
A $700 Juicer for the Kitchen That Caught Silicon Valley’s Eye - hvo
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/03/business/juicero-juice-system-silicon-valley-interest.html?ref=technology&_r=0
======
Animats
If people are willing to pay $400 for this[1], which is a manual juice press
kludged out of a $12.95 automotive jack.[2], they might go for this $700
device.

And that's before they've hooked the user on the proprietary packs. The thing
has DRM, and requires WiFi and an Internet connection just to validate the
packs. It has no other legitimate need for an Internet connection. Since it
doesn't do anything on its own, it has nothing to say to the user remotely.

Even the guy who invented the Keurig is now fed up with the company. And
Keurig was forced to give up on the DRM.[3]

[1] [http://www.amazon.com/Welles-or-Peoples-Juice-
Press/dp/B001A...](http://www.amazon.com/Welles-or-Peoples-Juice-
Press/dp/B001ACDLX0) [2] [http://www.amazon.com/Torin-T90203-Hydraulic-Bottle-
Jack/dp/...](http://www.amazon.com/Torin-T90203-Hydraulic-Bottle-
Jack/dp/B0002H3364) [3] [http://www.theverge.com/2015/2/5/7986327/keurigs-
attempt-to-...](http://www.theverge.com/2015/2/5/7986327/keurigs-attempt-to-
drm-its-coffee-cups-totally-backfired)

~~~
sudojudo
You're forgetting about _chi_ and _lifeforce_ , those alone are worth the
extra $300.

Throwing away a plastic container after every serving is what _chi_ is all
about, those other products simply don't have it!

------
oppositelock
You can eat the fruits and vegetables whole, juice and all, and you don't need
the machine and its plastic pouches. I don't get it. Why throw away all the
fiber?

~~~
memnips
You lose a lot more than just fiber in the juicing process:
[http://nutritionfacts.org/video/juicing-removes-more-than-
ju...](http://nutritionfacts.org/video/juicing-removes-more-than-just-fiber/)

~~~
tosseraccount
Not all processing is bad ...

 _" Studies show that like frozen produce, canned produce – provided it is
free of added salt and sugars – has a nutrient value that is often as good as,
if not better than, that of fresh produce."_

[http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/05/27/really-the-claim-
fr...](http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/05/27/really-the-claim-fresh-
produce-has-more-nutrients-than-canned/?_r=0)

------
jdietrich
This makes me feel genuinely sad.

Say what you like about the first dot-com bubble, but those founders were at
worst naive. In today's SV, we seem to have actively embraced malevolent
business models. Make something slightly more convenient, then use subtle
psychological tricks to exploit your customers.

A $700 juicer with DRM? Individual plastic pouches for a few ounces of
vegetables? You can dress that up with new-age buzzwords, but it's an awful
way to make a living. A mountain of waste and expense just to avoid the
inconvenience of chewing your food.

There's a vulgarity to all of this. A naked, grasping search for recurring
revenue at any cost. I recently saw a book entitled _Hooked: How to Build
Habit-Forming Products_ with a front-cover endorsement by Eric Ries. Those are
the ethics of Philip Morris, without a hint of embarrassment.

Maybe we've picked all the low-hanging fruit. Maybe there are no more good
businesses left. Maybe you can't make a profit by selling a useful product at
a fair price. Maybe the future of business is just wringing money out of
people with dark patterns. I hope not.

~~~
cylinder
I hate this almost as much as I hate the Keurig machines. Not only because the
coffee is terrible and it's incredibly wasteful, but also what it was about
American culture.

------
hashberry
I juice with the "Breville BJE200XL Compact Juice Fountain 700-Watt Juice
Extractor." $99 on Amazon[0] (4.5/5 star rating out of 4,835 reviews). You
don't have to chop anything--it's large enough to fit in small apples, pears,
beets, etc. Carrots go straight in. Clean up is a breeze with three large easy
parts (I clean while drinking my juice). It makes 25 oz of juice max versus 8
oz of this "Juice Box."

So in other words--I love juice but will be sticking with my cheapo juicer.

[0] [http://www.amazon.com/Breville-BJE200XL-Fountain-700-Watt-
Ex...](http://www.amazon.com/Breville-BJE200XL-Fountain-700-Watt-
Extractor/dp/B000MDHH06/)

------
noonespecial
Don't mean to be contrary here, but why do all of these "back to nature food"
things seem, upon closer inspection, to factor down being a way for rich
people to once again give mother earth another good poke in the eye with a
sharp, plastic, non-degradable stick?

How is this not just Keurig-ing the process of tossing veggies from the local
into your blender into a cross-country, plastic-generating, fuel-burning
waste-a-thon to prove how very extra-special and enlightened you are? C'mon.
Chi? Life force? In a disposable plastic pouch dropped off by Fed-Ex? Dawkins
would have a field day.

Sorry for the rant.

~~~
dnewms
That's exactly what it is, K-Cups of juice, and it's genius. People love
throwing things away instead of cleaning.

And like K-Cups, Juicero has already created a system to lock out generic
veggie bags past their patent with the barcode scan to check freshness.

The $700 might be worth it if you were able to use your own reusable veggie
squash bag, in addition to their premixes. But, it seems like the smart
machines themselves might be sold at-cost if they've built out a distribution
network for expensive pouches.

~~~
tommoor
$700 is selling them at cost? Seems terribly unlikely

------
DarkTree
For me, eating healthy and exercising routinely requires a lifestyle change.
It almost seems contradicting, but if I am going to consistently eat healthy,
it needs to consume a larger portion of my life. By sacrificing the money and
time to choose and buy vegetables/fruits, prepare, and consume them , I am
more likely to continue this process because I don't want to waste that
sacrifice.

So for me, products like Juicero that reduce the healthy part of eating to a
sacrifice-less convenience would make it a novelty item that wouldn't force me
to change my lifestyle and therefor fail to create consistency and tenacity in
my healthy eating habits.

From my buying perspective, this product would be just grouped in with the
other 'magic' pills and 'get-rich-quick' solutions to becoming healthier.

~~~
ctl
So your philosophy is, "I only do healthy things if they're also painful"?
That doesn't seem productive.

~~~
DarkTree
Sure, you can boil anything down to a contrived sentence that misses the
point, but I never once mentioned it being painful. It's much more about
building habits, and it's up to you to decide if habits are meant to be
painful or not. Choosing healthy ingredients, researching recipes, cooking
while I listen to a podcast, and then enjoying a nice meal with good company
isn't what I consider painful.

------
thatfrenchguy
Just use a blender, seriously. These hundreds of millions of dollars could be
used to do something useful for society.

------
IkmoIkmo
This must be a joke, $120m in funding so you can turn solid food into liquid
food, which actually detracts from the food, for just $700.

~~~
rpgmaker
Not to mention that if this catches on those packaged vegetables would be the
easiest thing to replicate.

------
steve19
The first thing I thought was surley this is an April fools but here is an
article about them from January

[http://www.businessinsider.com/juicero-
raises-120-million-20...](http://www.businessinsider.com/juicero-
raises-120-million-2015-1)

It seems insane to pay $700 for a press and then paying for expensive chopped
up vegetable and fruit in a bag... just so you can consume a whole lot of
sugar.

~~~
tashoecraft
[https://www.juicero.com/the-packs/just-greens/](https://www.juicero.com/the-
packs/just-greens/) 2g of sugar per 8oz. While it is the only one with even
close to that amount, it's the one I'd get (I used to make a juice very
similar). That's barely any sugar.

Everyone writes off juice as having "a ton of sugar", and yeah, if you make it
with only fruit it will. If you use vegetables, the thing that is hardest to
eat a lot of, then you are fine.

$700 is alot, although any high quality juicer is going to be in the range of
300-500+. A hydraulic press juicer is going to be the best you can get,
extracting everything out of the fruit and vegetables without building up
heat.

The cost of the bags are at about $5-$8(I see $5 and $6 on their website so
far). Which isn't really that bad. There is zero cleanup, chopping, and
planning . I juiced daily for about 2-3 months straight for breakfast, and it
takes up a lot of time and money. It was about 30-45 minutes to chop and
prepare everything, then sit and run it through the juicer, then disassemble
the juicer to clean everything.

The costs for all vegetables added an extra $30-$40 a week to my grocery bill.
But I ate the same juice every day as that is what I could prepare for. It was
a struggle to make sure everything was still good, and I was throwing away
food weekly because it goes bad (sizes of packaged produce varied so it was
tough to plan). I wasn't buying organic vegetables, so I saved a bunch of
money there.

Honestly for the time savings and the hassle free way to consume, I think the
product can work. This would be a great addition to many companies break
rooms, and far healthier than any of the other options they provide. I have no
idea whether then can make back all the money that's been invested, but we
shall see.

~~~
hashberry
How many ounces of juice did you drink per day? $5-$8 for 8oz of juice seems
pricey. That's the size of a "Short" Starbucks drink... I don't even want my
coffee that size.

~~~
tashoecraft
more then double that, probably should have mentioned that haha

------
DIVx0
I like juice and I like kitchen gadgets but wow, this thing is expensive. The
only thing it would buy is not having to hassle with owning and using a
juicer.

One is still left with the per drink cost, which at these prices does not
quite compete with simply going to a juice bar.

This is a very niche and expensive product. I'd worry about the company being
around long enough to realize the benefit of owning it.

------
st3v3r
The fact that this thing has raised $100 Million in funding is why I can't
take anyone seriously when they talk about VCs, especially when they talk
about them making decisions.

------
dankohn1
This is one of the funniest articles I've seen the NY Times publish in months.
It seems intentionally written to be referred back to when people ask in
future decades about the Roaring Teens Funding Bubble.

Relevant: "Fruit juice isn't much better for you than soda. Let's stop
pretending otherwise." [http://www.vox.com/2016/3/25/11305614/soda-juice-
energy-drin...](http://www.vox.com/2016/3/25/11305614/soda-juice-energy-drink-
consumption-nutrition)

------
rsmsky1
I wonder if people who are into juicing really want to have vegetables cut way
in advance as they're less nutritious that way. It's nice though that they
show the farms the vegetables come from. But anyway I think smoothies are
healthier.

------
gohrt
NYTimes has evolved quite a bit since Paul Graham failed to crack them in
[http://www.paulgraham.com/submarine.html](http://www.paulgraham.com/submarine.html)

------
notlisted
Get out of my way! Off to create the Guicero(sic) Replacement Pouch. Buy once.
Chop chop. Press press. Rinse twice. Repeat. Just $65. Dishwasher-safe version
$119. Call now, and you'll receive a 2 month farm-to-table membership valued
at $200.

I think I need about $20MM and four boxes of Ziplock bags to get started.
Who's with me!

~~~
1812Overture
This is why they have a camera in the juicer to take a picture of the juice
packet's QR code which it sends over your wifi to verify with Juicero
headquarters that you are using an authentic juice packet. I'm sure with a
hack saw, a soldering iron, and a decent knowledge of reprogramming embedded
systems you could turn it into a less smart juicer.

~~~
notlisted
Meh. Keurig tried the same thing. People cut the lid off a legit pod and taped
it on the lid of the refill thingamabob or in the DRM-Keurig machine itself. I
accept the challenge!

(I was also facetious. If this isn't an long con April 1st joke, I'll convert
all my tech stock into cash next week because I've seen this nonsense in the
first bubble...)

------
mikeryan
KP's Podcast "Ventured" talks a bit about the Juicero pitch.

[https://soundcloud.com/venturedpodcast/pitching-a-
vc#t=4:00](https://soundcloud.com/venturedpodcast/pitching-a-vc#t=4:00)

------
tobbe29
There could be a small market for that product after all. Think there are a
lot of people in SoCal that would pay insane amounts for trendy products like
this.

------
fl0wenol
Exactly. This is the epitome of waste.

Fuck these terrible 1%-er vegans and the horse they walked gently over here
with.

~~~
dang
Please don't post flamewar-style comments to HN.

We detached this comment from
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11400605](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11400605)
and marked it off-topic.

~~~
ars
Can you retitle this to say "Juicer" instead of "Juice Box"?

Saying "Juice Box" is just click bait so people will gasp at the idea of a
juice box so expensive, then you read it and realize it's actually a juicer.

(Sorry for putting this as a reply to this thread - not sure how else to ask
for a retitle.)

~~~
dang
Sure. But in the future, it's best to email hn@ycombinator.com with requests
like these.

