The Biggest Coffee Recalls In US History

America's love for coffee is big business. The U.S. coffee industry generates $84 billion per year — more than any other nation. Yet as any major player in the food and beverage industry knows, with great power comes a great amount of product recalls. Since the start of the 21st century, recalls for coffee have continued to disrupt business operations in larger and larger numbers. More importantly, these recalls have perpetually put the health and safety of the public at risk.

The most common reasons for a food or drink recall are: contamination from a foodborne pathogen, contamination from a foreign material, and an undeclared allergen due to product mislabeling. In the majority of recall cases, errors in the manufacturing process are responsible for the distribution of faulty (and potentially dangerous) goods. With ready-to-drink coffee, risk or spoilage caused by improper sealing or temperature abuse are problems that arise during production or transport.

Major coffee recalls have a relatively short history because there are so many more coffee products on the retail market than there were in past decades. Canned coffee, cold brew, and other ready-to-drink bottled coffees are sold under a vast number of brand names today. The U.S. is also home to over 3,000 coffee roasters. A bigger supply means the chances for something to go wrong with a batch of product increases as well. These are the largest recalls that have infiltrated the U.S. coffee trade.

One of the biggest recalls for coffee in U.S. history is active at the time of this writing. On March 13, 2025, Massimo Zanetti Beverage USA issued a voluntary recall for its cherry-flavored decaf coffee because a portion of it had been mislabeled. Certain 12-ounce bags, sold under the brand name Our Family as Traverse City Cherry Decaf Coffee, were filled with fully caffeinated coffee grounds. Consumers who must avoid caffeine for health reasons, such as the elderly or pregnant women, were left vulnerable by Massimo Zanetti's mistake. So far, 692 cases of ground coffee (3,114 pounds) have been recalled due to caffeine mislabeling.

The bags of Our Family Traverse City Cherry Decaf Coffee were distributed by the SpartanNash Company based in grand Rapids, Michigan. SpartanNash oversaw the delivery of the mislabeled coffee to 15 states primarily throughout the Midwest, Northwest, and Southwest. The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) set the recall level as Class II, with consideration to the health complications someone with a caffeine sensitivity or allergy might suffer if the mislabeled coffee was consumed. All of the recalled coffee was sold under a single batch code: V 15:37 C and printed with a best by date of August 3, 2025.

Times were tough for Snapchill in June 2024, when a recall was announced concerning the safety of a lot of its canned coffee products. The coffee cans were recalled over fears they could be contaminated with Clostridium botulinum — the bacteria that causes botulism. An oversight in Snapchill's production process was serious enough to warrant a recall of every single brand of canned coffee it made with expiration dates between June 16, 2024 and April 16, 2025. Snapchill, named for a coffee cooling method, produced canned coffee for over 150 brands.

The trouble began when Snapchill received word from the FDA, notifying the company of its failure to register its low-acid canning process with the agency. This is a federal regulation upheld by the FDA in order to reduce the chances of a botulism breakout — which could turn deadly. The low acid, low-oxygen environment within canned products are ideal conditions for Clostridium botulinum to develop. The recall affected nearly 300 products. Many of the brands were local artisan companies, but others like Intelligentsia, Dead Sled Coffee, and Snapchill's own name brand were more nationally known.

Although it was never confirmed that any of Snapchill's canned coffee was contaminated by Clostridium botulinum, the FDA wasn't willing to let the unregulated processing practices at its facility fly under the radar. The recall appears to have been too much for Snapchill. The company's Instagram page went dark for good in May 2024 and its website is no longer operational.

Trader Joe's is quite possibly the king of foreign matter food recalls. From bugs inside broccoli cheddar soup to rocks hiding in its cookies, Trader Joe's is no stranger to the foreign matter faux pas. In April 2023, the popular grocery chain was at it again, but this time the recall was for instant cold brew coffee. Trader Joe's sold its powdered cold brew in 3.5-ounce glass jars, but instead of simply serving as a vessel for the product, glass pieces were also inside it.

Glass and your throat do not mix — ever. Ingesting even a tiny glass particle can cause bodily injury, so keeping these glass-tainted coffee jars on Trader Joe's shelves was not an option. The grocer voluntarily recalled 14,112 cases of cold brew instant coffee in the name of public safety. The recalled coffee weighed in at 74,088 pounds.

Trader Joe's made a public statement about the recall, explaining that the company was notified by its supplier that the jars of instant cold brew may contain fragments of glass. The supplier was Regal Trading Inc, of Totowa, New Jersey. No consumer injuries were ever reported in association with this recall.

There's no such thing as a small batch at Costco, so pretty much any recall that affects its products will come with big numbers. Costco's in-house brand Kirkland Signature has a presence in practically every part of Costco's warehouse, including the coffee section — which was the site for one of the biggest coffee recalls the U.S. has ever seen. On February 17, 2023, cans of Kirkland Signature Colombian Cold Brew Coffee were recalled over fears that metal pieces were lurking inside.

In a letter issued to Costco members from Berner Food and Beverage, the maker of the cans, the company stated that the recall was initiated after a bolt was found inside a can intended for retail sale. The amount of cold brew cans hauled out of Costco after the recall announcement were staggering. The adulterated product was distributed to 13 states and sold in packs of 12. No less than 2,772,852 cans of Kirkland Signature Colombian Cold Brew Coffee were removed from Costco's inventory.

Part of what made this recall especially huge was how many batches of product were involved. A single lot number can contain tens of thousands of product units and in the case of Kirkland Signature Colombian Cold Brew Coffee, nine lot numbers were included in the recall. There were no reports of injuries stemming from Costco's recalled cold brew cans.

One of the first major players in the ready-to-drink coffee segment was Starbucks. When Starbucks and PepsiCo collaborated on a joint venture called the North American Coffee Partnership (NACP) in 1994, the companies formed a supergroup that still dominates the canned and bottled coffee industry today. PepsiCo already had facilities for canning and bottling up and running, and Starbucks relied on that resource to get mass amounts of its coffee drinks on store shelves. On September 26, 2021, a huge recall exposed a glaring problem with PepsiCo's canning operation.

For PepsiCo, churning out Starbucks Doubleshot cans was all in a day's work — when the factory's machinery was functioning as it should. PepsiCo produced three batches of Starbucks Doubleshot using faulty equipment, and as a result, some cans weren't adequately sealed. There were a lot of cans. The FDA recalled one batch of Starbucks, Starbucks Doubleshot Espresso and Cream, Starbucks Doubleshot Espresso and Light Cream, and Starbucks Doubleshot Espresso and Salted Caramel Cream due to the risk of premature spoilage. The total number of recalled Doubleshot cans was over 250,000.

The canning conundrum dealt a forceful blow to Starbucks' Doubleshot supply. On the bright side, the recall did prevent any illness related to the compromised beverage from being reported. NACP was able to recover from what was presumably a drastic financial loss and get Starbucks Doubleshot back into stores, but the ordeal was one of the biggest PepsiCo recalls to date.

The absence of Black Rifle Coffee's bags of Mac V Whole Bean Coffee on store shelves may have triggered some fans in 2021, but it was in the public's best interest not to drink it. A recall for Black Rifle's 12-ounce Mac V Whole Bean Coffee bags took effect on June 29, 2021. The voluntary recall was issued because some coffee bags may have been contaminated by plastic fragments. The FDA classified Black Rifle's coffee recall as Class III — the least dangerous designation. Though the recall didn't pose as severe of a threat to consumers as a Class I recall, Black Rifle still had to pull a ton of Mac V Whole Bean Coffee from distribution — 19,367 bags to be exact.

The coffee was produced at Black Rifle's facility in Manchester, Tennessee and the bags at-risk for containing plastic were not sold outside of Tennessee. The veteran-founded company opened a roasting plant there in 2018. Black Rifle was founded in 2014 and the foreign contaminant incident in 2021 was its first major recall and hasn't had another since, but that doesn't mean its production process has been problem-free. In 2022, Black Rifle announced it was voluntarily withholding multiple lots of its packaged and canned Espresso Mocha coffee from retail sale due to quality issues.

Tampa, Florida-based Buddy Brew Coffee wasn't exactly buddies with the FDA in December 2019 when a bunch of its cold brew coffees were recalled due to bacterial contamination. The problem boiled down to a quality issue rather than the products in question actually testing positive for foodborne bacteria, therefore no specific bacterial pathogen was named in the recall. The voluntary recall pertained to the brand's Organic Cold Brew Buddy Brew Coffee Bolt and Organic Cold Brew Buddy Brew Coffee Bolt Nitro.

The recall affected 10.5-ounce cans of Buddy Brew Coffee Bolt and, interestingly enough, 5 and 7.5-gallon kegs of cold coffee. The recalled coffee was distributed to both the wholesale and retail markets and although it was only distributed throughout Florida it was a lot of coffee. In total, 2,344 Buddy Brew cans and 263 kegs were recalled. The quantity pulled from sale was 16,816 pounds. It appears that Buddy Brew was able to make it through the recall without any consumers falling ill, and the FDA terminated the recall on May 12, 2020.

When it comes to full-sized bottles of cold brew, Califia Farms has been a fixture of this category for years. One way Califia set itself apart in the cold brew segment was by expertly mixing its 48-ounce cold brews with almond milk. Its Mocha Cold Brew Coffee with Almond was a particular standout — but an August 2018 recall due to contamination from cleaning chemicals threatened its widespread popularity. The recall affected a whopping 24,507 cases of product.

The FDA classified the recall as Class II due to the impermissible cleaning chemical contaminant mixed in with the cold brew. The recall was traced back to a mishap that took place during processing. While sanitizing the pasteurizer, cleaning chemicals found their way into Califia's Mocha Cold Brew. Five lot codes were implicated in the recalls — three lots were distributed throughout the U.S. and two others were shipped to Canada. No complaints or illnesses were documented in connection with the Califia recall.The FDA terminated the recall on February 21, 2019.

Product packaging that catches the eye can help boost business, but if that package also happens to be mislabeled, the FDA will recall it. Chun Yuen Trading Co. found that out the hard way in September 2017 when thousands of pounds of its Instant Reishi Coffee 4-in-1 was recalled for undeclared milk. The company, based in South El Monte, California, failed to list the presence of a major allergen on its coffee packages, forcing a Class I recall — the most serious designation a recall can receive. A Class I recall is given when consumption of the recalled product could cause death.

Chun Yuen stated that the mislabeling occurred after the wrong artwork was sent to the print shop that created the coffee's packaging. This incorrect packaging did not include an allergen warning for milk, which left consumers at risk. The recall implicated 12.7-ounce packets of Instant Reishi Coffee 4-in-1 and amassed 12,658 pounds of product. Reishi coffee combines extracts from the reishi mushroom — which is known to contain medicinal properties — with traditional coffee. Mushroom coffee is also favored for having a lower caffeine content than traditional coffee. Chun Yuen's Reishi 4-in-1 Instant Coffee is currently sold under the brand names CB and Hoiyen.

Death Wish Coffee sounded like little more than an edgy brand name ... until it was discovered that the brand's canned coffee really was capable of killing people. On September 18, 2017, Death Wish Coffee Co. voluntarily recalled all of its 11-ounce cans of Death Wish Nitro Cold Brew after it was determined that the company's canning process was insufficient in preventing the growth of botulin, the lethal toxin that causes botulism. The recall affected 80,777 cans of Death Wish Nitro Cold Brew, that was available nationwide.

Canned goods are particularly susceptible to botulin contamination because the bacteria thrives in an anaerobic environment with low acidity, which a lot of canned food and drinks provide. Deviations or missteps in processing leaves cans vulnerable to hosting these extremely dangerous foodborne pathogens and has been the source of huge canned product recalls in the past.

As hard as it may have been to recall all those cans, Death Wish Coffee took responsible action to prevent illness in its customers. In a public statement following the recall, Death Wish Coffee founder Mike Brown said, "Our customers' safety is of paramount importance and Death Wish Coffee is taking this significant, proactive step to ensure that the highest quality, safest, and of course, strongest coffee products we produce are of industry-exceeding standards." Death Wish Coffee also agreed to halt production of its Nitro Cold Brew until an additional step had been integrated in its production process.

Mr. Brown, the friendly face fronting Taiwanese company Mr. Brown Coffee, has been gracing ready-to-drink coffee cans since 1982. What started as canned coffee became much more — Mr. Brown has gone on to sell a range of instant coffee packets and various milk tea products. In October 2008, multiple Mr. Brown products vanished from U.S. stores. Mr. Brown voluntarily recalled six types of its instant coffee and one type of milk tea in connection with the tainted milk scandal that had been plaguing China at the time.

In September 2008, after approximately 300,000 infants and children in China suffered kidney and urinary tract-related illnesses and six deaths were reported, an egregious scandal was made public. Melamine, a nitrogen-based compound commonly used in plastic kitchenware and not meant for consumption, was purposely being added to the Chinese milk supply as a haphazard way of boosting its protein content. The contamination sent shockwaves through the globe and constituted one of the largest deliberate food contamination incidents in history.

Due to the scandal, the FDA wasn't taking any gambles on products that may contain milk derived from the melamine-tainted supply. U.S. consumers were cautioned against consuming Mr. Brown Instant Coffee as well as Mr. Brown Milk Tea due to the contamination threat. Recalls of Mr. Brown Instant Coffee spread to Canada as well. Luckily, no illnesses linked to melamine poisoning were reported in either nation. None of Mr. Brown's canned coffees were implicated in the recall.

Oklahoma City-based Neighbors Coffee has been roasting beans since 1972, but in August 2004, the family-operated company was behind the first significant coffee recall in U.S. history. It wasn't because Neighbors let its commitment to quality slip, the recall happened because Neighbors slipped tree nuts into a bunch of its coffees and forgot to tell people.

Neighbors is really into flavored coffee, which is why so many varieties were implicated in the recall. Flavors ranging from the standard Hazelnut and Toasted Almond to Neighbors originals like Coco Cabaret, Mochadoodle, Holiday Cheer, and Frangelico Creme had to be recalled because of the undeclared allergen. A total of 25 flavored coffees were pulled from the retail market. They were sold in 8-ounce, 1-pound, and 5-pound bags. Altogether, the recall accounted for 44,878 pounds of Neighbors Coffee.

Neighbors fell victim to some big regulatory changes that were happening at the federal level. In 2004, Congress passed the Food Allergen Labeling and Consumer Protection Act (FALCPA) requiring all food manufacturers doing business in the U.S. to not only declare major allergens on a product's ingredient list, but print a warning on the outer packaging as well. Tree nuts were one of the eight major food allergens included in this legislature, alongside peanuts, eggs, milk, fish, crustacean shellfish, wheat, and soy.