Chameleon Cold-Brew facts for kids

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Chameleon Cold-Brew is an American coffee company located in Austin, Texas. It is well-known for its special cold brew coffee. This company was the first in the United States to make cold brew coffee that was both fair trade and organic. In 2014, Chameleon Cold-Brew won the Best Coffee award from BevNET.

How Chameleon Cold-Brew Started

Chameleon Cold-Brew was started in 2010 by two friends, Steve Williams and Chris Campbell. Steve Williams had worked in the coffee business for a long time. He owned a coffee shop in Austin called Bennu Coffee. There, he made a special cold brew coffee recipe.

Chris Campbell had a business degree and worked as a consultant. He met Steve at a neighborhood barbecue. They decided to work together. Chris would use his business skills, and Steve would use his coffee knowledge. Their goal was to bottle and sell the delicious cold brew coffee from Bennu Coffee.

They worked with R.C. Beall, a famous coffee roaster in Austin. He helped them make the cold brew perfect. They tried many ways to brew coffee and used different beans and water. Finally, they found the best recipe. In 2011, Chameleon Cold-Brew sold its first products in Austin. You can still find the original cold brew at Bennu Coffee's two locations in Austin.

Growing the Business

Chameleon Cold-Brew grew by working with local companies. For example, Texafrance helped them bottle their coffee. By 2012, their products were in 225 stores across 18 states!

In 2013, the company got money from an investment group called Fortitude Capital LLC. This money helped them send their coffee to more places, advertise, and build up their company.

Chameleon Cold-Brew started selling its products in natural and specialty stores like Wegmans and H-E-B. They also reached six regions of Whole Foods Market. Even Target Corporation wanted to sell their coffee. At first, Chameleon Cold-Brew said no because they didn't want to grow too fast. But later, they agreed to a test. Their coffee was sold in 81 Target stores in Texas, Colorado, Oklahoma, Kansas, and Louisiana. In 2014, they won the Best Coffee award from BevNET.

By 2015, Chameleon Cold-Brew was sold in over 520 Target stores across the United States. That same year, they raised more money to expand their business and create new products.

In 2017, a very big food and drink company called Nestlé bought most of Chameleon Cold-Brew. This helped Nestlé grow its coffee business and offer more ready-to-drink options.

What Chameleon Cold-Brew Sells

Bottles of Chameleon Cold-Brew.

Chameleon Cold-Brew offers coffee that is ready to drink. They also sell coffee concentrate. You can mix this concentrate with water, milk, or other liquids to make your own cold brew coffee.

Their products are made using a special 16-hour brewing process. They use only fair trade and organic coffee beans. They also use special water from the Texas Hill Country.

You can find their products in three main flavors: black, mocha, and vanilla. In 2015, they added new ready-to-drink flavors like espresso, chicory, and Mexican coffee. These were first sold only at Whole Foods Market. They also have concentrate flavors like Caramel, Mocha, and Texas Pecan. In 2016, Chameleon released a large one-gallon size of their black concentrate.

Chameleon Cold-Brew cares about the environment. They use 100% recycled packaging for their products. They also ship their products using a special program called carbon offset through Green Mountain Energy. This helps reduce their impact on the environment.