: https://blog.suddencoffee.com/transparent-pricing-what-goes-into-every-cup-of-sudden-coffee-6ed4a76b91c2#.cjwjqe2d1 https://blog.suddencoffee.com/transparent-pricing-what-goes-...
- zloof 10y agoThanks for the feedback! Glad you're loving it. I'm Kalle's co-founder/ wrote that blog post, so glad to hear it was helpful.
- eps 10y agoThis reads like a run-of-the-mill marketing blurb.
- aquilaFiera 10y agoI'll try to use less marketing terms next time? I'm just a satisfied customer and happy to see them do well. I'm an engineer in SF, see my Keybase: https://keybase.io/btholt https://keybase.io/btholt
- dragonwriter 10y ago> The coffee is definitely as good the corner cafe here in San Francisco. I've only tried a few since I don't even live in SF, but IME "as good [as] the corner cafe here in San Francisco" could be anywhere from horrible to excellent, depending on the particular corner cafe.
- aquilaFiera 10y agoOkay, fair. I'm from Salt Lake City where the coffee is decidedly not as good. What I meant to say it's as good to me as Philz.
- draw_down 10y agoGreat name!
- freese 10y agoThanks! Kudos to our investor & Chairwoman Caterina Fake - she's the one who came up with it
- huhtenberg 10y agoWasn't a problem with "bad" instant coffee largely solved by Starbucks VIA, which too utilizes a novel tech that produces very decent results? Even the mega snobs of /r/coffee were largely OK with it came out few years ago. Also, re: this - Instant coffee is liquid coffee that’s been dehydrated. It’s normally made with the worst beans ... Next, the liquid is boiled down and finally dehydrated by spray drying it with hot air. From what I remember this is how Nestle was making its first version of instant coffee back in 1930s. It then switched to the freeze-drying method in mid 60s, which is still used to make Nescafe Gold. It's very cool to see that you made your own brewing/dehydration tech, but twisting facts and bad-mouthing your competitors is not the right way to go about promoting yourselves.
- ryanSrich 10y agoEvery flight I've been on with Starbucks VIA has been absolute trash. Airplane coffee quite literally tastes like it was made with toilet water. That's honestly the only way I can describe it. I'm bearish on any improvements because I'm convinced the problem is the water they use.
- gingerbread-man 10y agoYou're spot on re: the water quality. An investigation at DFW a few years ago found hazardous levels of e.coli in the potable water tanks used to refill aircraft. I wonder why the airlines aren't doing anything about this. I'm not a frequent first-class passenger, but if I were, high-quality coffee would be a big deal for me.
- freese 10y agoPlane water is really nasty. Even Sudden made it will not taste great. You can mix Sudden with cold water by shaking it in a bottle and that's what I usually do when traveling
- objclxt 10y ago> I'm not a frequent first-class passenger, but if I were, high-quality coffee would be a big deal for me. Many transatlantic and transpacific flights now have a proper grind-on-demand coffee machine (allowing for lattes, cappuccinos, etc) in business / first class. Doesn't necessarily solve the water problem, although they can fill them up from bottled (I don't know if they actually do).
- alaskamiller 10y agoI work in the coffee industry and saw Sudden pop up last year so was interested in the technique and hacked it out. Freeze dried coffee is already what Folgers does and sell you. This is the more artisanal version of that since the big brands have big factories that can pump out plenty of instant coffee grounds. So this is a ramped up volume play on existing techniques perfected by the doomsday preppers. Youtube search for freeze dried coffee and you'll plenty of people explaining how to do it. The freeze drying machines sell for $600 to $1000 from a variety of vendors. I think I figured out which one Sudden is using, it's the low end consumer version from Salt Lake City. They just have 20 of these in a SF warehouse somewhere. From there it's just a method of scaling expensive capital costs, labor intensive processes, and maximizing the calculation of yield, and marketing enough to convince people that $2.50 for freeze dried coffee in a tube is a good deal. That only works when relative to the crazy world of craft coffee people charging $5 or $7 for a pour over with the Keurig pods at $1.50 anchoring the bottom and buying a big can of coffee to make your own at $1 a carafe.
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- zloof 10y agoHappy to answer whatever questions we can disclose! Thanks for starting the thread. It's somewhere in the middle to be honest. We did not invent freeze dried coffee - it's been around for over a century. However, it is quite difficult to make it work at-scale in a way that's profitable/sustainable, and that still tastes good. I have a pretty extensive background in operations, manufacturing, & tech and I had to pull out every trick in the book to get this to work at our current scale & price. It was a lot of work. It is also inherently more expensive to sell. All of the same things that make regular instant coffee taste bad also make it super cheap. We are trying to make it as affordable as possible, but at the end of the day the higher quality does require a more expensive process.
- Balgair 10y agoDefine 'tastes good/bad'
- akago 10y agoI'd try this if there was UK shipping!
- freese 10y agoWe shipped internationally for about a year but stopped recently since a lot of packages got stuck in customs or got lost.
- paulcole 10y agoWhy no one-off purchase option?
- freese 10y agoEmail me and I'll see what we can do ;)
- mythrwy 10y agoInstant coffee can actually be good (although right now almost all of it is downright horrendous). (sorry, have to mention competing product). Nescafe Tasters Choice in the single packs I find very acceptable and often prefer to brewed coffee. So I'm pretty sure good instant coffee can be done. Be very interested to see what can really be done with an even higher quality product as this outfit appears to be doing. Not crazy about subscription though. Understand it makes business sense from companies perspective but it doesn't from mine. Maybe this will work out nicely to where other distribution models make sense. Best of luck! I'm rooting for you :)
- freese 10y agoThanks for the feedback! We chose the subscription model partly because that allows us to use 1) really high-quality coffee 2) not cut corners in the process 3) Sell it at the lowest possible price to you guys
- mslev 10y agoHonestly I'm mostly interested in the centrifugal brewing system. 85-90C doesn't seem very low to me, maybe just below my brewing range across methods (192-204). Sounds like your current method would be similar to an Aeropress. You said you'd spent 12 hours a day pulling shots- were you using espresso for the coffee? Is this freeze dried espresso, with more water added to it (like an Americano)? I'd truly love to know more about your brew technique and process.
- freese 10y agoIn the beginning we were brewing the coffee as espresso since that was an easy way to get a higher strength (≈10% TDS) coffee brewed in low volumes - kind of took the YC mantra "do things that don't scale" to heart. So yes, until Aug 2016 it was basically dehydrated espresso. Our current setup is quite different and in terms of flavor profile and brew dynamics does represent AeroPress. I'd love to go in more detail but can't disclose more.
- DiabloD3 10y agoI don't understand the point of this product. You're obviously targeting people who already like coffee, such as myself: I already buy beans, grind them myself, and manage the process using an Aeropress, and I'm hardly some coffee hipster because I use goddamned Eight O'Clock Columbian Peaks. Yet, you are trying to sell me instant coffee, which I automatically am wary of because instant coffee is the shittiest coffee you can drink... yet you have no way of convincing me otherwise. Subscriptions are only useful if you can convert the customer, "the first hit is always free." Also, your entire website is a hastily developed trainwreck: "Copyright $copy; 2017."... Copyright who? The email harvesting call to action in tan needs to follow the rule of thirds to stand out, your contact page needs serious loving (seriously, Google on how to make these), and your front page hero image is goddamned tiny and isn't even full width of the page, and the Sudden/Instant comparison block below it is formatted horridly. Please hire a web designer, you need someone with experience on how to do this right.
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- dsco 10y agoThe design is fine. Certain things can be tweaked but great web design isn't really going to drive the product. The taste, market-fit and brand probably have more impact. I'd suggest offering samples for a small price. Convincing customers about the taste with only a website can be an uphill battle unless they've been recommended the product, or actually tasted it. Perhaps free taste samples in stores can be a sales channel to the web site.
- freese 10y agoThanks for the suggestion! We're exploring what we can do here. Ideally we'd love to make sampling really easy & inexpensive but with our current costs it's simply not feasible right now.
- swamp40 10y agoThere must be some price where you would break even shipping out a single tube. You could charge that amount for a sample, even if you consider it overpriced. You might be surprised at how many people want to try it, but don't want to commit to a subscription right away.
- togasystems 10y agoWhile travelling through Thailand, I discovered that the country thrives on terrible instant Nescafe. Open to international expansion?
- freese 10y agoWe're currently fully focused on the US market. International expansion is definitely in the plans but not for this year. By far the biggest growth for instant coffee is in China.
- elnygren 10y agoHi Kalle, the best coffee I ever had was an espresso macchiato at Freese Coffee in Freesenkatu (Helsinki, Finland - and yeah, that guy's lastname and company's name matches the street name due to some history). I used to live couple blocks away. Awesome stuff :) Please, don't offer these only with subscription. Let me do one-off purchases and you have me as a customer.
- freese 10y agoHahaa! Really happy to hear that :) Thanks for the feedback re: one-off.
- mgberlin 10y agoI buy instant coffee 3 or 4 times a year when I go backpacking. Because it's that rare, I'm not going to subscribe, but if I saw this for sale at [Big Box Outdoor Store] when I was buying supplies, I'd probably pay a premium for it.
- freese 10y agoGreat, thanks for the feedback!
- kepano 10y agoCongrats on the launch! It's been great seeing your progress since last summer.
- freese 10y agoThanks! We've loved using stuff from Lumi :)
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- mrbill 10y agoAny chance of offering a "test drive" purchase, so I can check out the product before committing to a subscription?
- zloof 10y agoIf you go to this secret link you can get a 2-cup trial that auto-converts to a subscription in 21 days. https://www.suddencoffee.com/?trial=true https://www.suddencoffee.com/?trial=true We are experimenting with ways to let people try it first - so more solutions are coming!
- jongold 10y agoSuper impressed with this - one of my coworkers has been giving out samples of it, it's absolutely perfect for mornings when I'm in too much of a rush to deal with grinding / brewing, and also for camping trips.
- freese 10y agoAwesome - really happy to hear that! I use it every morning at home and it's soooo easy.
- msencenb 10y agoMy two cents from a sustainability perspective. My girlfriend and I would never consider something like this due to the high volume of plastic involved. Can you make the containers compostable?
- zloof 10y agoWorking on it. We do individual servings because they preserve freshness - that's the only reason we do it. It's hard for us to do compostable since we are still very small compared to your average consumer good, but we are 100% committed to doing it when we are big enough. We even have 2 sustainability advisors involved with the company.
- mellamoyo 10y agoCool. I'm not the one who originally posted the question but had the same one upon checking out the starting page. Great idea, something I would be interested in signing up for, but too much plastic at this point.
- blunte 10y agoYeah, the amount of plastic waste here would eliminate a lot of the kind of thinking buyers you might normally get. Hope you find a solution, and hope you sell in Netherlands!
- akandiah 10y agoI would love to try this, but having the monthly subscription as the only option is off-putting. You should at least offer an option to 'buy' a trial pack.
- freese 10y agoWe have a trial option available here: 2 cups for $6: https://www.suddencoffee.com/?trial=true https://www.suddencoffee.com/?trial=true
- stjarnljuset 10y agoI'm actually a daily instant coffee drinker so I'll definitely check this out. Currently I use the Korean instant coffee packets (includes powdered cream and sugar). Since I get these for about 12 cents a packet, it's unlikely I'll be a permanent convert, but I adore the packaging for Sudden Coffee.
- freese 10y agoYeah we definitely won't be able to beat that price. Would you buy a Sudden three-in-one with cream and sugar if there was that option?
- stjarnljuset 10y agoI've already ordered the regular kind, but I'd be interested in the three-in-one also! I do occasionally drink my coffee black if it isn't super bitter.
- sargun 10y agoSo, I am curious -- A while ago I experimented with making a better instant coffee. I came up with a few different solutions. I'm curious as to whether you've looked into them: 1) Pouring a ristretto into liquid nitrogen. At reconstitution time, put into boiling water and stir. Issue: Cold coffee, potential colloid separation -- solutions might include some kind of stabilizer 2) Taking a ristretto and removing water content to concentrate it, and then pull a vacuum on it and package it. Said package can then be opened and dissolved in boiling water. Issue: Complexity. Removing the water can be complicated, pulling a vacuum on it, and then heating it while at vacuum is hard. 3) Coffee puck: Take traditional coffee, and put it into a permeable membrane that when exposed to water above a certain temperature is permeable. When that temperature drops, it stops being permeable. Problem: Said polymers were hard to find.
- freese 10y ago1) You need to keep it frozen, right? That makes it a lot more complicated + probably issues with the colloids (we experienced that at one point) 2) The bigger challenge is actually brewing large amount of ristrettos/espressos, not necessarily concentrating it. 3) just sounds way too complicated to me to rival/equal soluble coffee Edit: haven't really looked into any of these as a feasible option for us.
- sargun 10y agoThis might be a trade secret, but how are you keeping the colloid solution coherent? I'm kinda surprised you say that brewing the ristrettos are the hard parts. I know that centrifugal brewing is all the rage these days (as siphon, pour-over, and espresso were before), but it seems like automating espresso is a solved problem. Are there no industrial-scale burr grinders? I think the biggest problem would be tamping and getting that to be consistent. Is there anyone who needs industrial scale espresso?
- zloof 10y agoThe part re: colloids is a trade secret at this point, but definitely a real challenge. As far as we could find, there is no common solution for industrial scale espresso. If someone has one, please post it here. This was a personal obsession of mine last spring - "How does this not exist?!?" Kalle is the coffee expert, but as the 'non-coffee guy', I have no idea why this wouldn't exist - I would have thought someone out there would need it?
- davidjnelson 10y agoDo the machines that brew these accumulate mold like keurig machines?
- freese 10y agoDo you mean the equipment we use to brew and dehydrate the coffee? We use CIP process for all the equipment - there's definitely no mold growing in any of our equipment. For brewing - just add the powder to water or milk, no need for brewing
- Grue3 10y agoI already prefer instant coffee (sublimated) to the usual coffee machine-grinded bean coffee (it always tastes off for some reason). Instant with milk always tastes perfect.
- astrange 10y ago> We start with good beans: currently from a co-op called Biftu Gudina in Ethiopia, roasted by 49th Parallel in Vancouver, BC. Can someone explain how cities like SF and Vancouver, where nobody can afford to live, can sustain indie coffee shops? I have never understood this.
- freese 10y agoGood questions! Most people working in these cafes can't afford to live in the city - most baristas in SF seem to live in the East Bay. A lot of people are still able and willing to pay $3-4 for a cup of coffee so instead of going to Starbucks people choose to buy better coffee in smaller shops?
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- mjhoy 10y agoAs someone who would love to buy this for long bicycle trips, I'm a bit turned off by the subscription model. I know you want to hook me with a steady supply of superior coffee that's quicker to make, but I love the ritual of brewing my own pour-over coffee too much to think I'd give that up.
- freese 10y agoTotally get that! I love making coffee too (guess that's why I'm a barista). Our goal is not to replace your existing coffee rituals but rather to offer an alternative that's better than other instants etc.
- mjhoy 10y agoRight. My point is I only use instant on a very specific occasion, maybe once every two years, so a subscription turns me away. I'll still probably try it, though!
- comments_db 10y agoMichael: What do you think of when you hear the name, "Sudden Coffee"? George Michael: Coffee dressing, I think. But for some reason I don't want to drink it. Jokes aside, best wishes. Got a trial subscription for $?
- freese 10y agoYup - here: https://www.suddencoffee.com/?trial=true https://www.suddencoffee.com/?trial=true
- beatboxrevival 10y agoI'd like to try it for backpacking, but not interested in a subscription. Give an option to purchase a sample pack.
- RandomOpinion 10y agoAmen to this. I would be much more inclined to try Sudden Coffee out if there were an option for a one-time purchase, especially if registration were not required (I really don't want to deal with yet another password). As a side question: what's the shelf life of Sudden?
- freese 10y agoThanks for the feedback - duly noted. The shelf life is around 4-6 months - we recently started to flush the tubes with nitrogen so as long as you keep the in cool, dry and dark place they'll last for a while.
- csours 10y ago+1 to the above. The first thing I looked for on your site was how to try it. I don't want a sub before I try it. Has anyone 'hacked' your coffee - I'm thinking of the Aeropress community and the nifty things they've done. Have you demoed this anywhere in person? For instance, in Austin people stand in line early in the morning for BBQ, and I'm sure you would make a huge impression if you gave out free samples a few times.
- tyre 10y agoMaybe I'm biased, as a fellow YC founder, but I don't understand the negativity. 1) Sudden is the first company that I've actually considered buying instant coffee from. In the US, there's a pretty strong stigma against it, so that's not an easy task. 2) $3 per cup isn't a lot of money, roughly equivalent to a cup of coffee elsewhere in SF. Especially if I don't have to stop anywhere and can just put it in a water bottle. Actually this would be great for camping. 3) I have no idea how they are making it, but having read numerous writings by the founders, this sounds a lot harder than I imagined. 4) Having spoken to many investors, fellow founders, and others, this is really compelling to a lot of people. Again, I live in the bubble of Silicon Valley, but "better, faster coffee" doesn't feel like an elitist product. I'm all for Sudden Coffee being successful.
- bigtunacan 10y agoThere is definitely some SV bubble around this. I can buy a local cafe pour over cup for less than this product. I can buy my own beans and heat the kettle and pour that over in less than 5 minutes. If I'm desperate and in hurry then I can make a cup of Keurig for a fraction of the cost.
- freese 10y agoI don't in any way disagree with you. If you're happy with those options then that's great - as you said, you'll save money. However, we're seeing that Sudden is a really compelling product to a lot of people. Most of our subscribers are outside of any larger cities and we ship to 42 states. Sudden is not for everyone and we're totally ok with that. As YC says "it's better to have 100 people that really love you than 1M that just kind of like you" ;)
- jtmcmc 10y agoDefinitely can't buy a pour over in the bay area for under 4 dollars so this is a better price than that - also I can just put this into hot or cold water and instantly have high quality coffee? That's pretty nice.
- tedmiston 10y ago
- ryanx435 10y agowhen companies do these types of posts, does that mean that they have already been accepted into the 2017 winter batch of YC companies? or is this just part of the application process?
- _vertigo 10y agoHave you considered letting the coffee speak for itself and offering a paid/free one cup sample to get people interested? I'm not going to take a $19 leap on coffee I don't know if I'll like, no matter what people say or how good your marketing is. The fact that it's currently offered as a subscription makes it even less likely that I'll bite. However, if I tasted your coffee and found it reasonable, I would probably sign up, even for a subscription. If you had an option to just buy a $3 sample cup I would, and if what people say about your coffee is true, I'd probably turn into a customer. I think a lot of people would be in the same boat, as well. Just something to consider.
- freese 10y agoI totally get that we have a high barrier of entry. We tried lowering it last year when we offered one-off purchases. However, that just doesn't work with our current user acquisition model. Even if we get a lower number of subscribers their LTV is much, much higher.
- jacquesm 10y agoIt's not about LTV of your customers for you. This could easily be interpreted as 'when given a chance to try the product without a subscription a large percentage of the trials led nowhere'. That you get a larger LTV out of an automatic conversion is a given, it would be extremely surprising if that were not the case. I would suggest that you try to get to the point where your LTV of customers trying one paid/free sample and then converting into regular paying customers or subscribers is proof that the product works rather than to get into the bin where the unsubscribe barrier is what keeps you going.
- zloof 10y agoShort answer - we're starting to experiment with trial options. This is a link to a 2-cup trial that converts to a sub: https://www.suddencoffee.com/?trial=true https://www.suddencoffee.com/?trial=true Longer answer - sort of but not that simple in our current state. Even if you absolutely love a product, often times you don't buy again. Many reasons for this - it's a pain to checkout again, you don't have your credit card on you, you forgot about it, you're just too busy with other stuff. If we had an Uber-like app - one click to order, saves your credit card, sends you push notifications to remind you - it would be a lot more feasible to send you a single cup of coffee and make it really really easy for you to buy again. Unfortunately, it's hard for us to do that right now and we end up losing a lot of people who truly did love the product. Before LTV or any of that stuff - the big question is if we call up our subscribers, are they happy? We hear again and again "Yes, I love the product, I love that it shows up, it tastes great and saves me time". We would not be building a subscription service if that were not the case. However, we are absolutely testing different trial options to get at what you're talking about.
- ccameron 10y agoI'd like to echo a huge need for this in backpacking and travel areas. For instance I went on a cruise recently and could not get a decent cup of coffee for a week. I would have loved this option for travel. If I saw this at a premium price and it was marketed and positioned properly as a much better alternative than Starbucks Via at REI or some other outdoor retailer I'd definitely buy it. I wouldn't subscribe for it simply because it doesn't meet my daily needs. I already have a nice electric grinder and do either pour over or Aeropress for coffee. Maybe I'm not your target market, but I think I could be if I can simply order it for travel and backpacking or on the go use.
- freese 10y agoThanks for the comment! I hear ya. We're considering retail as an option in the future. Right now the subscription simply is the business model that makes sense for us - our current margins are too slim for retailers.
- ccameron 10y agoThat makes sense. If you offered a batch where I could just buy a bunch and it stays good for a long while then I would definitely buy some in that model. That way I can simply stock some away and pull it out for trips or when I don't feel like making it / in a hurry etc. If you want to hit the backpacker market get some freebies out to blogs like Andrew Skurka, Section Hiker, Adventure Alan, Gear Junkie, etc. I don't know that the market is big enough to target, but I suspect with how profitable REI is there may be something to it.
- freese 10y agoThese are all great - thanks! Although we don't advertise it on the website you can always email me and we can figure out something in terms of orders ;)
- tedmiston 10y agoI'm not sure what the shelf life is currently… maybe a couple months? Personally I subscribe for a similar use case and then just defer a week or two or skip on the months where I haven't used it all yet. Their subscription management options are very fine grained which is nice. I've been really happy with it so far.
- spinlock 10y agowhat do you think of the starbucks instant stuff? (personally I think it's as bad as starbucks but not much worse)
- freese 10y agoIt's remarkably similar to fresh Starbucks. I think it's up to everyone to decide whether that's good or not.
- pfooti 10y agoLike other people, I'm not precisely the target market. I brew my own pourover with beans I get from my local roaster (hooray Andytown!) and admit that part of my love of the whole thing is for the ritual of grinding, weighing and so on. That said, I appreciate good-tasting coffee, enjoy trying new things, and am intrigued. I could see uses for this, and it would make an interesting gift. I'm way more likely to buy a one-off than subscribe. I understand wanting to have consistent month-over-month predictions, but there we are.
- freese 10y agoThanks for the feedback! I love Andytown - have you been to the new shop yet? I live in TL and wish it was closer :(
- _eht 10y agoOK, I'll try it. I've been interested in an instant/easy cup of coffee for a long time and yet to find anything worthwhile. From a tech standpoint the order process is a bit lacking and confusing. I'm prompted to create an account after ordering, but then emailed an activation for an account that was automatically created. I'm unsure if my month starts now, and I can expect a shipment soon, or if I have to wait till 4/22, which is what your site says my next shipment will process. You linked to a 'super secret' area (https://www.suddencoffee.com/?trial=true https://www.suddencoffee.com/?trial=true) where it says your trial will convert to an eight cup subscription for $24/month, but I signed up on the normal page for $22/month. I'm looking forward to trying the coffee, as well as having a more intuitive and less confusing site to manage my subscription. How is that for a coffee/tech snob? :D
- freese 10y agoThanks for pointing all these out! Agree that the order process is a bit lacking. We just hired our first engineer to work on it. We're currently using Shopify + a bunch of apps since our focus has been the hardware (brewing + coffee). Also - just had a meeting yesterday to figure out how to make the site more clear. Your month starts now. We'll ship your coffee tomorrow and the subscription will renew on 4/22. The pricing for the trial is a bug. We lowered the price recently and clearly forgot to update the description - I just fixed it. Really appreciate the feedback!
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- Exuma 10y agoI just wanted to comment that I LOVE your marketing site. Extremely easy on the eyes, clear, good calls to action. I don't give that compliment easily either, it really is great, succinct, clean. That's my biggest problem with most sites is they're ridiculous and not built for actual sales. Great work PS. I just ordered some. Now if only blue bottle coffee would do this :| I think their coffee is god like. we shal try yours now
- freese 10y agoThanks! We're considering partnerships with different roasters and maybe Blue Bottle could be one of them.
- cstrat 10y agoI would love to try this out but you guys don't post to Australia yet :(
- freese 10y agoWe did international shipping until Jan but it turned out to be just a pain. A lot of shipments got stuck in customs or got lost - it wasn't the customer experience we wanted and not really worth it for us
- anotherevan 10y agoIt did make smile when I looked at the country drop-down and the options were United States, Canada, and… Finland. I also recommend offering a one-off ordering option. It offers a try-before-you-commit option, as well as for those who normally brew, but would buy some of this for when they travel. I would also recommend adding Australia to your country drop-down, but I have ulterior motives there.
- cstrat 10y agoAh ok I missed the boat then :( I could imagine it being difficult to send to Australia. We have strict rules on food and plant matter coming in and I am not sure what this would be classified as. Thanks for the reply!
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- jlarocco 10y agoI've recently cut down to one or two cups a day, and I'm not super picky, so I'm not the target market here, but I'll give my two cents anyway in case it helps. Number one, $19 for 8 cups of instant coffee seems really expensive. I can get a really good basic coffee around here (Boulder, CO) for between $1.50 and $3, depending on size and quality. If the instant costs almost as much, I might as well just walk across the street. Second, a subscription model seems strange for instant coffee. It's something I'll use when I don't want to make regular coffee, but also can't run across the street to buy one. I'm not in that position often, and I'm not even a coffee snob. Just a random thought, but have you considered a tiered approach? Sell the first extraction at a higher cost, but also have a cheaper product line that does the extraction process two or three times to increase the yield?
- freese 10y agoThanks for the feedback! The price is that high because of the quality of coffee and process we use. My co-founder Josh wrote a blog post about it here: https://goo.gl/mYuxkt https://goo.gl/mYuxkt Re: extraction - We've thought of that. With our current equipment it's not possible. I think the more realistic way would be to extract the coffee once and sell the spent grounds to another company for further extraction.
- hellothree23 10y agoI'd plus one the price too...its laughably expensive. plus the packaging is extraordinarily wasteful. I'd say the process needs major work to reduce the price point and rethink out the packaging. I actually drink instant when I'm camping and would love to try it but I would consider this product super niche because it's honestly not much more work to just do a pour over of real coffee (for less money).
- ed 10y agoI had a batch of this and can confirm – not only did it taste like pour-over, it tasted like one of the best pour-overs I'd ever had. I was shocked. It just happens to come in powder form. (I'm your typical SF tech coffee geek, like a lot of us I'll seek out the good stuff.) Sell on Amazon already! :)
- freese 10y agoThanks Ed! We're considering/exploring Amazon.
- kup0 10y agoAt the current pricing, there is no way I would purchase. Flavor isn't worth THAT much to me. At least for me personally, mediocre but extremely inexpensive coffee > "great tasting" $2-3/cup coffee. Not to mention, it being "instant" to me, means even at this price it will still be inferior to high-end bulk coffee. I already thought Keurig pods were expensive (and they don't make great coffee either so I avoid them), this makes those look reasonable. Maybe I'm just not your target market. The product itself sounds like it may be great, just IMO not worth the cost, and I have no idea what your target market would be, but it seems it would be an extremely small subset of coffee drinkers (I could be wrong)
- NamTaf 10y agoYou're targetting espresso over drip. This is good in my books, but I don't know how the US oddity about drip vs espresso will affect your market. Europe and Australia/NZ will likely pose different marketing requirements. For EU/AU, it seems to me like you want to be competing with the Nespresso market and leveraging the fact that you can produce a similar 'pod' quality (or better) without the machine - basically a convenience approach, perhaps with some price influence. You'll struggle to compete with superior flavour since we understand decent espresso. There's a reason Starbucks has nearly completely collapsed in Australia and it's largely thanks to Italian migrants in the 60s, and enough of Europe knows about Italy that they have a clue about coffee. The secondary advantage is that in AU at least (maybe also EU? my experience of travel there isn't broad enough), a good cafe-made espresso is quite expensive (AUD$5) so you have profit margins on your side too. For the US, you can't really compete on price and people are more happy to drink rubbish coffee like badly made drip and Starbucks. To this end, in my mind you will need to convince them that the superior flavour is worth it when it is not prohibited by superior expense or effort (ie: going out to a specialist cafe). The evidence is in this thread where people balk at the idea of a $3 'instant' coffee. This is a distinctly different marketing ploy to the above, but I think a one-size-fits-all won't work for you. I don't really have a lot to add, but that's my gut feel on how you need to go about pitching this. Simply saying 'we can do instant coffee that doesn't suck!' to me doesn't quite capture the subtlties of the problem you're actually solving for consumers, as it doesn't place it in the broader context of how/where/why they consume coffee. Good luck!
- rfrey 10y agoI would keep a stash of this for when I get up early and want a cup while I set down to work. I can't run my grinder or espresso machine because it wakes up the kids. I do drink normal instant coffee in those desperate times, but I would very much enjoy a high quality alternative. Not interested in a subscription though, it's bad enough that every piece of software I use has moved to a monthly model without it taking over my physical world too. You do your thing, but I'll be checking back periodically to see if you've started selling individual boxes.
- costcopizza 10y agoAs a regular instant drinker-- I wish you luck. My go to instant is Cafe Bustelo, cheap, woody, strong and 17¢ a cup when it's on sale. At your price, Sudden occupies an interesting niche, but I think it will do fine given how massive the coffee market is! Nothing beats instant for convenience, it's a lot easier to find a hot water than a coffee machine. And slips in your pocket like grinders and a bag o' beans doesn't.
- kazinator 10y ago> It’s normally made with the worst beans that are roasted really dark and extracted up to 6 times at temperatures up to 180C [...] This process results in the gnarly bitter, woody, rubbery instant we all know. And then there is Nescafe Gold. Thanks for playing.
- astrocat 10y agoSince HN is probably a caffeine-heavy crowd, I'll launch into this here... I understand the pitch, and I'm happy someone is pursuing better instant coffee. The status quo is really, truly miserable. If you have the need to carry coffee on your person at all times so you can have a decent cup wherever you are, Sudden sounds like a good option. However, I suspect most people drink their coffee at home or work, and while everyone will have their different "optimal" coffee scenario, I'll offer my experience to great coffee without spending unnecessarily on pods or instant: If you want better coffee, you'll get most out of your investment by buying fresh, whole beans and a grinder. The $15 blender-like grinders? Just fine for most. As long as your beans are fresh you'll have a vastly better cup of coffee. Grind up whole beans in like 30 seconds and stick it in your regular drip coffee machine and enjoy 10 minutes later. You've now improved your coffee game 100%. Find a local roaster, or a roaster that will ship coffee within 24-48 hours after roasting. The reality is you can often get fresh, locally roasted coffee for the same price or less than what you can get national brands for like Starbucks, Pete's or premiums like Stumptown. If you're a 2-4 cup a day, expect to need 1.5 - 2 pounds (~1kilo) a month. That's probably ~ $30 in fresh beans. (depends on what a "cup" means to you in terms of volume, but 2 pounds of beans makes quite a bit of coffee). YMMV, but that's a conservative estimate. After that, investment in fancy equipment is much more marginal so make investments that fit your needs. The next big step up in quality comes from temperature (regular drip coffee machines just don't get hot enough for the best flavor extraction), but solutions to better temperature brewing usually require more direct attention at brew time. Pour-over is great and inexpensive, and even if you don't take the time to carefully poor for 5 minutes and just dump, you'll get decent results. The Aeropress is another option in the same price range that can be marginally faster and also has really good flavor results. I use one frequently. Impatient? Well, if you're thinking of spending $2+/cup on instant (where you still have to heat the water for those that want hot coffee) because you're in such a hurry, consider what that will cost you in a year and look at investing in something like a Breville Barista Express* or independent burr grinder and espresso machine. You can grind beans and pull a shot in less than a minute. Drink Americanos (espresso + hot water to yield what is essentially a regular cup of coffee. Flavor IS different than drip/pour-over though. maybe taste at a good coffee shop first (not starbucks)) or drink cafe-au-lait (warm milk+espresso) or even just espresso shots. You'll be net positive in about a year if you're drinking around two cups a day. This route also ends up wasting less coffee than making a whole pot and never finishing it (to be fair, also a pro of Sudden/instant). * This isn't a plug for Breville explicitly (I DO have one, though), it's just that the Breville is really the only machine of it's type on the market (a grinder and true-espresso machine in one housing, not a super-automatic like the Jura). You CAN get great (maybe better) results with separate grinder and espresso units that have better qualities independently, but you won't necessarily be saving money. Imho, never buy a super-automatic. You can easily spend ridiculous money on coffee and equipment. For most people, it's not worth it unless you want coffee to be your other hobby, (or, "snobby" as I'd probably call it). For me, it's just sourcing fresh beans at ~$20-$30/month and that gets me most 90% of my enjoyment for my multiple daily cups of coffee. I enjoy my Aeropress, Chemex and espresso machine, but they'd be useless without good, fresh beans.
- riemannzeta 10y agoPlease do a carbon dioxide extracted decaf!
- freese 10y agoWorking on it - either that or Swiss water.
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- hellothree23 10y agoholy shit. soooooo expensive.
- freese 10y agoHere's our blog post about the pricing and cost breakdown: https://goo.gl/WwQLYc https://goo.gl/WwQLYc
- qume 10y agoThere is a three michilen star chef in Milan who uses instant coffee in his signature dish. Send him a sample! I found someones version of the recipe: https://forums.egullet.org/topic/112265-carlos-craccos-basmati-risotto/ https://forums.egullet.org/topic/112265-carlos-craccos-basma...
- qume 10y agoThere is a three michilen star chef in Milan who uses instant coffee in his signature dish. Send him a sample! I found someones version of the recipe: https://forums.egullet.org/topic/112265-carlos-craccos-basmati-risotto/ https://forums.egullet.org/topic/112265-carlos-craccos-basma...
- jtmcmc 10y agoThis seems great - I've bought a subscription and look forward to trying it at the office. I hope it's as good as you say so I can try and convince our ops folks to order it at work. Curious - have you considered doing coffee tastings at local (or YC) startups to try and get recurring subscriptions at businesses?
- amelius 10y agoThose plastic containers; why such expensive and environmentally unfriendly packaging?
- freese 10y agoWorking on it. We do individual servings because they preserve freshness - that's the only reason we do it. It's hard for us to do compostable since we are still very small compared to your average consumer good, but we are 100% committed to doing it when we are big enough. We even have 2 sustainability advisors involved with the company.
- SeaDude 10y agoHm. 1 plastic tube / cup?...eco-booboo -eh?
- freese 10y agoWorking on it. We do individual servings because they preserve freshness - that's the only reason we do it. It's hard for us to do compostable since we are still very small compared to your average consumer good, but we are 100% committed to doing it when we are big enough. We even have 2 sustainability advisors involved with the company.
- tamal 10y agoI've switched almost exclusively to drinking Mount Hagen organic Fair Trade instant coffee. It's very, very good at a decent price.
- sandGorgon 10y agoThis is amazing..I wish we had this in India, which is still catching up to high end coffee. As a coffee obsessed , but curious hacker - what is the biggest technical challenge in for this? Is it the brewing, or the bean selection..or the freeze drying?
- erispoe 10y agoWere you on the last season of the pitch? https://thepitch.fm/episode/sudden-coffee-season-2-episode-2 https://thepitch.fm/episode/sudden-coffee-season-2-episode-2
- threepipeproblm 10y agoHave you measured acrylamide levels?
- freese 10y agoWe haven't measured them but they should be equal to any high-quality specialty coffee. I know that regular instant coffees have considerably higher levels of acrylamides that are caused by poor quality coffee and processing at extremely high temperatures.
- threepipeproblm 10y agoYes and it might turn out to be a useful marketing angel for you. Thanks for the reply.
- the_common_man 10y agoAnd here I was thinking that coffee is a solved problem with starbucks :-) I wish you had a one-off offer so that I can first taste the coffee before I subscribe.
- projektir 10y agoI'd be interested in this, but it's considerably more expensive than a large cup of pretty awesome coffee I can get at the local cafe on the way to work...
- grogenaut 10y agoWhile I've had fun going down the freeze dried prepper hole a few times for trying to make gluten free camping food... If you're considering doing this yourself, just buy a good super automatic coffee machine. Such as a Jura Ena. Good ones can be had on craigslist. They're prosumer type machines so you can fix them as well. They make amazing coffee, so good you'll burn yourself out on it if you're not careful. They cost about $350 used and $1k new. Both prices are totally worth it, esp when compared to trashing a kuerig machine every few years and the prices you're paying for k cups. And you get fresh. That is for home consumption. Travel? this might be cool. My camping gear has a aeropress in it.
- apapli 10y agoFor some Australian context, being in Melbourne, a place full of coffee lovers (and something we jokingly say our city is better at than Sydney) I can't say I see a market for nice freeze dried coffee. I'd almost go so far as saying it's become a very established cultural past time to go out and buy a fresh coffee from a local cafe - even when there may be Nespresso on offer in the office for free. I don't see how this product would make it here - the taste of the coffee is simply one (very important) part of the coffee experience. Where I do see a market however is outdoor activity stores; camping, caravanning, fishing, boating etc. Sell them in large boxes so we can take them away for trips. I know it's not a "monthly" transaction then, but I fail to see how that model will work here. Perhaps some of our other states such as Queensland, NT or WA where it's a bit harder to consistently find a good coffee somewhere nearby.
- apsdsm 10y agoThat's not a joke. Melbourne coffee is definitely better than Sydney coffee.
- erikb 10y agoI want to challenge your idea with the question of whether it's really needed. True, having good instant coffee would be an improvement. But I guess we have just accepted that it is as it is. If you want good coffee you sit down, take your time, it's also a culture a thing. If you just need something warm to drink at the bus stop or a caffein shock before a meeting, badly tasting coffee is "good enough" for most people. So, who'll buy "suddencoffee"? (and is that really a good name for it? sudden doesn't feel like high quality) PS: Btw I really think if this thing has a market you are probably the guy to make a product for it. I can believe that. Great. But if there's no market, better focus on other stuff, e.g., how to get the premium locations were people come to get great coffee.
- ricardobeat 10y agoLooks great! Can you add the Netherlands to your list of shippable countries?
- cyberpanther 10y agoWhy are startups obsessed with subscriptions? Just sell me some coffee. Start an Amazon store and let them handle the logistics.
- vmateixeira 10y agoFrom their website: Instant Coffee Often made from leftover crops, sometimes 5+ years old. Coffee is unripe, moldy, or has insect damage. Yikes. Any sources on this?
- Borkdude 10y ago> On the flight back to Helsinki I was desperate for caffeine and ordered a coffee which was horrendous. This is what I hate about caffeine, the dependency and withdrawals you get when you're not taking your dose. I love coffee and black tea, but the dependency and habituation to the effect of it is what makes me wean off from time to time.
- bambax 10y agoNot a connoisseur by any means but a drinker of expressos. Where I can I drink Nespresso, meaning I have machines at home, at work, in summer homes usually, etc. Many hotels also have a Nespresso machine in the room nowadays. In rental homes, and esp. when you go skiing and the apartments you find yourself in are very small, there sometimes isn't any Nespresso machine. There I usually buy the likes of these: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0052OOLZY https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0052OOLZY and while it's nowhere near "good", it's "good enough" to get one started in the morning. So, what's the market for Sudden? Apparently it's only available via subscription, so the casual user isn't included. Are you claiming to be better than Nespresso? That would be interesting -- hard to believe at first, but exciting if true.
- dcgoss 10y agoFirst heard about these guys on the Cooking Issues podcast a while back. Cool to see them with YC!
- futurix 10y agoSudden coffee? That's when someone knocks the cup into my lap!
- J_Sherz 10y agoWhy the tubes? What are the downsides of using a standard stick pack format instead? I would think that's cheaper from both a materials and a shipping standpoint.
- aedron 10y agoHow come freeze-dried is preferred over concentrate (pods)? It seems like the freeze drying process would inherently be more destructive that simply preserving the liquid in a pod, minus some water.
- 0x6c6f6c 10y agoVery interesting product. I'm glad to see an instant that's dedicated to quality. (Edit: Found a bit on your page on the tubes not being biodegradeable: "we simply aren’t big enough to get a packaging company to make us biodegradable alternatives", hopefully this is addressed later.) I do have a question to do with your Transparent Pricing page, where the following is stated: > It costs us $2.34 to make each cup. followed by > A general rule of thumb for most packaged goods is that you must mark up the product by 50% to cover your expenses marketing and selling the product. Luckily we don’t follow the rules. If we did, we’d have to charge $4.68 a cup! Marking up 50% sounds like you should charge an extra 50% of the cost of the product, but that statement uses an extra 100%. I'm not sure if it's wording or phrasing but that sounds like bolstering an exaggerated markup price to increase the perceived value of your actual price. Any clarification on this?
- jgalt212 10y agoThis sounds very interesting, but why did you choose YC? The organization seems to be suffering from serious style drift lately (I know this is "diversification" by design). That being said, YC has no demonstrated historical core competency in physical consumer foods or goods. In short, there had to be a better org to be a better initial investor/growth partner for a food company than YC.
- yawz 10y agoI love my cup of good coffee, but this is a little too expensive for me for day-to-day use. But I may use something like this when I'm on the move or camping etc. if it is truly better than the best instant.
- jenkstom 10y agoThe wife and I are coffee nuts. To some extent, anyway. We also like to go "camping" in an RV. I used to do french press, but the ground beans would get old too quickly and I don't have much interest in a grinder inside a tiny space. So we're using plain-old instant coffee. It's better than nothing, but that's about it. I've been thinking about cold brewed coffee, but that's a completely different taste. Not bad, but very different and not really what we're looking for. All that said... I'd love some "not horrible" instant coffee for this situation. Also to keep in my desk drawer for when we run out of k-cups. Or even to replace them if it's good enough.
- _puk 10y agoThere seems to have been (in the U.K. at least) a recent drive towards 'wholebean instant'. This mixes your traditional freeze dried instant coffee with some very finely ground beans, which does make for a much better cup of instant. Give it a try if you come across it, it may fit that niche.
- losteverything 10y agoFirst. Good luck I'm all for trying new coffee. So far nothing has been worth the difference in the price which is why I still but store brand. (Bounty towels ARE worth the difference in price, e.g.) Will you sell creamers and sugar and stirrers and cups? I'm not sure what your product does - do I still have to heat up the water? I would love your product to be alka-selzer like in that I drop it into my cold cup of water and I get a hot cup of good tasting coffee. No need to heat up the water
- vit05 10y agoSo, I drank instant coffee in morning and immediately recalled the headline I read last night here in HN "Instant coffee that doesn't suck". Unfortunately, I'm not in the US to order, but when I opened your website, I did not find your package beautiful. It did not seduce me, it did not seem to be a premium product. It seems to me that one of the biggest potential marketing strategies you could have is when someone takes one from the bag in a public space, like an office, and another will ask: What is it? But, at least for me, the only thing I would think would be that this is some kind of medication or a cigar, and I would remember the Seifield episode about Pez. Have you thought about changing the package to something that gives a better experience and seems more premium?
- p0la 10y agoYou should put some on Amazon FBA for Europe. Volumes are decent and it's like super low maintenance. You can then decide where to expend your subscription based on sales rather than intuition. I'm based in the UK and I would love to try some.
- miraj 10y agoKind of curious why you guys chosen 49th Parallel, when there are myriad other roasters in USA itself. I mean its great you picked 49th; I lived in Vancouver for many years and am a fan of them(+Lucky's Doughnuts!). But wondering if you are based in SF, & assuming your initial target market is USA, why go with a cross border hassle?
- romanovcode 10y agoToo bad it's only in Canada, Finland and U.S. Also, why in hell you use plastic as a holder? Do you realise how much waste you are creating?
- tmaly 10y agoYou have me almost sold. Is there a way to buy some on a one time basis without subscribing? I would like to sample the coffee before committing to a subscription.
- rmist 10y agoInstant coffee is the definition of "sucks"
- theveloped 10y agoLove the positive approach to bringing good coffee to places where people would often settle for less, be it due to time, noise or weight constraints. Any chance you guys are looking for a mechanical engineer to scale up production?