Coffee for One

by KJ Fallon

  Keurig sees the recyclable K-Cup as the next breakthrough and they have been working toward that end for a number of years. Keurig’s chief sustainability officer Monique Oxender is in charge of Keurig’s work with Brewing a Better World. On their website, Keurig points out that a lot of waste is on the manufacturing side and they have worked toward lessening that impact.7

  With the Keurig Vue brewer that was introduced in 2012, the company was able to offer more environmentally friendly coffee pods, which are made of recyclable #5 plastic. These were slightly smaller versions of the K-Cups. With the coffee pods for the Vue, consumers could just peel off the top, throw away the “inside” (the pouch, coffee filter, coffee, and the top) and recycle the plastic. Keurig introduced its My K-Cup reusable coffee filter for its brewers in 2005.

  It appears that the environmental controversy hasn’t really had a significant impact on Keurig’s long-term success, and the recycling issues didn’t seem to be that much of an impediment. Does it keep some consumers away? Some, yes.

  The single-serve option has been steeped in controversy for years. Hamburg, Germany, made news in 2015 when the city banned single-serve coffee pods from government buildings. There are those who are vehemently against single serve, particularly in its manifestation as plastic pod. There’s even a website, Kill The K-Cup, devoted to, well, killing the K-Cup.8

  At present, Keurig has several K-Cups that are recyclable, including Breakfast Blend, Nantucket Blend, and Hazelnut.9 Keurig has announced plans to produce 100 percent of K-Cup pods in Canada in a recyclable format by the end of 2018. Keurig also stated on their website that they are on track to have 100 percent of K-Cup pods recyclable by the end of 2020.

  Keurig states on their site that they want their pods to be effectively recycled and they are working with recyclers and industry experts to improve the capture rate of valuable small plastic items, such as their pods.10 They are using polypropylene #5 plastic in their recyclable K-Cup pods and maintain on their website that polypropylene #5 plastic performs well in their brewing system, is accepted for recycling in a majority of communities in the United States and Canada, and is in high demand as a recovered material.11

  Keurig says it has tested the new recyclable in “real world recycling and recovery facilities.” The consumer just has to “peel the foil lid. Empty the used coffee grounds. Place the empty pod in the recycling bin.” Keurig is “transitioning over 100 manufacturing lines across eight North American production facilities to manufacture recyclable K-Cup pods for all Keurig brands.”12 While they are currently focused on recyclability, Keurig is exploring the use of many different materials, including those that are compostable.

  An increasing number of coffee drinkers are realizing that compostable, or at least recyclable, pods are the way to go. According to the Global Food & Drink Trends Survey released by Mintel, a global marketing intelligence agency, 40 percent of Canadian adults who drink coffee and/or tea agree that single-serve coffee or tea pods should be compostable or biodegradable.13

  CHAPTER 10

  Giving Back

  Laughing Man Coffee is well-known because of the efforts of actor Hugh Jackman, its cofounder. As Jackman said in a press release, “We started Laughing Man Coffee and Tea to fulfill a commitment I made to share the amazing products and story of an Ethiopian coffee farmer named Dukale. Six years later, it’s humbling to think that, through this agreement, Dukale’s exceptional coffee will be enjoyed by millions through the convenience of the Keurig brewing system.”

  Hugh Jackman started Laughing Man Coffee Foundation in 2011 to offer farmers in developing countries a marketplace to sell their coffee to US coffee lovers. Jackman contributes 100 percent of the profits to the Laughing Man Foundation, which supports educational programs, community development, and entrepreneurship worldwide.

  David Steingard is a cofounder of Laughing Man Coffee and is the CEO of the coffee company and the director of the Laughing Man Foundation. How did Steingard, a former assistant district attorney of Kings County in New York become a part of this venture with Jackman?

  According to Steingard, it all happened pretty organically. “It was,” he said in an interview, “sort of two different unknown paths coming together. We had been family friends for a while, and I’m a lawyer. I was a criminal prosecutor before I got into coffee, and he was global ambassador for an NGO [non-government organization] called World Vision Australia.” World Vision provides economic confidence-building throughout the world on a community basis. Jackman has been a longtime supporter of a number of area development programs, and in 2009 he and his wife, actress and producer Deborra-Lee Furness, took a trip to Ethiopia to see how World Vision’s work empowered communities at ground level and to make a documentary about World Vision’s work there. They met Dukale and his family, and saw their coffee plantation.1

  Steingard thinks that this trip and meeting Dukale was a bit of a defining moment for Jackman, the coming together of a lot of different things that he had read about and had done. Jackman “is heavily philanthropic, and really well-read in this field, and different areas of micro-finance, and so I think for him it was sort of an ‘Aha’ moment.” Jackman met Dukale, and he promised him he would help. “I don’t think he even knew what that meant, but he was really moved.”

  David Steingard is no stranger to coffee. His family has been in the coffee business since the 1970s, before coffee became a phenomenon unto itself, in the form of the Cupping Room Café, a neighborhood place where locals and the well-known alike gather. The name of the New York City establishment refers to its beginnings as a wholesale coffee supplier where various blends of coffee were brewed and tasted—cupping—by prospective buyers. Steingard wanted to leave law and get back into the coffee business. As he said, “There were a lot of great things happening that I was interested in, as far as the specialty coffee movement, and the sort of socioeconomic issues built into it, such as the consumer getting more interested in the farmers.” He liked what was happening and that it dovetailed nicely with the idea of business entrepreneurship.

  One day when Steingard and Jackman were talking, Steingard randomly mentioned getting back into coffee, and Jackman asked if he wanted a partner. Steingard said, “Well, that’d be amazing, but let’s do something like Paul Newman.” [The Paul Newman model is that all profits go to charity.] Said Steingard, “We all really love his story, and I sort of consider Hugh the sort of Paul Newman 2.0, really well respected, known to be philanthropic, very nice, so I thought it’d be something that we could do.”

  The idea was that the café would support the foundation, and as they continued to grow, the foundation would give back to farmers. Currently, the majority of their effort goes back to Dukale, whether it be equipment, or scholarships, or things like that.

  Jackman spoke at the United Nations in 2009 and told Dukale’s story during Climate Change Week. The documentary film Dukale’s Dream came out that year and has been recut a number of times. “What has been so nice about the whole journey of the coffee company has been it has been really organic,” Steingard said. “It hasn’t been planned out much. It’s just been sort of following events. When we opened the café, we then recut the film to show again the birth of this café inspired by this real person, Dukale, and bringing his coffee over and trying to share it with the world, and him not being the only person in the world, but sort of our muse, if you will, because he’s certainly not the only farmer in that situation.”

  When they were approached by Green Mountain, the film was recut again to reiterate the message of meeting this farmer, to growing the company and going national. The message and great mission were a very powerful story.

  By the way, although this is not widely known, the origin of the name Laughing Man stems from the fact that both Jackman and Steingard are big J. D. Salinger fans, and the name comes from the title of a short story that Salinger wrote that appeared in The New Yorker in 1949. But the name also is a great way to demonstrate an idea
or ethos of unity, Steingard said. Thinking about best friends laughing together, breaking down barriers, having a sense of commonality no matter who you are. “Even if you’re a stranger, if you get into that moment of great laughter, you have this moment of unity, and hope, and this sense that those who are able to laugh freely are those who have the ability to provide for themselves, create their own destiny, have work, have fulfillment, and this was something that we hoped the foundation can help provide,” Steingard said.

  One of the things in the coffee industry that has improved is that there has been a lot of talk and a good amount of action around fair trade. The term “fair trade” is sometimes used as an umbrella term for a sustainable supply chain. “Obviously,” said Steingard, “[World] Fair Trade Organization does a specific thing. What I think is good about the [World] Fair Trade Organization, but as well as all the other certifications, is it just begins to keep raising the bar on transparency, and quality coffee, and a sustainable living for the people producing it.” Fair trade and all that it stands for is, of course, essential. Steingard believes that it ideally should be made more clear to more people that fair trade also leads to a better cup of coffee. “If everybody plays their part really well, and invests in each other,” he added, “you end up with a better product. I think that’s important.”

  And there is always room for improvement. Coffee, he said, generally comes from some very unstable areas so more can be done to have increasing transparency where possible at the supply chain level.

  On the retail side, there has been a lot of improvement and a little more openness from the specialty coffee movement, Steingard found. Not only is there great customer service, there are efforts to educate and introduce people to specialty coffee and to the idea that paying a little more for coffee that is organic- or fair-trade or rain-forest certified, or whatever the certification is, again leads to a better experience for the end consumer.

  Steingard thinks that this is happening more in food than in other industries, maybe because with food it is more immediate. While there has been a lot of good work done, you can always refine how you tell the story and how you educate, and how you welcome people into this movement.

  The vision of Laughing Man Worldwide is basically focused on making Laughing Man Coffee a success, and the foundation in the future will look to support entrepreneurs, as well as give back to the farmer where it can, but right now mostly the focus is on the coffee.

  Steingard says that the foundation in a way is in its infancy, because its funding and growth come from the growth of the Laughing Man coffee shop (as of this writing, there are two in NYC ) and it has, of course, taken some years to make that sustainable. “I think right now we’re in this exciting time of trying to go deeper and clarify the things that we are interested in,” he said. “We’ve always worked with World Vision. We’ve always remained connected to Dukale and the Kochere region, and giving back there. I think certainly this year and [in] the coming years, you’ll see greater depth of projects and clarification, especially with the partnership with Keurig Green Mountain.”

  Green Day also gives back through Fueled by Love, a charitable organization committed to delivering funding and infrastructure at the local level to support communities in the regions where coffee is produced.2 They work with Crescendos Alliance, which is a nonprofit organization that works to better the quality of life in remote, rural settings. Some projects they have worked on together are supporting a new clinic in a region in Peru that had no emergency medical service, expert water testing to assess the integrity of a village’s water supply, starting a local learning center to help with the community’s childhood educational resources, and starting programs to offer youth counseling in the area.3, 4

  They are very committed to this, as they emphasized in our interview, “We will continue to forge deeper partnerships with the farmers and communities that grow our coffee beans. We will also be creating an arm of Fueled By Love that will focus on helping other like-minded companies through the process of incorporating fully compostable packaging.”5

  The Rogers Family Company is also dedicated to being socially and environmentally responsible. Through sales of their products, the Rogers family has improved housing, medical access, water quality, environment, and more in the areas where coffee is grown, including Mexico, Indonesia, Central America, and Rwanda.

  In addition to making an environmentally friendly single serve, Rogers Family Company has built seventy schools around the world and has provided housing for thousands of workers. As outlined on their website, Rogers Family has a Community Aid program that is based on three principles:

  1.

  Care for Farmers: Long-term contracts so coffee framers can be fair to their employees and earn a reasonable profit for their hard work, keeping in mind the costs of production, infrastructure, and maintenance.

  2.

  Care for the Community: Rogers Family’s investment in the Community Aid program runs about $1,000,000 a year, which goes to education, nutrition, and health-care programs that help break the cycle of poverty in their partner coffee growing communities. From 2001 to 2009, they constructed twenty-five schools, 140 bathrooms, 130 housing units, fifteen clinics, and sixty kitchens in communities throughout Central America, South America, Rwanda, and Southeast Asia (Sumatra and Papua New Guinea).

  3.

  Care for the Environment: Rogers Family supports sustainable, responsible farming. This means shade-grown, organic coffee, and farmlands with substantial areas left in their natural state so that the ecosystem can continue to thrive. Responsible farming not only means excellent coffee, but it also helps keep the land, people, and wildlife healthy everywhere their coffee is grown. They use natural, sustainable methods, such as using ten billion worms to turn coffee farm waste into five thousand pounds of pure fertilizer each week.6

  Rogers Family also is adamant about paying a fair price for the coffee. Said JR, “We pay about a dollar more than the market is right now. We’re paying about $2.37 a pound for coffee when everybody else is paying a buck thirty, or a buck fifty.”7

  CHAPTER 11

  Coffee and Health

  Drink More—It’s Good for You!

  Like quite a few other foods and beverages (eggs, butter, wine), it seems as if one year coffee is extolled for its health benefits and the next year it is vilified as an impediment to a healthy lifestyle. The caffeine in coffee can be very beneficial and not only for the obvious reason of brightening the coffee drinker’s outlook and increasing energy levels.1 The caffeine in coffee might have health benefits, as well. [Of course, how much caffeine is too much can vary from person to person, and checking with your doctor or other medical or health professional about your diet—or changing your diet—is important. This book is not recommending anything, just reporting on recent studies.] Coffee is rich in magnesium, niacin, and potassium, and contains powerful compounds like chlorogenic acid and polyphenols, which are formidable antioxidants that can help thwart damage to cells. That is good news, indeed.

  According to the American Cancer Society, coffee beans are chock full of antioxidants that might protect against cancer.2 Earlier studies had been mixed about this added benefit of the bean, but larger and more precise studies have found that coffee might indeed protect against some cancers, including prostate, liver, endometrial, and some mouth and throat.

  Coffee may reduce the risk of gallstones and inhibit the occurrence of colon cancer.3

  True, the benefits kicked in when the participants in the studies drank more than four cups and up to six cups of coffee per day. Some people would say that is a great deal of coffee. Others, though, think of it as just eighteen hours’ worth of enjoyable coffee drinking. And drinking lots of coffee alone is no guarantee against cancer. You have to lead an otherwise healthy lifestyle as well.

  Dr. Marilyn Cornelis, a nutritionist at the Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, said that the coffee-cancer connection can vary by canc
er. With some cancers, the links are much stronger and more consistent. For other cancers, the link is not as consistent.4

  Researchers at Harvard have been studying the benefits of coffee for years.5 In 2014, the international research team, led by Dr. Cornelis who was a research associate at the Harvard T. H. Chan School of Public Health at the time, discovered six new human genes that interact with coffee.6 Only two human genes had previously been linked with interacting with coffee. Studies have found that coffee can help ward off type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease, and researchers are looking closely at whether coffee can keep Parkinson’s disease at bay. Coffee might even help prevent dental cavities. Coffee also has a possible role in the mitigation or prevention of some other conditions or diseases including migraines, cardiovascular disease, depression, and dementia.

  Type 2 Diabetes

  Studies have shown that drinking coffee may help reduce the risk of getting type 2 diabetes in the first place.7 But what if you already have type 2 diabetes?8, 9 Isn’t caffeine a problem when managing this disease and diet? Dr. Cornelis found that it might not be the caffeine in coffee that has the benefits to help foil some diseases. In fact, caffeine has been proven to raise glucose levels in some cases. So, what is behind the beneficial side of coffee? Dr. Cornelis wondered if there were chemical compounds in coffee other than caffeine that provided health benefits, like the high antioxidants. The delicious fragrance of coffee is actually the result of the plethora of chemical compounds that could be the secret to the powers of the bean. There is much we do not know about how the chemical compounds found in coffee interact with the body. Dr. Cornelis is researching what the chemical compounds are and how they affect the body. She is exploring a study in Finland, a country where people drink on average more coffee per capita than anywhere else in the world, 2.64 cups per day.10