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I Also Heart Coffee

By Beth. Filed in finances, food  |  
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Coffee Beans So, we’ve all heard that buying coffee is one of the big ways that a lot of people blow huge amounts of money without even realizing it.  Drink a coffee a day? If it’s simple $2 coffee, that’s $730 a year… and if it’s a $5 fru fru Starbucks drink, you’re talking $1,825 a year! That’s enough to cover my car insurance for the year… or almost three months rent1!!

So, how much cheaper is it to make coffee at home?  Well, being the scientist that I am, I decided to do some fancy pants maths to figure that out.  Where by “fancy pants maths” I mean counting how many pots of coffee I can make from a bag of beans.  Now, I’m a bit of a coffee snob, so I won’t drink cheap, crappy coffee.  My coffee of choice is Fair Trade Organic Bolivian from Level Ground Trading2  A 300 g bag of this deliciousness makes ~500 fluid oz of coffee.  If you divide that up into 12 oz3 cups, that’s 42 coffees.  And though a 300 g bag of beans officially costs $15, I always stock up on it when it’s on sale for $114.  That works out to 26 cents per 12 oz cup.

Let me me say that again:

  • 12 oz cup of coffee at a coffee shop = ~$2.00
  • 12 oz cup of coffee at home = $0.26!

That’s EIGHT TIMES cheaper!  Even if I paid full price for the beans, it would still only be $0.36 per 12 oz cup!  And remember, I’m not talking about some crappy tasting coffee – this is fair trade, organic and absolutely delicious!  In fact, I actually like my homemade coffee more than stuff from a coffee shop!

Given my cheapness, I’ve been pretty good about not buying coffees out since I’ve been on my budget, but even *I* didn’t realize that that making it at home was so much cheaper! Now that I’ve done the math, I have a really, really hard time buying coffees!

Image Credit: Posted by Refracted Moments on Flickr using a Creative Commons license.

  1. granted, I do have pretty cheap rent [↩]
  2. as usual, I have no financial interest in this company.  I know it’s surprising, but they haven’t paid me off for this endorsement.  Though, for the record, I’d *totally* take a bribe in the form of free samples.  I’m just sayin’. [↩]
  3. or a Starbucks tall [↩]
  4. and on very special days, it’ll be on sale for $9, and then I *really* stock up! [↩]

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This entry was posted on Wednesday, July 7th, 2010 at 9:18 pm and is filed under finances, food. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

3 comments to “I Also Heart Coffee”

  1. Comment by Dave:
    Thursday, July 8th 2010 at 7:29 am

    Geez, I was already having a hard enough squeezing two bucks out of Sarah for the occasional Timmie’s, and now you’re using hard science against me?

    THANKS SO MUCH.

  2. Comment by Beth:
    Thursday, July 8th 2010 at 10:00 am

    Sorry about that, Dave. Maybe you can use pregnancy brain against her – “Honey, I didn’t spend $2 on Timmie’s, you must have spent it somewhere and forgotten. You know, because of your condition.”

  3. Comment by Sarah in Ottawa:
    Sunday, July 11th 2010 at 5:23 pm

    The guy can get free coffee in his office! FREE! Plus – he brews fair trade, organic, Equator coffee at home. Such a waste of cash.

    Even more of a waste? Buying tea. I cannot stand to pay for it, so I bring my own teabags in and make it at work. I buy stuff when it’s on sale ($2 for 20 or 24) rather than pay at least $1 per cup.

    My work colleagues hit Starbucks at least twice a day and/or only drink Vitamin water. It’s nutty to me!

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