Pumpkin Spice Latte

The Pumpkin Spice Latte is a coffee drink made with a mix of traditional fall spice flavors (cinnamon, nutmeg, and clove), steamed milk, vanilla syrup and espresso, topped with whipped cream and pumpkin pie spice. Since 2015, it has also contained a small amount of pumpkin puree. The drink is offered by Starbucks and many other cafés on a seasonal basis, usually being introduced on the first of September—though in 2014 the drink was introduced earlier on August 25—and usually, depending on the store, will end sometime around the end of December. History: Starbucks started developing the Pumpkin Spice Latte in January 2003 after the company noticed the success of other winter seasonal drinks such as the Peppermint Mocha and Eggnog Latte and wanted to expand their seasonal reach into the fall. According to Peter Dukes, Starbucks' director of espresso Americas, developers went through a large brainstorming process in which they came up with ten products to test with consumers. Peter Dukes was also the man who led the development of Pumpkin Spice Lattes. The overall response from the ten experimental beverages came back with the Pumpkin Spice Latte somewhere in the middle of the spectrum behind ideas including chocolate and caramel flavors. However, as Peter Dukes notes, "developers realized there was something special around the pumpkin flavor, especially since there wasn't anything around pumpkin at the time". The company started experimenting with many different combinations and ratios of pumpkin to spice, ultimately deciding on a recipe with more spice in it. In fall of 2003, the final recipe was tested in Vancouver and Washington, D.C.. Sales of the drink exceeded all expectations—"we couldn't keep up initially" explained Dukes, "we had to expedite inventory to the stores at the time 7,225—now nearly 19,000." This immediate success called for a national debut of the flavor, which entered all American Starbucks stores the following year. "Pumpkin Spice Latte has become more than just a beverage," Dukes said. "It has become a harbinger of the season." Now, the company and consumers recognize the Pumpkin Spice Latte as Starbucks' most popular seasonal beverage with more than 200 million sold since it was introduced in 2003. After this, sales increased by 234% from 2008 to 2012. The beverage is known to have a distinctive aroma, which has since been branded into a range of articles, such as air fresheners and other foodstuffs, like tortilla chips, produced by companies other than Starbucks. In August 2015, Starbucks announced that their Pumpkin Spice latte would undergo a change of recipe to include real pumpkin and remove artificial colours. The ingredients announced included a "pumpkin pie flavored sauce" made with sugar, condensed skim milk, pumpkin puree, coloring and preservative. Nutrition: In 2014, the controversial pseudoscience blogger Vani Hari, better known as "Food Babe", voiced concerns about the ingredients used in Starbucks' Pumpkin Spice Latte. Hari's widely shared article "You'll Never Guess What's in a Starbucks Pumpkin Spice Latte (Hint: You Won't Be Happy)" focused on the use of Class IV caramel coloring (E 150d), which contains low levels of 4-MEI, a potential carcinogen. Caramel coloring is generally recognized as safe by the Food and Drug Administration; human exposure to 4-MEI at normal levels is considered safe by the FDA, the European Food Safety Authority, and Health Canada. Others have raised concerns over the absence of actual pumpkin in the drink, a point which Kantha Shelke, a food scientist with a background in organic chemistry and spokesperson for the Institute of Food Technologists, would say is for the best. "It's supposed to taste like the spicy components of homemade pumpkin pie, not actual pumpkin" explains Shelke. Kantha Shelke does, however, draw attention to one other health concern surrounding the Starbucks Pumpkin Spice Latte—the sugar content. "One pump of pumpkin sauce contains 8 grams of sugar, Starbucks says—in the form of both sugar and high fructose corn syrup—so a grande Pumpkin Spice Latte, with three pumps of syrup, had 24 grams of sugar just from spice flavoring, and 49 grams total." In 2015, Starbucks reformulated the flavor to include actual pumpkin and to remove artificial coloring. Sales and marketing: Starbucks has sold more than 200 million Pumpkin Spice Lattes over the last 11 years, generating revenue at a rate of at least $80 million a year in its most recent seasons. This makes the Pumpkin Spice Latte Starbucks' most popular seasonal beverage by far, outperforming old favorites such as the Eggnog Latte and the Peppermint Mocha. The success of the Pumpkin Spice Latte is often attributed to a variety of factors. For some, the Pumpkin Spice Latte has become synonymous with the beginning of fall and all of the traditions that come with it, for example the celebration of Thanksgiving. For others, the drink's limited availability is what drives their purchase. As noted in an article published in Forbes magazine, "products that are available only for a limited time have a kind of built-in marketing that can grow in impact over time." However, marketing experts at Mottis explain that the success of the Pumpkin Spice Latte can be most widely attributed to Starbucks' smart marketing campaigns. Starbucks has found numerous ways to connect to their target market of men and women ages 25 to 40 including their contemporary designs and messaging which have helped keep its brand and products top-of-mind. Moreover, Starbucks understands that their target market represents the demographics using social media most heavily. For this reason, the company has created a strong presence on numerous social media sites including Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram. Recently, the company has also added a gaming element to the drink's arrival, allowing customers the opportunity to "unlock" the drink at Starbucks stores nearby by ordering the drink with a code before the official release date. Growth of pumpkin spice: "It's been great to see the trajectory over the past decade, because when we launched the Pumpkin Spice Latte ten years ago we took a bit of a risk on a new innovation…You just didn't see pumpkin-flavored food and beverages ten years ago the way you do today," explains Peter Dukes, director of espresso brand management at Starbucks and a co-creator of the Pumpkin Spice Latte. Since the introduction of the Starbucks Pumpkin Spice Latte, many companies have worked to create Pumpkin Spice inspired products. According to Datassential Menu Trends, "restaurants' pumpkin-inspired limited-time offers are up 234 percent from 2008 to 2012, while overall limited-time menu offers have grown 143 percent over the same period." These new pumpkin-inspired menu items range anywhere from pumpkin M&M's, to Dunkin' Donuts new pumpkin flavored coffee K-packs, to pumpkin flavored whiskey. It has even moved over into the fragrance world as companies are now manufacturing pumpkin spice lotion, shampoo, and candles. Social media: The Pumpkin Spice Latte was popular before Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook were founded, but marketers at Starbucks have incorporated social media into an evolving strategy that has increased the drink's popularity even more each year. The Starbucks Pumpkin Spice Latte, often referred to by its nickname "PSL," has become a social media icon in the past few years with over 94,000 Twitter followers through the social media account @theRealPSL on Twitter as well as an additional 4,700 "likes" on the Pumpkin Spice Latte Facebook fan page. On top of that, the Pumpkin Spice Latte also has its own hash tag (#PSL) for dedicated drinkers to post photos on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. Since August 2012, there have been over 29,000 tweets that have featured the hash tag and in a single fall day the timeline deliveries of the PSL hash tag can exceed 12 million. Other variations: The Starbucks Pumpkin Spice Latte can also be made iced or as a Frappuccino upon request at a Starbucks store. Additionally, Starbucks also seasonally offers pumpkin spice-flavored instant coffee pouches.