Coinstar, the company that sorts your coins and takes a cut (and also runs those Redbox DVD machines), wants to make sure that your coffee purchasing experience has as little human interaction as possible. After a successful rollout of its Seattle's Best Rubi Kiosks this summer, the chain is now pumped to get 15,000 of the machines out in the wild, Bloomberg reports. Because you never really can have enough Starbucks sub-brand coffee, right?
What the 9-square-feet Rubi boxes lack in humanity, they make up for in cheap coffee drink making abilities. Each one grinds its own beans and then brews a hot cuppa in under a minute using a variation of the French press method. Oh yeah, and it can make lattes, too. All for about $1 to $1.50 for regular drinks and $1.50 to $2 for specialty drinks.
And this summer at least it seemed to have found some fans in test markets. "40 percent of coffee kiosk customers made it a habit to stop at the markets just to buy Rubi coffee." Which makes sense when the average American spends about $5 per workday for their coffee drinks outside the home. Gotta save somewhere.
Initially this sounds like the sort of thing that we won't be seeing much of in the our coffee-shop filled city—but only for now. A quick, cheap non-K-cup cup of coffee does have its appeals. Especially if you don't have to make it yourself or interact with another person to get it.
