I read about this last night, and my first thought was that it had to be an April Fools Day joke, but it is apparently a real thing that is now on sale in California, and will later be more widely available.
The product is called a Juicero, and it’s sort of like a Keurig, but for juice.
The juicer costs $699, and it apparently produces delicious cold-pressed juice. But you can’t just chop up a few fruits and vegetables and chuck them in, because the only way to use it is to insert a pre-packed plastic pack full of chopped fruit and veges, which you get from the manufacturer of the device. Each bag apparently costs from $4-10, and produces a single, 8-oz glass of juice.
The benefits of the device, according to its boosters, are that it produces incredibly fresh and high-quality juice, and that there is no cleaning up involved, because all of the crushing happens inside the plastic package, and you then just remove the package.
Problems, for me at least, begin with, but are not limited to, the cost. Not only does it cost you about 700 bucks for the machine itself, but once you have it you are apparently required to commit to a subscription of at least five juice packs per week. At up to $10 per pack, that could get pricey very quickly.
I’m sure that the first thing that comes to many people’s minds in the waste. If this product became popular, the disposal of the plastic packs would create a massive amount of waste. In that way, it is just like a Keurig.
Also, because the fruit and veges come in pre-packaged form, you are limited to the juice combinations selected for you by the company. There are currently five flavor combos, with a promise to release more later. But still, as it stands, there’s no experimentation.
Apparently the machine is also network connected by wi-fi. It’s not quite clear to me exactly what it can do, but it can apparently be programmed to re-order new packs when you’re running low. One story also suggests that it will read the QR codes on the packs themselves, and will refuse to juice the packs if they have passed their best-before date.
And now my opinion, which might reflect the fact that this was initially going to be a Pit thread.
Fuck. That. Shit.
Who the hell would buy this fucking piece of shit? The price, the waste, the fact that you’re locked into buying expensive packs from the company? No thanks. No amount of convenience can make up for that. It doesn’t surprise me that Silicon Valley venture capitalists have dumped over $100 million into this monument to “convenience.”
And i say all that as someone who does some juices. We have an Omega J8004 slow juicer, which does a good job, even if it takes a bit of chopping. My wife is actually the one who is most into juicing; i was a bit dubious about getting one, but i admit that i like the product. But a Juicero? Fuck no.
[poll coming]