Caribou Coffee

Caribou Coffee is the United State’s second-largest specialty coffee retailer. Caribou Coffee outlets concentrates on selling gourmet coffees, teas, and bakery goods. They have over 464 coffeehouses in 18 states across US.

In 1990, on a trip to Denali National Park in Alaska, newlyweds John and Kim Puckett thought of starting a chain of coffee shops. And thus, Caribou Coffee was thought of. The couple raised money to start the first Caribou Coffee shop in Edina, Minnesota, a suburb of Minneapolis, in 1992. Following several years of mixed performance, the Pucketts sold their controlling interest in the company to Atlanta-based Crescent Capital, which has since changed its name to Arcapita and still manages the hugely successful coffee retail chain.

Caribou coffee chains guarantee a quality cup of coffee every time you have it. According to them, “whether you buy fresh, craft-roasted beans to brew at home, or a steaming cup that we’ve prepared, you’re receiving our labor of love: our passion for amazing coffee.”

The coffee beans are treated correctly right from the start, as they selct the best green beans, create blends, roast them, and then finally brew them while also maintains the beans fresh. Caribou only accepts high quality coffee beans and employs the highest standards of production. They even ask their suppliers to hold their coffee in its parchment, a protective husk, until they require it to be shipped to Caribou. After which, roasting is the most critical process for converting these hard, green seeds into the potentially aromatic beverage we all crave. Caribou roasts only to replenish the small amounts their warehouse can hold.

This ‘Just-in-Time’ process means that the coffee you get is always packaged within hours roasting, locking in the inherent character of the coffee from the time of roast until the bag is open to be enjoyed as a beverage. Caribou’s packaging process removes nearly 100% of oxygen, which is considered as freshness culprit.

Caribou employs some of the world’s most famous roast masters, have high quality standards, and follow a unique roasting style. This all has helped them develop a very strong reputation of providing the smoothest and best tasting cup of coffee.

Caribou offers around 22 unique coffee drinks ranging from light- to dark-roast coffees-of-the-day, to espresso-based drinks like cappuccinos, lattes, and mochas, to branded specialty drinks like our Caramel High Rise, Turtle Mocha, and Mint Condition. They also offer Caribou coolers, which is their cold coffee variant.

Caribou coffee chains also offer other drinks like premium hot teas, hot cocoa, smoothies and kids cocoa. They also offer baked foods, sandwiches, salads and other snack items. To complement with the world’s best coffee, they also have bets bakery products on offer. Bakery products like Blueberry muffins, Reduced Fat Mountain Berry muffins, Chocolate Chips muffins, Cinnamon Chip Scone, Reduced Fat Cranberry Orange scone, Lemon Peppy Seed Loaf cakes and many other mouth watering bakery products.

Caribou has topped 41 other regular and decaffeinated Colombian and Kona coffees in tests performed for the December 2004 edition of Consumer Reports. Inexpensive Eight O’Clock and Dunkin’ Donuts placed second and third respectively, beating brews from Starbucks and Seattle’s best.

Caribou Coffee recently partnered up with General Mills to release granola bars that have real coffee in them and come in four flavors: Vanilla Latte, Chocolate Mocha, Caramel High Rise, and Mint Condition. The largest beverage company in the world, Coca-Cola, is said to be soon coming out with a new iced coffee beverage which is made with Caribou Coffee.