As time passes, more and more folks find The Brew Bag and wonder if the filtering capability could be applied to their processes. Some call and speak with us, while others simply order and include the name of their business in the address. The business name prompts us to call them and ask what they're up to and why they think The Brew Bag will solve their filtering issues.
We've filled two orders for commercial coffee brewers and based on a conversation with one on the East coast, we think there have been more but we don't recognize as them as such. Coffee filtering was never in our marketing plans, but it is now.
Maybe like a printer ink profit center, the commercial coffee filter manufacturers' use the frequent replacement revenue to off set the competitive margins of the machinery. I really don't know much about it, and I say this because they know the filter will deteriorate after a few uses. The customer referred to earlier says they buy at least three per week per location at a cost of $10 each, so $90 per week or about $5,000 per year.
To figure out if there was a filter on the market that would last longer and thus save some expense, they bought a bunch of different filters off Amazon and began testing them. The Brew Bag was the obvious winner for a number of reasons, but mostly because it didn't break and the filtering capability was better than the others. They said that if the barista's were a bit more careful, the original bag purchased six months ago would still be in use.
A quote from their production specialist - "The Brew Bag never wears out - never. Week after week we think it's going to fail, but it doesn't." In the six month trial period, they have saved about $2,000, so roughly $4,000 per year.
They've been trying to figure out how to get into the cold brewed coffee market using the commercial brew set ups, but again, the filters were a drawback. In addition making small batches takes the same man hours as large batches, and thus cuts into profit. After speaking with them, and as a test they ordered a bag for a 20 gallon food grade plastic barrel. They have plans of making this a wholesale division - something other folks are doing as well.
For a different customer we made a bag for a 110 gallon vessel. His text response - "Awesome!!!"
