Keurig K-Cups

In an ad that has been airing during the MLB playoffs, Keurig claims that its K-Cup pods contain coffee that is “freshly ground.” The commercial features a man waiting in line at a coffee shop who grows increasingly frustrated with a slow-moving barista. It ends with the tagline, “You deserve great coffee without the grind.”

But “the grind” as it relates to the process of turning whole beans into ground coffee actually has a big impact on the freshness of coffee. According to coffee aficionados, for peak freshness, the best time to grind beans is right before brewing. As award-winning barista Michael Phillips told MarthaStewart.com earlier this year:

Once the coffee is ground, the CO2 from the roasting process that protects the coffee from oxygen escapes very quickly no matter how the coffee is stored. Optimal taste is within a few hours of being ground, but you can still get good cups for a day or two.

Even Folgers, a quintessential American supermarket coffee brand, acknowledges that there’s a limit to the freshness of ground coffee purchased in stores (though it places that limit a bit further out, saying ground coffee “is typically at its freshest within two weeks of being roasted”).

Which brews the question: Isn’t there a difference between ground coffee staying fresh and coffee that is “freshly ground”? While ground coffee may be able to remain fresh for weeks or even months, depending on who you ask, there would seem to be a much shorter period of time in which coffee can accurately be described as “freshly ground.”

It’s also worth noting that Keurig’s “freshly ground” K-Cups have long expiration dates – some as far as a year and a half away. In 2028, will that coffee still be “freshly ground”?

Keurig did not respond to a request for comment.

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