This just happened, and it shouldn’t be shocking: Keurig Green Mountain gets roasted. Stock drops 10%
If you don’t think of your customers, they aren’t going to think of you. How stupid do you have to be to think you can take away freedom in your product and somehow be more successful. Anyone with a brain could see this coming from a mile away. But apparently the executives of Keurig thought they could strong arm customers. Or perhaps they simply weren’t thinking.
Keurig needs to embrace the enthusiasm for their product and encourage other businesses to invest in their product by providing their own coffee in compatible cups without licensing. And consumers should be allowed to put their own coffee in the machine. How is Keurig going to lose out in the long run if they build a community around their product?
Instead, Keurig took a big hit in the short term because they were greedy, or negligent.
If anything Keurig needs to focus on increasing the quality of the coffee in their K cups, I never was that impressed. Instead of blocking people from competing, differentiate on quality.