A cuppa Joe with DiMaggio

We bought a new coffeemaker yesterday. It’s a purchase we have to make every year, regardless of how much we spent on the latest and greatest Bunn or Braun or Cuisinart or Melitta model the year before. Everything is made of plastic these days. Nothing is engineered to last.

I did some online research and to my amazement, learned that Consumer Reports rates the lowly Mr. Coffee Model No. VMC-SJX33GT to be the best coffeemaker on the market, outperforming prestige brands that cost well north of $100. So I went to Target and bought one for $29.95.

Those of you of a “certain age” will remember that the first spokesman for Mr. Coffee was baseball great Joe DiMaggio. Joe, who had been retired from the Yankees for more than 20 years when he signed on the dotted line with Mr. Coffee in 1973, appeared in commercials for the brand well into the 1990s.

Funny thing is, Joe preferred instant coffee. How do I know this? Because, in 1979, at the same time he was working for Mr. Coffee, Joe was also spokesman for The Bowery Savings Bank in New York.  The Yankee Clipper was the perfect celebrity to represent a financial institution that targeted working-class New Yorkers, many of whom who considered him a god. I was working for the ad agency that handled the account. In fact, The Bowery was my account – my responsibility – and my duties included keeping Joe happy when he came to town twice a year from his home in San Francisco to shoot commercials and pose for print ads and brochures.

For the first photography session at which I was going to meet Joe, I made sure we had a Mr. Coffee machine in the studio along with a can (coffee came in cans back then – ask your parents) of every brand of coffee Gristedes supermarket sold.

Joe arrived at the studio. Being a gracious albeit nervous and star-struck host, I offered him coffee before we got down to the task at hand – posing for a series of print ads and brochures. “Name your brand,” I told him proudly. “We’ve got ‘em all, along with a brand-new Mr. Coffee.”

“I want a cup of Taster’s Choice freeze-dried instant,” he announced.

The photographer instructed his assistant to run to the nearest grocery store to buy a jar. She was gone for what seemed like an eternity. After thirty minutes or so she returned, said she had been to half a dozen stores and none carried the freeze-dried version, but that she had bought a jar of regular Taster’s Choice Coffee.

“I want freeze-dried,” Joe said, as if she had suggested he drink coffee made from ground rat turds. 

An hour and several dozen desperate calls later, a jar of Taster’s Choice Freeze-Dried was located at a supermarket several miles uptown from the Chelsea studio in which we were shooting. When the guy who answered the phone was told it was for Joe DiMaggio, he offered to hop in a cab and bring it himself if he could meet him and get an autograph. When he arrived, Joe refused to give him one.

Joe’s cuppa joe was made and served to him in a china cup with saucer. After precisely one sip, he set it aside and announced he was ready for the photographer.

Back to our new Mr. Coffee machine.

While thumbing through the instruction manual, I ran across three pages headlined, “Troubleshooting your coffeemaker.”

The folks at Mr. Coffee must assume that people who buy their machines are complete idiots. A few examples:

Problem: The “Brew Now/On” light does not light up.

Possible Cause: The appliance is unplugged.

Solution: Plug unit in.

Problem: The coffeemaker only brews water.

Possible Cause: There are no coffee grounds in the filter basket.

Solution: Add the desired amount of coffee to the filter.

Problem: The coffee is not hot.

Possible Cause: There is a power outage.

Solution: Wait for power to be restored.

Having brewed my first pot in our new Mr. Coffee machine this morning, here’s one I’d like to suggest be added to future editions.

Problem: Coffee has a distinct plastic aftertaste.

Possible cause: Cheap materials.

Solution: Make yourself a cup of Taster’s Choice Instant Coffee in the microwave.

Joe would.