 | |
| Owner | Massimo Zanetti Beverage USA |
|---|---|
| Country | United States |
| Markets | Worldwide |
| Previous owners | Nestlé Sara Lee |
| Website | http://www.hillsbros.com |
Hills Bros. Coffee is a maker of packaged coffee, founded in San Francisco.
| | |
| Owner | Massimo Zanetti Beverage USA |
|---|---|
| Country | United States |
| Markets | Worldwide |
| Previous owners | Nestlé Sara Lee |
| Website | http://www.hillsbros.com |
Hills Bros. Coffee is a maker of packaged coffee, founded in San Francisco.
The company has its origins with the sons of shipbuilder Austin Hills (1823–1905), who was born in Rockland, Maine, and ran a business in California building clipper ships. His sons were Austin Herbert Hills (1851–1933), and Reuben Wilmarth Hills I (1856–1934). [2] [3]
When Reuben and Austin began to produce roasted coffee there were at least twenty-five other companies already engaged in some form of coffee production and distribution in San Francisco including, of course, the well-known Folger Company started by William Bovee (which began in San Francisco thirty years earlier). Most of these coffee businesses were started by family groups which contributed to the growth of San Francisco. San Francisco in the nineteenth century was ripe for the importing and roasting of coffee. The foundation for commercial production of coffee dated back to the 1820s when English planters brought coffee to Costa Rica. By the early 1840s German and Belgian planters followed with coffee plantations in Guatemala and El Salvador, two of the several Central American countries where Hills Bros. would obtain its mild coffee beans. During the Gold Rush (1849) San Francisco rapidly expanded and grew. Coffee was imported and sold, after roasting, to restaurants and hotels. Yankee gold miners and others without equipment to roast and brew their own coffee, populated "coffee houses." In 1873, two brothers, Austin Herbert and Reuben Wilmarth Hills arrived in San Francisco from their home in Rockland, Maine with their father Austin who had come to California some years earlier. Five years later in 1878 A. H. and R. W. Hills established a retail stall to sell dairy products in the Bay City Market under the name of their new partnership Hills Bros. Their small business expanded in less than four years with the acquisition of a retail coffee store titled Arabian Coffee & Spice Mills on Fourth Street in San Francisco. In two more years (1884) still larger quarters were occupied at Sacramento and Sansome Streets. [4] [2]
In 1898, Edward Norton, of New York, was granted a United States patent on a vacuum process for canning foods, subsequently applied to coffee. Others followed. Hills Brothers, of San Francisco, were the first to pack coffee in a vacuum, under the Norton patents, in 1900. [5]
In 1900, Hills Bros. were the first to pack roast coffee in vacuum sealed cans. [6] They incorporated under the Hills Bros. name in 1906. [7] In 1926 Hills Bros. moved its operations to 2 Harrison Street in San Francisco, [2] a Romanesque revival building on the Embarcadero designed by George W. Kelham that is now a city landmark. [8] The roasting operations once made the surrounding area smell like coffee, according to a Key System "March of Progress" style public service film from 1945. [9] In January 2012, the building had become home to Wharton | San Francisco, a satellite campus of the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania. [10] A Wharton sign can be currently seen on the Embarcadero side of the building. Google LLC and the Mozilla Corporation also have offices on several floors of the building. [11]
A symbol of an Arab drinking coffee called "the taster", introduced in 1898, [12] was designed by an artist named Briggs in 1906 [2] but was replaced by a new, European-American, "taster" to represent the original founders in 1990. [13] [14] In 1976, Hills Brothers hired American singer Sergio Franchi as their TV spokesperson to introduce several lines of specialty flavors. [15] Noted character actor John Zaremba was the primary commercial spokesperson for Hills Brothers in the 1970s and early 1980s, portraying a fictional coffee bean buyer. [16]
In 1930 Hills Bros. expanded into Chicago. [2] On 2 November 1938, Hills Brothers Coffee Company filed a petition to rezone 37 ½ acres for industrial purposes to build a plant in Elmhurst, Illinois, north of the North Western tracks to where Schiller Street extended beyond Geneva Avenue. Opposition caused Hills to drop its request. [17]
During World War II, the company's metal containers were replaced with glass jars. [1] In 1984 they purchased the name and manufacturing facilities of the Chase & Sanborn Coffee Company. [18]
In 1985 Nestlé bought Hills Bros. and MJB coffee companies. [2] [19] Hills Bros. opened a new roasting plant in Suffolk, Virginia in 1988. [20] The San Francisco headquarters were closed in 1997, moving operations to Nestlé's U.S. headquarters in Glendale, California. [19] Nestlé sold Hills Bros. to Sara Lee in 1999. [2] [21] Massimo Zanetti Beverage USA purchased the brand in 2006. Massimo Zanetti Beverage USA is headquartered at the Suffolk plant. Austin E. Hills was, formerly, chairman of the board of directors. [22]
Instant coffee is a beverage derived from brewed coffee beans that enables people to quickly prepare hot coffee by adding hot water or milk to coffee solids in powdered or crystallized form and stirring. The product was first invented in Invercargill, the largest city in Southland, New Zealand, in 1890. Instant coffee solids refers to the dehydrated and packaged solids available at retail used to make instant coffee. Instant coffee solids are commercially prepared by either freeze-drying or spray drying, after which it can be rehydrated. Instant coffee in a concentrated liquid form, as a beverage, is also manufactured.
Folgers Coffee is a brand of ground, instant, and single-use pod coffee produced and sold in the United States, with additional distribution in Asia, Canada and Mexico. It forms part of the food and beverage division of The J.M. Smucker Company. Folgers roasts its coffee in New Orleans.
Peet's Coffee is a San Francisco Bay Area-based specialty coffee roaster and retailer owned by JAB Holding Company via JDE Peet's. Founded in 1966 by Alfred Peet in Berkeley, California, Peet's introduced the United States to its darker roasted Arabica coffee in blends including French roast and grades appropriate for espresso drinks. Peet's offers freshly roasted beans, brewed coffee and espresso beverages, as well as bottled cold brew. In 2007, Peet's opened the first LEED Gold Certified roastery in the United States. Peet's coffee is sold in over 14,000 grocery stores across the United States.
Home roasting is the process of roasting coffee from green coffee beans on a small scale for personal consumption. Home roasting of coffee has been practiced for centuries, using simple methods such as roasting in cast iron skillets over a wood fire and hand-turning small steel drums on a kitchen stovetop.
Nescafé is a brand of instant coffee made by the Vevey-based company Nestlé. It comes in many different forms. The name is a portmanteau of the words "Nestlé" and "café". Nestlé first introduced their flagship coffee brand in Switzerland on April 1, 1938.
Chock full o'Nuts is an American brand of coffee that originated from a chain of New York City coffee shops.
Roasting coffee transforms the chemical and physical properties of green coffee beans into roasted coffee products. The roasting process is what produces the characteristic flavor of coffee by causing the green coffee beans to change in taste. Unroasted beans contain similar if not higher levels of acids, protein, sugars, and caffeine as those that have been roasted, but lack the taste of roasted coffee beans due to the Maillard and other chemical reactions that occur during roasting.
A cereal coffee is a hot drink made from one or more cereal grains roasted and commercially processed into crystal or powder form to be reconstituted later in hot water. The product is often marketed as a caffeine-free alternative to coffee and tea, or in other cases where those drinks are scarce or expensive.
MJB Coffee is an American brand of coffee that is owned by Massimo Zanetti Beverage USA.
Coffee cupping, or coffee tasting, is the practice of observing the tastes and aromas of brewed coffee. It is a professional practice but can be done informally by anyone or by professionals known as "Q Graders". A standard coffee cupping procedure involves deeply sniffing the coffee, then slurping the coffee from a spoon so it is aerated and spread across the tongue. The coffee taster attempts to measure aspects of the coffee's taste, specifically the body, sweetness, acidity, flavour, and aftertaste. Since coffee beans embody telltale flavours from the region where they were grown, cuppers may attempt to identify the coffee's origin.
Coffee substitutes are non-coffee products, usually without caffeine, that are used to imitate coffee. Coffee substitutes can be used for medical, economic and religious reasons, or simply because coffee is not readily available. Roasted grain beverages are common substitutes for coffee.
Caro is a brand of roasted grain drink, a caffeine-free coffee substitute made of roasted barley, malted barley, chicory, and rye. It is manufactured by Nestlé and was first introduced in West Germany in 1954. It is available throughout Europe as well as other markets including New Zealand and Australia. It is imported to the United States under the name Pero and sold in Spain as Eko.
Chase & Sanborn Coffee is an American brand of coffee created by the coffee roasting and tea and coffee importing company of the same name, established in 1864 in Boston, Massachusetts, by Caleb Chase (1831-1908) and James Solomon Sanborn (1835-1903). It says that it is the first coffee company to pack and ship roasted coffee in sealed tins.
Alfred H. Peet was a Dutch-American entrepreneur and the founder of Peet's Coffee & Tea in Berkeley, California, in 1966. Peet is widely credited with starting the specialty coffee revolution in the US. Among coffee historians, Peet has been called "the Dutchman who taught America how to drink coffee." Peet taught his style of roasting beans to Jerry Baldwin, Zev Siegl and Gordon Bowker, who, with his blessing, took the technique to Seattle and founded Starbucks in 1971. Peet later distanced himself, however, from the Starbucks trio as they experimented with ultra-dark roasts. "Baldwin never learned anything from me," Peet was later quoted as saying.
Massimo Zanetti Beverage Group is an Italian coffee company that owns brands such as Segafredo and MJB. With turnover of around US$1.2 billion per year, it claims to be the biggest private company in the coffee industry.
Blue Bottle Coffee, Inc., is a coffee roaster and retailer once headquartered in Oakland, California, United States. In 2017, a majority stake in the company was acquired by Nestlé (68%). It is a major player in third wave coffee. The company focuses on single-origin beans.
Seattle is regarded as a world center for coffee roasting and coffee supply chain management. Related to this, many of the city's inhabitants are coffee enthusiasts; the city is known for its prominent coffee culture and numerous coffeehouses.
Gaviña Gourmet Coffee is a coffee importer and roaster located in Vernon, California. It produces the Don Francisco's Coffee, Gaviña and La Llave coffee brands, as well as private label coffees.
Chameleon Cold-Brew is an American coffee company based in Austin, Texas. It is known for its cold brew coffee and is credited as the first fair trade and organic cold brew company in the United States. In 2014, Chameleon Cold-Brew was given the Best Coffee award by BevNET.
Their father, Austin Hills, born in Rockland, Maine, in 1823, built clipper ships. In 1863 he joined several other Maine friends in search of the fabled California gold. . . . The two original patriarchs, brothers Austin Herbert and Reuben Wilmarth Hills, died in 1933 and 1934, respectively, but their children carried on.
Processed by Grace Meyer, volunteer, 1996; Deirdre Ryan, intern, 1996; and Vanessa Broussard-Simmons, archivist, 1996.
free download
Hills Bros. Coffee, founded in 1906, has grown to become a market leader in the coffee industry, offering the highest quality coffee beans throughout the United States
This Romanesque Revival building was designed by George Kelham.
Twenty-two years after he retired as a vice president and director of Hills Bros. Coffee Inc., 86-year-old T. Carroll Wilson... hired as a warehouseman in 1924... in 1900 the company was the first coffee roaster to package in vacuum cans
But it was in San Francisco in 1878 that Austin and Reuben Hills purchased the Arabian Coffee & Spice Company, and they made Hills Bros into one of the longest-lasting purveyors of coffee in America. Integral to the company's success was the "Arab gentleman" image that became its brand up through the 1950's. So iconic did he become that, today, the company has commemorated him with a bronze statue at the entrance of its old factory....In 1990, Hills Bros adopted a new "taster" figure designed to evoke its turn-of-the-century American founders....
{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)San Francisco-based Hills Bros. bought coffee roasting plants in New Orleans, Miami and Casa Grande, Ariz., and will continue to produce ground and instant coffee under the Chase & Sanborn name, according to Rosalind Reidy, a Hills Bros. spokesman. Chase & Sanborn, based in Miami, filed for protection under Chapter 11 of the Federal bankruptcy laws in May 1983. Terms of the purchase were not made public.
Nestle plans to sell its U.S. roast and ground coffee operations, including the Hills Bros., Chase & Sanborn and MJB brands. "We will announce something in the coming days," chief executive Peter Brabeck said. Nestle decided to put its American ground and roasted coffee operations up for sale because it intends to focus on coffee-based beverages. In an attempt to stimulate flagging instant coffee sales, Nestle is relaunching its Nescafe brand in the United States, introducing new varieties and flavors.
Coffee Pacifica, Inc. announced that Austin E. Hills, a former chairman of the board of Directors of Hills Bros. Coffee, Inc. was appointed a special advisor to Coffee Pacifica.
as presented by Thomas Carroll Wilson, Philadelphia District Sales Meeting, September 9, 1966
Twenty-two years after he retired as a vice president and director of Hills Bros. Coffee Inc., 86-year-old T. Carroll Wilson... hired as a warehouseman in 1924... in 1900 the company was the first coffee roaster to package in vacuum cans
T. Carroll Wilson, a longtime employee (1923-1966) and board member of Hills Bros. Coffee, died on 16 November 1997, at the age of 96.
(Alaska Open File Report 109)
