I received a Keurig Coffee maker for Christmas.  The single serving coffee maker works great.  You get a sampler packet in the box offering a variety of flavors which to try.  Once those are consumed ,and you need to go to the store by new ‘K-cups,’ as they are called, sticker shock sets in.  I paid $12.00 for a box of 18 cups of coffee.  That is 91-cents a cup!

Of course I am seduced by the ease of popping the K-cup into the coffee maker and having a great cup O’Joe in a minute.  The incredible selection of flavors on my kitchen counter  defeats any rational analysis of my  new coffee addiction  After a few weeks reality begins to creep in as I order a a refillable brew basket which I can fill with any coffee.

Still I hang with the K-cup.  Then it happened. The New York Times figures out we are paying $50 per pound for Folgers in K-cups.  That is about $40 more than I am paying for Folgers at the Big Y Supermarket!  Since my head snapped back into place I’ve filled the brew basket with my supermarket Folgers.

Interestingly enough in the New York Times article I learned than I had fallen into the mental trap of comparing the price of the K-cup to the price of a cup bought at a coffee shop.  That is really dumb thinking.  I can’t say the makers of single serving coffee makers reframed our thinking, but certainly they and the makers of ground coffee were in position to grab our wallets.