1 of 4
Coind’s latest capsule type, made of aluminum, debuted in February 2021.Credit: Coind s.c.
2 of 4
Luca Cioffi, president and c.e.o. of Coind :moving away from polypropylenecapsules. Credit: Coind s.c.
3 of 4
Thailand’s home-compostable Take-5 pods claim to beone-third the cost of Nespresso or Dolce Gusto pods. Credit: Take BK Co. Ltd.
4 of 4
Left: Take-5 Regular in commercialpackaging. Right: The Take-5 brewer is closelymodeled after thePhilips/Douwe Egberts“Senseo” machine. Credit: Take BK Co. Ltd.
From PLA to aluminum and even ordinary paper, there are many options for producing single-serve capsules more sustainably.
When developing a new single-serve coffee capsule or pod, companies usually consider two things: the capsule’s main material (which should be sustainable, i.e., compostable or at least recyclable), and its Nespresso compatibility (the global brand having successfully established itself as the de facto benchmark for single-serve brewing technology).
Coind: Moving away from polypropylene
One of Italy’s largest commercial coffee companies and third-party private label manufacturers, Bologna-headquartered Coind s.c., did exactly that when it rolled out its latest capsule type in September 2020. Produced for Coind by Capsul’in, it is made of poly-lactic acid (PLA), deploys in-mold labeling (IML) technology, and is fully compatible with Nespresso brewing machines.
“It is Coind’s very first PLA Nespresso-compatible capsule,” the company’s president and c.e.o., Luca Cioffi, told STiR. “Prior to this new product, we mostly used recyclable polypropylene plastics such as PP-EVOH-PP.”
According to Cioffi, the company decided to introduce PLA in order to address growing environmental concerns among consumers, who are increasingly switching to more eco-friendly options. “PLA is a material that not only shows ecological characteristics in the finished product but is also made from renewable resources, specifically, fermented vegetable starch,” Cioffi explained.
In addition, its Nespresso compatibility plays into public demand for perhaps the most widespread brewing technology on the planet. “The Nespresso system, with its tens of millions of units sold all over the world, has become a standard in the single-serve arena, enabling consumers to enjoy their favorite blends without having to buy a new machine whenever they migrate to a different coffee brand.”
In-mold labeling
Coind’s latest capsule also now deploys in-mold labeling, during which the label is inserted into the actual mold, fusing it with the cup during the PLA injection procedure. This technique tags along with two distinct advantages, according to Coind’s beverage systems r&d manager, Marco Lenzi. “On the one hand, the in-mold fusing guarantees the oxygen barrier, and on the other hand, it prevents the label, which bears important product and consumer information, from detaching or become soiled and unreadable, as can be the case with pasted-on labels,” he said. He added that the labels are made of a multilayer cellulose film, which is 100% compostable.
The lid consists of a mix of PLA and cellulose fibers. ”We settled for that specific material following extensive testing,” Lenzi said. “The two most important factors to be achieved with lids, in general, are oxygen impermeability and that the material opens up at the correct pressure point to obtain a proper coffee brewing result.” In the case of Coind’s capsule, the lid’s PLA/cellulose material is compostable in its whole form, without having to first detach a non-compostable lid.
The Italian firm’s new capsule type is already used for at least two of its proprietary coffee brands, Meseta and Carracci. But according to Luca Cioffi, Coind is also offering the product to private label customers as an option that already is “tried, tested and approved through experience.” All of that doesn’t mean that Coind has abandoned recyclable (i.e. non-compostable) plastics altogether. The firm still also deploys PP and PP-EVOH-PP for certain single-serve products.
The aluminum renaissance
But, in February 2021, the company even went “retro” by launching an aluminum capsule. That “back to aluminum” resolution was of course originally spearheaded by trailblazer Nescafé. The Switzerland-based coffee giant divulged at an industry conference in Berlin in September 2019 that it was re-introducing aluminum capsules for its Nespresso machines because the metal was “infinitely recyclable without any quality loss”. Several other firms, always keen on staying on Nespresso’s heels, have since followed suit. According to Luca Cioffi, Coind’s resolution to roll out its own aluminum capsule was a direct response to that trend with the aim of “meeting market demand by offering customers a product that is aesthetically pleasing and, at the same time, perfectly preserves the coffee aroma.”
Furthermore, Cioffi pointed out that aluminum could further reduce plastic waste. The company expects that, from 2022 onward, it will be able to offer capsules made from recycled aluminum as yet another step toward eco-sustainability. However, in Cioffi’s opinion, the global resurgence of aluminum among top coffee industry players and large distribution chains, alike, is not going to phase out compostable bioplastics such as PLA. Rather, the two materials will negotiate their respective paths side by side.
“Both products represent solutions for reducing conventional plastics, but they still have markedly different characteristics,” he said. Aluminum capsules are perceived as a premium product, while PLA capsules are mainly targeted at consumers who care about the environment and their impact on it. “For this reason, we do not believe that aluminum will become ‘the new PLA.’ Both materials will continue to evolve and lead to further innovation.”
But what about paper?
With all the focus on bioplastics and aluminum, one particular material seems to have largely gone under the radar: paper. In 2001, Dutch electronics firm Philips and the Netherlands’ leading coffee roaster, Douwe Egberts, formed a joint venture to market a new coffee brewing system under the “Senseo” brand. This brewing machine uses a single-serve paper pod system. After becoming an instant success in the Netherlands (with a 40% market share), and also making impressive inroads in the rest of Europe, as well as in the Americas and Australia, legal wrangles eventually forced the joint venture to relinquish its EU patent for the Senseo pods in 2004.
Thai company adopts paper pod idea
Cue Take BK Co. Ltd., a small coffee roaster in Thailand’s northeastern province of Udon Thani. Having stumbled across the “up for grabs” patent left in limbo by the Philipps/Douwe Egberts joint venture, the firm used it to launch its own proprietary Take-5 single-cup brewing system in 2014.
The paper pod technology is comparatively simple, according to Take BK’s managing partner, Abraham Verloop. “A pod basically consists of two halves made from unbleached, recycled paper. Once filled with coffee, the two halves are sealed together under pressure using a cellulose-based glue,” he explained.
Production of the paper shells was originally to a company in Malaysia but some time ago was shifted to Udon Thani after Take BK acquired and set up a filling and sealing line. Filled in a nitrogen atmosphere, the pods are airtight and designed to withstand the Take-5 brewing machine’s operating pressure of approximately 6 bar. The pods’ shelf life has been ascertained at 18 months — a time span rarely, if ever, reached.
“One of the main reasons to move production to Thailand was that it enabled us to keep everything as fresh as possible,” elaborated Verloop. “We are roasting and packing six days per week and it is, thus, hard to find a pod of our coffee that is actually older than two months. I would even claim that online orders are never older than one week.”
Freshness aside, perhaps the single most striking feature of Take-5 pods is that they are, in the words of Verloop, “100% organic, as well as 100% biodegradable and home-compostable.” They don’t need to be sent for recycling or industrial composting, nor do the used coffee grounds have to be emptied from the shell. “Simply throw the entire used pod into the household bin or — even better — on your compost heap, where it will naturally decompose within weeks.”
Unique in Asia
Owing to the free patent, the pod technology has been picked up by dozens of smaller coffee companies in Europe. However, Verloop insisted that his firm so far is unique in Asia. That said, Take-5 is exclusively marketed domestically in Thailand only, with Verloop and his business partner having no plans whatsoever to expand to anywhere else in the region. And perhaps they don’t need to. Sales are reportedly brisk, with about 85% generated through mail order and another 14% through local retail distributors, most of them operating in tourism places.
“Take-5 may not be as fancy or fashionable as Nespresso or Dolce Gusto,” said Verloop, “but our pods only cost one third while still delivering a very tasty an