COFFEES Dunkin' Donuts serves espresso

Dunkin' Donuts promises to offer espresso without the pretense.
BOSTON (AP) -- Dunkin' Donuts, a place where regular people go for a regular coffee, is starting to offer a brew associated with fancy restaurants and upscale shops: espresso.
But the idea isn't to move Dunkin' Donuts upscale. It's to bring the espresso line of beverages -- cappuccino, latte and the like -- down to the masses.
"The stereotype was that Starbucks and other fancy coffeehouses, you had intellectuals and yuppies drinking their espresso drinks there. It's not necessarily true," said Steven Eckenhausen, president of Long Island, Calif.-based Schaerer USA, which sold the espresso machines to Dunkin' Donuts.
"Dunkin' is pulling it out of that environment. They're democratizing the beverage," he said.
Select group
Dunkin' Donuts, based in Randolph, Mass., has 5,700 shops, the bulk of them in New England. A select group already has the espresso line. Most in New England will have them by the end of September, the rest by next summer, the company said.
CEO Jon Luther said there are several reasons for delving into fancy coffee. Among them: Customers were asking for it.
Still, customers won't find specially trained baristas or a change in Dunkin' Donuts' simple countertop atmosphere. No piped-in jazz here. Machines will make the drinks cheaper and more quickly than in boutiques, and the quality won't suffer for it, the company said.
A Dunkin' Donuts large cappuccino will cost about $2.69, while the comparable Starbucks size -- a "venti" -- costs about $3.40.
"Anybody can drink espresso, and we're showing that you don't have to wait seven minutes in line to get it," Luther said. "We've removed the mystique around the cappuccino. We don't have to be pretentious," he said.
Starbucks said it does not comment on competitors.
One who's critical
Peter Femino, owner of an independent chain of Boston-area shops called Red Barn Coffee Roasters, said a mechanical quick-fix drink isn't the same as one prepared by hand.
"There's a process involved ... that makes it a real latte," he said.
He still understands why Dunkin' Donuts wants to offer the drinks. "There's a niche for it in the market," he said.
John Glass, a Boston-based analyst with CIBC World Markets Corp., follows the coffee shop industry and said the move makes sense. "It is a sign that espresso-based beverages have hit the mainstream," he said.
Paul Kiami, a manager of seven franchise Dunkin' Donuts, said espresso-based drinks have driven about 5 percent of his stores' sales in the month since they got the machines. Once the official advertising campaign begins, he expects the number to go up to 10 percent to 15 percent.
Tommy Coye, a 39-year-old dance teacher, said he is not a fan of highbrow coffee shops but is becoming an espresso regular at Dunkin' Donuts.
He's hooked
"I just tried it a few weeks ago, and I was hooked," he said, as he sipped his iced latte. "I like the taste here, but I really like the lack of pretense."
But Massimo Castellano, 31, a Boston financial adviser, thinks Dunkin' Donuts should stick to what it's known for and not venture into specialty coffees.
He said he'd never drink a Dunkin' Donuts espresso. "It just doesn't sound right."