Stainless Steel Coffee Mugs Reviews On Stainless Steel Coffee Mugs

I purchased two of these from our local Starbucks a couple of years ago. I was very impressed with the cup, despite the $22 price tag. The sturdy carabiner-style clip works well to attach the cup to the strap on my satchel. In the morning, I fill the cup, clip it to the satchel, and out the door I go. The seal on the lid has never failed, and I really like the ring-clip that covers the drinking spout. The coffee stays hot for a couple of hours, and is at least warm right up through the afternoon if I just haven’t had the time to drink it. They perform even better with cold drinks. I can put some ice cubes into them in the morning, pour in some juice or water, and by the time I get off work, the ice is still clinking happily away. I purchased one in red, and one in white. These colors, I assume, are for Starbucks only, as I haven’t seen them anywhere else.

OK, so those are the positives. My wife and I liked those two cups so much that, when we saw the same ones in brown at Target, we bought two more. Starbucks must have different manufacturing specifications, or they ripped-off and improved upon Contigo’s design (though they look identical, right down to the dot pattern on the black rubber grips.) These two mugs may look the same as the others, but they certainly don’t perform the same. First, the carabiner clips began to loosen and wiggle on the handle after only a few uses. The lids are hard to unscrew, yet the seals are unreliable. They’ll hold just fine one time, and the next they’ll leak all over the place. The ring-clip spout is the same way: unreliable. The rubber insulation on the bottom of each cup fell off within a month (they reattach easily, but imagine my surprise when a colleague wandered into my office with a funny-looking rubber thing asking me if I lost something.) Add to these wonderful traits the fact that the coffee is ice-cold within an hour, and this cup is just not worth the price tag.

I take care of these mugs according to the directions. None of them have ever been in the dishwasher — hand washed each and every time, and I’m just not the type to leave the cup open for any period of time, as I’m a bit of a klutz and know it. The ones labeled “Contigo” are still falling apart, while the ones with the Starbucks logo work as well as they did when they were new. Hmmmm . . .

I use the Contigo-branded cups at home, where I’ll be more likely to drink coffee more quickly. The Starbucks ones are still trooping along. They’re battered and scratched now, but they’re still performing in the same impressive way that made me buy the other two. At only two bucks per cup difference, you’d think that there would be little difference between the two, but there is. Go with the Starbucks ones, you won’t be sorry.

Two stars, and that’s generous.

bw
2/5
10/08

This mug is extremely well designed and built. It has very strong construction and just looks good. The mug is expensive, but you really get what you pay for in the case.