A BestCup coffee pod.
Salt Lake City-based coffee co-packing startup BestCup is offering a new approach to Keurig-style brewing with a compostable pod product called the Hi-Fi Coffee Pod.
Featuring an open-bottom filter design, a proprietary grinds refinement process and more coffee loaded per pod than conventional K-Cups, Hi-Fi pods are optimized to provide what BestCup considers a more pourover-like cup.
The founders of BestCup are Khris, Greg and Ike Bombeck, the brothers behind the specialized espresso equipment company Saint Anthony Industries.
“We invited other accredited coffee professionals into our lab and did various blind taste tests comparing the pod coffee to pourover coffee,” the brothers Bombeck jointly told Daily Coffee News in an email. “We found the pod to be on par with the pourover extractions, and in many cases, yielding higher extraction levels.”
Each pod, including its interior filter materials, is made entirely of bioplastic derived from plant starch. The pods contain 70% more coffee than standard K-Cups, and feature a peel-away bottom layer.
The faster flow through the exposed bottom is one factor allowing the higher dose of coffee. Another is what BestCup calls kinetic mass separation, KMS for short, which involves vibration and air flow to remove chaff and fines from coffee as it is ground.
The Bombecks’ research into KMS is what set the stage for their foray into K-Cups. The grinds refinement method was originally developed in 2016 for a packaged pre-ground coffee product that was ultimately shelved due to a lack of viable options for scaling production. The brothers revisited KMS in 2021 while exploring ways to build it into grinders as a feature.
“The idea was, with KMS, we can achieve the cup quality of a roller mill with the ease of use and affordability of a burr grinder,” The Bombecks said. “To better understand the effects of KMS, we began to test KMS coffee across a wide spectrum of brew methods, including pod brewing, which at that point was a foreign format to us.”
Upon closer examination of the widespread K-Cup system, the Bombecks were “astonished” by how poorly suited it is for coffee extraction.
“We found the jetted pressurized K-Cup brew slurry destroyed the coffee bed’s ability to self filter,” said the Bombecks. “The overly turbulent brew mechanics resulted in a thin, flat cup experience. Just for fun, we ‘cut’ the traditional K-Cup pod and ‘pasted’ it back together in a way that allowed it to harness the brew pressure and achieve beautiful extractions.”
From there, the Bombecks partnered with a pod-filling machine manufacturer to design a way to incorporate KMS into the production of pods.
Hi-Fi pods loaded with coffees roasted by four different specialty coffee companies are retailing for $32 per 16-pack through the BestCup website. Roasters include Amavida Coffee, Four Barrel Coffee, Salt Lake Roasting Co. and Topeca Coffee.
For business-to-business co-packing, BestCup is offering different service tiers, starting with a minimum order of 2,000 pods to be made out of 75 pounds of coffee for $.95 per pod.
“The BestCup website serves as an easy entry point for interested coffee enthusiasts,” said Bombecks. “Our focus remains B2B.”
Prior to Saint Anthony, the brothers co-founded the now defunct Alpha Dominche company, maker of the commercial Steampunk brewing system invented by Khris Bombeck.
Yet for all the focus on careful manual brewing and barista craft, the Bombecks have simultaneously ventured into automation. In 2018, Khris Bombeck revealed a self-tipping gooseneck kettle system for automated pourover brewing called The Automatica. The Hi-Fi Coffee Pod design for Keurig brewing systems finds the brothers circling back for another approach to the world of hands-free convenience coffee.
“We love manual brewing and enjoy every slow pour cup,” the Bombecks said. “We’ve learned so much over the years about coffee brewing and many of our lessons should be employed to improve convenience coffee for the benefit of all coffee drinkers.”
Comments? Questions? News to share? Contact DCN’s editors here.
Related Posts
Howard Bryman
Howard Bryman is the associate editor of Daily Coffee News by Roast Magazine. He is based in Portland, Oregon.
Comment