JOI Nut Milk - Cost and Comparisons

JOI started with a problem -- the founders couldn’t find a great tasting pure almond milk! All of the ones they tried tasted like almond flavoured water with a few other ingredients thrown in. 

JOI nut milks win on multiple factors:

 

Number of Ingredients:	1
Quality	Just 1 Ingredient (JOI)
Price	As little or as expensive as you want! You control how much water vs JOI so you control the cost!
Save Time	Add 1 TB JOI nut milk base to 1 cup of water and blend!
Taste	Smooth, nutty. No gritty nut milk consistency
Shelf Life	The tubs last up to 1 - 1.5 years in your pantry! A glass of fresh made nut milk lasts up to 7 days in the fridge.
Reducing Waste	Save room in your recycling bin and no more cartons going to landfill!

Depending on which size you buy, the price can range from $0.88 / cup - $1.22 / cup for non organic and $1.10 / cup - $1.48 / cup for organic if made following JOI's instructions. 

Let's dive into the current nut milk choices, monthly budget, quality, price and taste.

 

Nut Milk Choices on the Market

If you are dairy free or just love almond or cashew milk, nut milks are a staple part of your food budget. 

Before JOI, to make clean nut milk at home, you had to:

1) Make it yourself at home by grinding and soaking nuts; or

2) Find a nutmilk with no additional ingredients at the store (which is difficult).

Making it yourself takes time. Store bought nut milk brands often have extra ingredients like gellan gum, locust bean gum, carrageenan, and more. 

 

If you have house made nut milk, you are fighting to finish it within 2-3 days because the shelf life for freshly made nut milks is a few days. We also know this because a local coffee shop actually stopped making their own house made nut milk for coffees during the pandemic because they were not able to guarantee that they would not have to throw it out. This is a HUGE reason local coffee shops do not make fresh nut milk in house - it is actually to avoid throwing out nut milk that has gone bad. 

How much of my monthly food budget goes to JOI?

(no pun intended)

What if I told you that you can make Starbucks level lattes at home for under $9 / week (excluding the cost of coffee)?

Let's get right to it!

Option #1: Purchase an 8lb / 3.6kg JOI Pail 

	Cost / Day	Cost / Week	Cost / Month
1 cup / day	$ 0.88	$ 6.16	$ 26.40
2 cups / day	$ 1.76	$ 12.32	$ 52.80
3 cups / day	$ 2.64	$ 18.48	$ 79.20

 

Option #2: Purchase a 15oz / 425g JOI tub

	Cost / Day	Cost / Week	Cost / Month
1 cup / day	$ 1.22	$ 8.54	$ 36.60
2 cups / day	$ 2.44	$ 17.08	$ 73.20
3 cups / day	$ 3.66	$ 25.62	$ 109.80

 

Bonus: You can cut back on the Starbucks budget because with JOI nut milk lattes are so creamy (ask our Customer Friends), you can make Starbucks level lattes right at home, and without nut milk filler ingredients!

 

Quality

The reason for the price is the quality of JOI vs typical store bought almond milk:

	JOI	Store Brand
% Almonds	6%	2%
Protein	3g	1g
Fat	8g	2.5g
Ingredients	Almonds, Water	Almonds + fillers, stabilizers

 

Your typical almond milk in the store is made up of approx. 2% almonds (and usually includes other ingredients than just almonds and water such as stabilizers etc.) whereas JOI, with the suggested mix (1Tbsp per cup of water) is around 6%. The average store bought almond milk contains around 1g of protein and 2.5g of fat, a serving of JOI contains 3x that at 3g protein and 8g of fat.

Price

In order to compare the price of JOI to a store bought option, you need to dilute JOI to the same level of almonds and nutrition as store brand.

	JOI diluted to Store Brand	Store brand	Pure Almond Milk Brand
Cost / Serving	$ 0.41 / cup*	$ 0.44 / cup	$2 / cup (organic)

 

* up to 10% lower if multiple tubs bought at the same time. 

JOI diluted to Store Brand - a 15oz JOI container would give us 81 servings if we were to dilute it from 6% to 2% almonds and 3g protein / 8 g fat to 1g protein / 2.5g fat.

Store brand cost - $3.50 for 8 cups of almond milk in grocery store

Pure Almond Milk Brand (organic) - $8 for 4 cups 

The closest price comparison in Canada is a nutmilk found at specialty stores with a short shelf life. The ingredients are just almonds, water and sea salt (all organic).  

Taste

A question we often get is "how is JOI different from nut butter"

JOI calls this the elephant in the room and you can read their detailed answer here our summary below: 

• no gritty nut milk consistency - because the process of making this nut base was designed to create creamy nut milk. Never salted or roasted, the process is to cold mill and steam pasteurize the nuts, which is different from the grinding and milling process to create nut butters. This means - no separation or gritty goop, just ON DEMAND creamy nut milk!
• additional nutrition - nuts must be activated to release their enzymes to make digestion and nutrient absorption easier. JOI's steam pasteurization takes care of this because it blanches the nuts to remove their skins. Nut butters do not have enzymes released because they are made by grinding nuts.
• does not meet the legal definition of nut butter as defined by the USDA - this is real! the US Department of Agriculture defines nut butters as able to spread easily. JOI nut bases are strong and thick!
• cheaper - At first, the sticker price on a tub of JOI may feel like a big jump from a jar of nut butter, but it is more cost effective! You will need a LOT more of nut butter (with extra ingredients and a really good blender) to make a creamy nut milk.    

 

 

JOI Price Breakdowns Per Serving

15oz / 425g JOI tub  (Almond or Cashew, non organic)

 8lb / 3.6kg JOI Pail (Almond or Cashew, non organic)

Sizes	Cost per serving	Total Cost	# of servings
Individual	$  0.88	$  199.99	228

 

15oz / 425g JOI tub  (Almond or Cashew, organic)

 

 8lb / 3.6kg JOI Pail (Almond or Cashew, organic)

Sizes	Cost per serving	Total Cost	# of servings
Individual	$  1.10	$  249.99	228

 

 

And so this is why we carry JOI! You can jump to the collection to check out JOI Almond and Cashew nut milk bases!