Brrrr... Iced Coffee, Frappes, Shakeratos and Other Cool Stuff

For those that haven't seen it already, China Millman writes about cold coffee drinks in today's P-G.  We're briefly mentioned a couple of times.

In the article, China talks about unique brew methods at different cafes, but also includes a curious (to us) paragraph:

The real money for cafes is in flavored, iced lattes and frozen coffee drinks, which cost pennies to make (at least at most cafes) but fetch premium prices -- usually $3 to $4 for a small and often approaching $5 for a large. That's why cafes go to such efforts to differentiate their products from the competition. Most of those frozen, flavored drinks are similar, but a catchy name goes a long way. Starbucks has frappuccinos. Caribou Coffee has Northern Light Coffee Coolers and Snowdrifts.

We must be doing it wrong.  Our frozen drinks, whether frappes, smoothies, or iced chai (and all chai for that matter) are among the menu items with the lowest margins in terms of cost of goods v. net profit. 

But we're fixing that next week ;-)

China also mentioned our Shakerato (and a recipe for making one at home).  We're still surprised (and disappointed) that Shakeratos haven't found wider acceptance here as they have in much of Europe.  It one of our favorite ways to enjoy a cold coffee.

For the record, we don't use a cold brewer here (although we have a Toddy system in the basement).  We simply brew double strength coffee right over ice.  Nothing against cold brew methods, we simply don't have the space in our refrigerators (in fact, our milk orders are now spilling over into the display case).