Keurig Q1 Earnings: At-Home Workers Stock Up On K-Cups

When picturing people getting coffee from a Keurig machine, it’s easy to imagine workers waiting to make their favorite brew at a company break room, or a business traveler in a hotel room, anticipating that first cup of the day. And while the COVID-19 pandemic made those scenarios exceedingly rare in the past year, it apparently didn’t stop people from getting their single-serving coffee fix.

That’s according to Keurig Dr. Pepper’s first-quarter earnings report, which says that “accelerated eCommerce growth of K-Cup pods continued in the quarter, more than offsetting declines in the away-from-home office and hospitality businesses.” Retail consumption of single-serving coffee pods increased by 3.9 percent during that quarter and by 11 percent on a two-year stacked basis, the report said.

Keurig’s findings are in keeping with what Nestle reported in its first-quarter findings last week. The company enjoyed a 7.7 percent growth in organic sales — the strongest quarter Nestle has had in a decade — fueled largely by demand for Nespresso, Nescafe and Starbucks products. A good chunk of this purchasing happened online, either through retailers or Nestle’s direct-to-consumer channels, per the report.

“We clearly benefited from people enjoying their coffee at home rather than in the office or the cafeteria,” a Nestle spokesman told The Wall Street Journal.

And it’s not just coffee makers benefiting from people staying at home. PYMNTS’ How We Eat report found that 40 percent of consumers have been eating more snack foods during the pandemic. PepsiCo said recently that its snack and beverage sales continued to swell, even as people returned to work.

But that isn’t to say companies aren’t looking forward to things reopening. “We are assuming that vaccination efforts will accelerate and population mobility will improve,” PepsiCo CEO Ramon Laguarta told Reuters recently. “This should benefit the [away-from-home] channel as … travel, lodging, dining, education and entertainment trends accelerate.”