© GE Appliances
General Electric (GE) has integrated a Keurig single-serve brewing system into the door of a new refrigerator to be released later this year.
The GE Café pairs the K-Cup system from Keurig, one of the most important names in the single-serve coffee market, with its own unique hot water-dispensing refrigerator door to meet what it describes as “growing consumer interest”. It cited a 2014 survey that suggested 29% of American coffee drinkers use a single-cup brewer – an increase of nearly 50% over the previous year – as evidence of a trend.
Dan Goldstein, refrigeration marketing manage for GE Appliances, said: “Over the last couple [of] years, GE surveyed Café French door refrigerator consumers who have the hot water feature; they asked, ‘When can we have a refrigerator that dispenses coffee or tea?’ In fact, two-thirds said they’d be interested in a single-serve hot beverage dispenser. This inspired GE and Keurig to purse the development of the industry-first, built-in, single-serve brewing system from a refrigerator.”
The Café model from GE’s appliances division also allows users to preset brew times via their mobile device and is available with a pre-determined flow rate and temperature designed to optimise the brewing experience.
Mark Wood, chief product officer at Keurig Hot Beverage Systems, said: “With more than 60 brands that consumers love and over 400 beverage varieties in the system, Keurig is all about offering consumers the great-tasting, high-quality beverages they want, simply and conveniently. As an innovator in the personal beverage system industry, Keurig is excited to partner with GE and to be the first to offer hot single-cup technology right from a refrigerator.”
© FoodBev Media Ltd 2024