Coffee makers are a bit of a one-trick pony, but Keurig — maker of the machines that use single-serving K-Cups — wants users to branch out and use them to make lunch. Partnering with Keurig, Campbell’s has a new product: fresh-brewed soup, which comes in a K-Cup.
Users dump the accompanying noodle packet in a 12-ounce cup, then stick the broth cup in the Keurig. It “brews,” then it’s ready to be stirred into the noodles and consumed. The mmm, mmm goodness is 70 calories and comes in two flavors, Homestyle Chicken and Southwest Style Chicken. An eight-pack costs $12, or $1.50 per cup on Keurig’s site, but it will cost you more to go through Amazon: $16.24 for a six-pack, making the price significantly higher per cup.
There are already ways to use your Keurig to make soup that aren’t sanctioned by the company. For around $1.56 per cup, you can get Beef Bone Broth from Minute Cup on Amazon. Keurig Green Mountain angered a lot of users when it announced its $200 Keurig 2.0 machine would use DRM technology to ensure only approved K-Cups could be used in the machine. There are several ways around the tech, and the company finally decided to bring back refillable K-Cups. That doesn’t mean it approves of these off-brand cups, but users can now at least use their favorite coffee in the machine and not toss out the difficult-to-recycle cup afterwards. Keurig faces increasing backlash because of the sheer volume of waste the cups generate. Even the K-Cup’s inventor has expressed regrets.
Though the partnership with Campbell’s was announced two years ago, the soup pods’ debut comes when a savory savior is most needed for Keurig, which announced layoffs last month after sales dropped 5 percent in the most recent quarter.