Convenience Rules

On my travels this summer, I happened upon the unofficial Heinz museum, housed in a public art gallery in Leamington, Ontario, longtime home of a large Heinz plant. 

These "2 minute soup" machines caught my attention.  There wasn't a lot of information, so I'm a bit fuzzy on how they worked. They were still a good reminder that convenience has been on consumers minds for a very long time. 

Campbell's Soup At Hand seems to be addressing the same desire.

Self-heating cans have also been used, most recently by Wolfgang Puck for a self-heating latte. (NY Times article here, free subscription required).  Nestle used to have a self-heating coffee product in the UK, but it apparently has been taken off the market.

OnTech is the leading can provider, although the underlying concept has apparently been used in the military for many years. OnTech kindly provides a summary of their marketing research here and here although they don't appear to have a lot of customers, other than Hillside (an affiliated business?)

Our take:

We want convenience, but it doesn't always trump other considerations, such as taste and price.  A self-heating can is probably heavy, and you still have to plan ahead enough to take the can with you.  Plus, there's enviro-guilt to deal with when you dispose of the can. I'm guessing that these are some of the reasons that self-heating cans have yet to take off, while microwaveable soup in an insulated container is doing just fine.

On the other hand, as emergency supplies for hurricane season (as the PalmBeachPost suggests) price may be less of a consideration, and a self-heating cup of coffee could be just the thing.