The first commercial instant coffee was made in Invercargill, New Zealand by David Strang, who owned a coffee and spice works factory. He applied for a patent for his "soluble coffee powder" in 1889 under the name Strang's Coffee.
In 1901, the first successful technique for manufacturing a stable powdered product was invented in Japan by Sartori Kato, who used a process he had developed for making instant tea.
For the first time in 1909, instant coffee is mass produced. George Constant Louis Washington (1871-1946), and he makes the product after seeing, when he was in Guatemala, coffee powder that had deposited on the spout of a a silver coffee pot.
Nescafé was started in 1930 when a group of Brazilian bankers asked Nestlé to help find a way to increase coffee consumption and decrease the enormous surplus of coffee production in Brazil. The background to this inquiry was that Nestlé through it dry milk product has a worldwide reputation and that Brazil produced coffee in abundance, such that the country was forced to destroy part of its crops so as not to see prices fall through the floor on the world market.
Coffee specialist, Max Morgenthaler, was given a task to create a delicious cup of coffee simply by adding water. Morgenthaler, who studied chemistry at the University of Bern, was working for Nestlé when the Brazilian government approached the food and drinks group about producing a soluble form of coffee.
Max and his team worked hard to find a new way to make instant coffee that would retain the coffee’s natural flavor.
After seven years of development by chemist Dr. Max Morgenthaler, Nescafé was born. Max has invented a convenient soluble coffee powder that preserves the bean’s real aroma, but lasts a lot longer.
The breakthrough beverage was finally introduced to the world on 1 April 1938. The company applied the technology at its Hayes factory, west London.
Named by using the first three letters in Nestlé and suffixing it with ‘café’, Nescafé became the new name in coffee.
The new instant coffee process involves drying equal amounts of coffee extract and soluble carbohydrates, and the technique produces a better tasting instant coffee which quickly becomes a popular product.
In 1954 - Nescafé develops a method to produce instant coffee using only coffee, having previously added carbohydrates for stabilization.
Nescafé processing in history
