Green Mountain Coffee Roasters Responsible Growth

Green Mountain K-cups

With the growth of the single cup coffee brewing systems, there have also been increased sales of coffee to be used in these machines. The Keurig Company, which is now owned by Green Mountain Coffee Roasters, has shown steady growth, despite a national recession. It sold 983,000 single cup brewers in 2008 and shipped more than one billion K-Cups. This is an increase of 105% in brewer sales and a 59% increase in K-Cup sales.

Despite formidable competition from other machines: Flavia by MARS, Tassimo from Kraft, and Senseo made by Sara Lee, Keurig has increased its unit market share for single serve coffee makers from 33% in 2007 to 60% in 2008. Some financial experts believe that the reason for this increased growth in sales and market share is due to:

• Consistently high reviews for performance of the brewing machine
• Durability and reliability of the coffee maker
• Brewer produces a good cup of coffee each time.
• High quality of coffee that is packaged in K-Cups
• Availability of K-Cups from many different sources
• Large variety of coffee blends, roasts, plus flavored coffees that are available in K-cups.
• There is a good selection of teas and cocoa in K-cups.

Green Mountain Roasters sold approximately 32 million pounds of coffee in fiscal year 2008 and it buys Shade Grown, Organic and Certified Fair Trade coffees.  Newman’s Own Organic coffee is available in K-Cups as well as many different Fair Trade coffees. Green Mountain is one of the largest dealers, today, in both Fair Trade and Organic coffee. A Fair trade coffee guarantees farmers a minimum price that is usually higher than the market rate and ensures that producers meet social and environmental standards.

There are several smaller projects which the company supports to improve the quality of life of the coffee raising farmers in Central America. In Oxacaca, Mexico, Green Mountain, The Coffee Kids, and Newman’s Own have teamed up to help women and children with an innovative agricultural program of raising chickens for the eggs and meat. Nell Newman says “This is a wonderful project…Chickens and eggs are an inexpensive form of complete protein. Supporting our partners …is an integral part of our mission.”

In business for over 27 years, Green Mountain Coffee has grown from a very small roaster in a New England town to a $617 million publicly traded company. Every year it donates 5% of pretax profits to charity and it is a champion of social and environmental causes.