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Sunday, November 14, 2010

My name is Piccolo. I am the Newest Wasteful Product

Hello, my name is Piccolo. I love to fill the landfill with my little empty capsules of milk and flavorings. I am not frugal, just cute. I will waste your money and leave you sad and lonely as I sit on my shelf and wait until you can afford to buy more capsules. Remember, I am marketed as easy, not frugal. You can get the same thrifty results with your microwave or teakettle or any vessel to heat water.

Piccolo


Piccolo
Walmart was giving away free, huge cups of  cappuccino last Saturday, made one cup at a time in this machine--Piccolo is the name. This cost $99 or thereabouts. There are other larger, still cute, and named machines to buy from the site I have given you below.

One use machine
This won't work for anything but cappuccino, according to the woman who was giving away the samples. And, you must buy capsules to use it! This won't work for me or any frugal person.

Waste
There are little sealed packets (they call them capsules) that you MUST use with this cute little machine. You cannot use your own coffee from a large container. You cannot use your own milk or cream. You cannot have just any flavor.  Each use of the machine uses two packets. Even a person who is not green can see this is a landfill nightmare. Why not make a machine that does not require so much waste? Why not make a machine that allows a person to buy the ingredients in large quantities. Oh, yeah! Isn't that what cappuccino machines do?

Oh, yeah--more waste. Each cup had a sleeve added just so you would not be so stupid as to burn your hands on the hot, insulated cup.

Capsules
Beside the cup below is a capsule that MUST be used in this marvelous, little machine. Yes, it takes two capsules for each cup--Nescafe Dolce Gusto Flavor Capsules.
Espresso
How it works
You put water in the top of the machine. Then, you place the cup in the cup place in the front. THEN, you place a white (milk?) packet in a place above the cup. When that finishes emptying in to the machine, you place a brown (flavor?) into the place where you removed the white packet. The whole thing is through in nothing flat...well, that is after you put water, cup, white, and then brown packet and let it do its thing. (BTW, the woman called the capsules "white" and "brown." She had a typed page of instructions she was following, so I am sure the instructions named the capsules.)

Appearance
I was just a bit leery of my cup of hot chocolate flavored cappuccino because it was all white like milk with only a bit of brown, the chocolate flavor, right in the center of the cup. Yes, it came with a stirrer!

Stirring
It seems I spent an inordinate amount of time stirring this drink. That annoyed me a great deal.

Taste
Delicious!

Value
For the money the little capsules must have cost, it certainly could be made cheaper at home. Poor value!

How this might work well
If you live alone, have gobs of money, and don't care about the environment, and don't mind your cappuccino without froth.

Where was the froth?
None of the cups I saw prepared had any froth at all.
cappuccino
Okay, I am not promoting this. But, you can go to this site to see this marvel of wastefulness.

The gift that keeps costing the recipient 
If you were to receive this at Christmas, you would be obliged to keep buying the capsules to use your gift. I predict this will be in many yard sales for years to come.
Your turn
Would you buy this? Hmmm, I saw something about peach tea. Okay, you can have cappuccino and tea, maybe. Still, this is a wasteful product that appears to be aimed at Christmas shoppers. Isn't this outrageous?

(PS--I corrected all my spelling...lol. It was late. And, I must have been thinking of Timothy when I misspelled "leery.")



4 comments:

  1. Hi Linda, thanks for commenting over at CC. Wow, you must be some computer whiz to know that dead beef question! Even the people that wrote the article didn't know it-some old IT guy from back in the day told them. Regarding this Piccolo thing, I agree. Total waste. Funny you should do a post on it-I have been half-plannin a post about kitchen gadgets and my personal theory that if there is a suitable way to achieve the same results with basic equipment, new equipment should not be purchased. And corporate America does not really care about making your life more convenient or less expensive, any more than it cares about the environment. It cares about one thing and one thing only. Profit margin. Sad, ain't it? Great post.

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  2. CC, Thanks. feel free to link my post when you do the blog about kitchen gadgets. I just stand and stare at some items for sale, wondering who on earth would buy the overpriced, low quality, one-purpose gadget. Then, yard-sale afficionado that I am, I see these priced to sell and never taken from the box. That is how I bought my breadmaker I have right now. I have had four breadmakers, I think. When I find a newer or better one, I sell the one on hand. Of course, breadmakers are one-purpose gadgets and huge. But, somehow it seems they are more worthy of attention when bought new-in-the-box for $3. No, I am not a computer whiz at all. I just attend two computer clubs where I am the most ignorant person there...ignorant of computers, that is. I pick up things that are just trivia until a moment comes along where I shine...lol.

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  3. I agree..... I would never buy this gadget. I would much rather use a tea pot or just boil water on the stove..... and as far as those single serving capsules go..... I feel they are a total waste of money. Thank you for your insight... Have a Fabulous & Frugal Day!!!!

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  4. De-ette, I was ranting about this to a friend. He has seen them in doctors' offices and thought they were great. Stunned, I asked him if he would buy one. "NO," he scoffed, "that is too expensive for the home." He had seen a commercial where the father made coffee, and the mother came and made tea, while a child made hot chocolate, and another just got water for oatmeal. Since I don't have tv, this was a revelation to me, the commercial, I mean.

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Okay, hoping the annoyances have gone away.