July 22, 2008

More Tassimo Bosch Pictures and Info

We attended the Tassimo Bosch Hot Beverage System press event at the House Beautiful Kitchen pavilion last week in New York City, and we got some new facts on this new single serve coffee and hot beverage system. Over the past few days, we've been able to consolidate all of our findings into a list of new facts and features.

New Tassimo Bosch Facts and Features:

All Tassimo T Discs from the earlier "Braun Tassimo" era will be compatible
The water filtration is by Mavea. The filters appear very Brita-like.
The system does features a "steam" purge at the end instead of the messy water cycle
The Cup stand is much improved over the earlier model
The Tassimo Bosch can fit larger travel mugs
It's truly ready to brew - the brew cycle is very quiet and much faster
The water tank is easier to carry
The power cord is very thin and because it's so small it makes it seem like the Tassimo could be "wirelessly" powered
The cleaning disc is stored in the back between the water reservoir and the main machine
There's an overall reduction in power needed - as the water is on demand making the machine much more eco-friendly

Also there's going to be 2 new coffees from Starbucks coming at around the time of launch. And Starbucks and the Tassimo team are also working on other "Starbucks coffee related drinks" that hopefully will emerge sooner than later. Can you say mocha mint latte? We hope the team and Starbucks cook up some of the more fun drinks Starbucks has at their stores.

What are our thoughts and impressions? Did we like this new Tassimo designed by Bosch?

The steam purge at the end of a brew cycle.

Our impressions of the machine are the following:

We like the LED display - but it's not really the most amazing thing. It tells you when it's ready and when it's heating up - however it feels really nice to the touch
The machine is counter depth - meaning - it's truly much deeper but thinner than the earlier model. We're not sure how this will play out, but we expect it to be not too deep
The new tank and filter is a welcome addition. The filter is not a standard charcoal smallish filter - this thing looks like it can really do the job
The machine doesn't have the clear opening in the top of the brew head to view the brewing cycle. Bummer. We like being able to watch our coffee and our laundry spin around
It's pretty wild that the Bosch logo and the Tassimo logo are roughly the same size. We thought they would go with branding more in line with Tassimo - powered by Bosch
The machine does look like it's more up to date and less round - the overall aesthetic is better.
The coffee we had from the machine seemed hotter - the espresso was very good for a decaf

The back of the new unit and thin power cord.

Two models of the new TASSIMO hot beverage system by Bosch will be available in the U.S. in September 2008. One, sold in specialty and department stores, will have an MSRP of $139.99; a second, available in select grocery and mass merchandise stores, will sell for $99.99.

That's our thoughts for now. We'll have more details and a review once we receive a Bosch Tassimo single serve coffee and hot beverage system.