• Wall Street Journal, Thursday, October 14, 2010 9:31 AM

Nestlé, Kraft and Green Mountain Coffee Roasters are all about to launch advertising campaigns touting the merits of their single-serve coffee makers. Mars' Flavia system and Royal Philips Electronics and Sara Lee's Senseo maker are also competing in a category that's suddenly brimming over, despite a price tag that's generally between $100 and $400, Suzanne Vranica reports.

"It's a fast-growing market and the potential is huge because many [U.S. consumers] haven't heard about the single-serve concept," Frederic Levy, president of Nestlé's Nespresso North America, tells Vranica. Print ads touting the brand as "unique" and "refined" broke last week in upscale magazines.

A TV, print and online ad campaign for Kraft's Tassimo machine, dubbed the "Brew Bot," breaks this week. The tagline is "7 different beverages, one smart little bot." And Green Mountain's Keurig machine will be supported by a $20 million advertising effort starting next week.

"People are spending more time in their homes and consumers are rethinking some of their spending habits," says T.J. Whalen, vp of marketing at Green Mountain.

Read the whole story at Wall Street Journal »