Donate a pint of blood, get a pound of coffee

The American Red Cross Northeast Division and Dunkin’ Donuts are giving away coffee in exchange for blood. Sound like a good trade-off? This promo is valid from January 1st through January 31st, 2010 in selected areas only including Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Vermont, and parts of New York.

More Coffee with The Mayor

We’ve covered community coffee sessions with mayors and police chiefs before, here’s another one. Mayor Jeffrey Lamarand of Taylor has announced that “Coffee with the Mayor” — a series of monthly meetings for his constituents. The meetings will be done every second Tuesday.

Start your own coffeehouse

AsiaOne writes about Samantha Quek and Ernest Tan, two final-year Business Studies students at Ngee Ann Polytechnic’s School of Business & Accountancy, who also run their own cafe on campus. Smooch Cafe @ 72 sells up to 80 cups of coffee a day. Their motivation for opening up their own cafe? They wanted cheaper coffee for themselves. Samantha said: ‘It was frustrating having to pay close to $7 each time we wanted a cup of coffee, when we could probably recreate the flavours we wanted at home.’

K-Cups : balancing profitability and environmental responsibility

Boston.com writes about the success of the Keurig single-cup brewing system, and the environmental impact of their disposable plastic K-Cups. Keurig has sold a whopping 1.6 billion non-recycleable K-Cups, enough to fill several landfills. The company plans to start testing paper K-Cups this year, but only for tea. If you want your coffee quick and convenient, yet environmentally responsible, you may have to wait a while before looking at K-Cups.

The Best Coffee On The Interstate?

Pilot Travel Centers makes that claim, through their Facebook Fan page and Twitter feed. The Facebook site includes a coupon for a free beverage and lets coffee fans select their favorite among Pilot offerings like Costa Rica, Sumatra and Energy.

Don’t drink and drive, kids.