Coffee Break

Love the mug? You can get it for $12.95 from Coffee*Mate… but there’s more to the mug than meets the eye. Notice that little pink ribbon in the design? It’s there because this is the Susan G. Komen mug. You probably recognize the name - the Susan G. Komen For the Cure has probably done more to raise breast cancer awareness than just about anyone in the word.

When you buy a Susan G. Komen coffee mug from Coffee Mate, they will contribute $5 of the purchase price to the Susan G. Komen Foundation. They’re making a minimum $25,000 donation, but if more than 5,000 mugs are sold (that’s 5,000 x $5), they’ll add another $5 for every mug.  Coffee Mate is also making a $100,000 donation to  Susan G. Komen for the cure outside the mug donations.

You can buy your Susan G. Komen mug at the Coffee Mate web site.

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Are you packing up a kid for college - for the first time, or a back to school trip? Don’t let your coffee-lovin’ college student head back to the dorm without the basic essentials for living college life. What should you pack up for your college age kid to help him or her wake up for class, save money and stay up late studying? I’m so glad you asked!!

The best coffee maker for the dorm room

$78.00 Buy.com

The Keurig B30 personal mini coffee maker is THE pick for the college bound coffee lover. While the $78 price tag may be a bit more than you planned on spending for a coffee maker, the Keurig has some major advantages over a basic coffee maker.

- The K-cup system takes all the guesswork out of making coffee - premeasured, pre-packed and ready to toss. The easy cleanup is probably the single biggest reason to outfit your dorm room with a Keurig - no worries about what to do with the spent coffee grounds, no messy grounds to sit in the filter holder till next time you make coffee - no icky factor. And c’mon, mom. You know your kids - do you really think they’ll remember to empty throw away the grounds when the coffee’s done? Right.

- Huge variety of K-cups available for the Keurig. Even if you just stuck to Green Mountain Coffee, your kid would have an enormous choice. But throw in Tully’s, Paul Newman’s Own and about a dozen others, and you’ve got a menu to rival the local coffee shop.

- Coffee’s ready in about a minute - just right for the typical impatient college student.

- Much less chance of an accidental fire - like almost nil. That’s always a huge concern for me with heating appliances - a hot plate or even a hot pot - in a dorm room.

While you’re at it, do your kiddo a huge favor and hook them up with a subscription to the Green Mountain Coffee Club so they get regular deliveries of their favorite coffee.

Other Coffee Essentials for the Dorm Room

If your coffee lover is more sophisticated, you can hook them up with an electric kettle (mine is a Sunbeam that shuts itself off as soon as the water boils), a French Press, and a subscription to their favorite coffee roaster’s coffee club.

Don’t forget a coffee grinder - you can pick up a blade grinder for about $20.

And for those who have a serious Dunkin Donuts or Starbucks addiction, get them a refillable Starbucks or Dunkin Donuts card that they can use for coffee instead of the quarters they were saving for laundry!

Green Mountain Coffee Roasters (GMCR on the exchange) announced yesterday that they were selling off 4 million shares of common stock in the company. I’ve been talking about Green Mountain stocks for the past several months - the company has been reporting higher earnings quarter after quarter in an economic climate that has most others tightening their purse strings to deal with falling revenues.

While other companies have been cutting costs and hunkering in for a long, cold economic winter, Green Mountain Coffee opened a new packaging plant and roasting facility in Tennesee, and bought the Tully’s plant in Seattle. The expansion of operations means that the company needs to expand IT, HR, admin, payroll services - all the parts of the company that have to absorb the addition of new staff and facilities. The 4 million shares of stock - with stock currently selling at about $68 a share - will raise almost $300 million that will go to pay down debt and cover the expansion of general operations.

While 4 million shares of stock may sound like a lot to you, me and most unsophisticated stock watchers, it’s actually a relatively small percentage of the stock that GMCR could put out there. The result of the announcement yesterday was a drop of about 4% in the price of Green Mountain coffee stocks on the market. If the new stock announcement prompts a sell-off and drives the price of Green Mountain stocks down further, it could be a great time to buy Green Mountain Coffee - stocks, that is. The company is on solid ground, reporting a 169% increase in revenues last quarter.

The company dominates the single serve coffee maker market the way Mr. Coffee dominated the automatic coffee maker market in the early 70s. Unlike Mr. Coffee, though, Green Mountain has managed to capitalize itself by hitting the coffee market on as many fronts as possible - coffee makers, k-cups, their own coffee, licensing the use of k-cups to other big coffee names, exclusive deals with major retailers and coffee shops, a coffee club for direct subscription sales… in short, GMCR looks like its in for a long, long successful run.