USP–The Little Bead of Glue…

To the coffee-drinking world the cardboard coffee sleeve is indispensable. Come 6 or 7 a.m. at the local coffee hole it’s not a good

hot commuter coffee

thing when the stack of cardboard coffee sleeves runs out. Hoards of crabby commuters assault the half-awake coffee guy–sorry…barista.

As an avid coffee-drinker, coffee-ADVENTURER, I seek to try out many different kinds–Stumptown (Portland, OR), Peet’s and Seattle’s Best, Satellite (Albuquerque)….and of course I duck into the ubiquitous Starbucks. Occasionally a cup really stands out, but recently what’s won out over taste even is the grabability of the cardboard coffee sleeve. Have you noticed this phenomenon?

Coffee sleeves are a dime a dozen, made by dozens of differnet companies, many intended as advertising for the coffeehouse or as a moving graphic ad, nevertheless a million that all SEEM to do the same thing. But do they really?

About a month ago I was slinging my car down the Merritt Parkway in Connecticut — traffic moves briskly–drinking my hot coffee from Bruegger’s (Okay, so I enjoy a cup of flavored hazelnut coffee with my bagel) and everytime I picked up the cup to drink the sleeve slipped off. Talk about distraction and scalding hot hands at 70 MPH. I struggled everytime I went to take a sip of coffee. Come to think of it I had had this happen another memorable driving time, but with a coffee from another vendor altogether, and luckily had lived to tell about it. How come I cannot recall this ever happening with my Starbucks coffee?

This morning I decoded my hot cup of Starbucks with its stuck-fast sleeve. While I was driving I noticed no slippage, not even a

simple fix

hint of slip.

When I got home I dissected the little cardboard sleeve. Ah HA….those ingenious devils have included on the inside of their coffee sleeves an elusive little bead of clear glue. Until it comes in contact with the hot coffee cup, then melts just enough to bond, you don’t even notice it’s there. In fact, I had to rip it off the outside of my cup to conduct this little analysis.

here’s the sticky:

If I can avoid hurtling along in traffic at the edge of disaster because of an errant coffee sleeve, I know where I’ll be buying coffee for the commute. Talk about a distinguishing USP….