A whole latte love: coffee shops vs coffee machines?
By Vince Wong
Expensive gourmet coffee has taken a lot of flack this recession. The consumer gourmet coffee ambience triangle of financial incontinence is something we both love and hate. We know how ridiculous it is to spend £3 on a cup of coffee, yet we keep on doing it. Here are some sobering statistics about coffee in the the UK (and the world):
- 30% of the coffee consumed in Britain is instant coffee.
- Almost three-fourths of Brits drink coffee regularly.
- In the north east, coffee is consumed almost twice as frequently as tea.
- Next to oil, coffee is the largest trade commodity in the world.
- According to Mintel, increased coffee drinking in the UK is mostly due to expansion of the big boys like Costa, Starbucks, and Caffe Nero, a segment of the economy that was worth £1.2 billion in 2008.
Speaking of Starbucks, there are almost 400 branches of Starbucks in the UK. For the customers who fork out over £2 a day on a small latte there, it adds up to a hefty £500 a year (assuming regular lattes Mon-Fri, 1 cup a day). For those happy drinking their coffee at Caffe Nero, a small Americano can be had for £1.30, or a small Latte for £1.50. Over the course of a year, the difference of drinking coffee at Starbucks or Caffe Nero is actually quite staggering: a difference of over £110.
But why do people keep going out for coffee when a 39 oz can of Folgers costs £19, enough for 120 servings according to the label? £0.16 per cup, even with the costs of water, electricity, and filters factored in, is not a huge cost. The likely answer? Laziness, and the cost of machinery. A coffee machine to make that £0.16 cup of coffee is not cheap. Most run in the region of mid to high 3 figures.
Here are 4 coffee machine options you can consider (and if you find better deals, please share them with us!):
- The Krups XP4020 is an Espresso and Capuccino Coffee Maker. At £94.33, the programmable 15-bar pump espresso machine with Thermoblock,steam nozzle, filter holder, 32 ounce removable water tank and a stainless steel drip tray for easy cleaning makes a pretty good buy. Reviews on Amazon.co.uk are worth a quick glance at, but appear generally good.
- The Philips Senseo Coffee Machine is £149.99. Sixty-four pods of Senseo Douwe Egberts Coffee costs £20 on Amazon, equal to £0.32 per pod. Don’t let the single 1/5 rating deter you, as the reviews on Review Centre fare much better.
- The John Lewis Dualit Espressivo 84200 costs costs £155.
- The De’Longhi ESAM4200S Bean to Cup Espresso/Cappuccino maker is £349.99.
But that doesn’t answer the fundamental question: why people go out for coffee rather than making it at home, if it saves money. Is it the coffeehouse ambience? The delectable aroma of gourmet coffees being served? Or following the wisdom of crowds? Or are we all just a bunch of lazy bastards?
Posted in Deal roundup, Resources and tools, Stuff June 17th, 2009 | 22 Comments
feral trolley of the week
Most of my coffee is drunk away from home, but generally when I’m in a restaurant, I don’t frequent hellholes like Starbucks, however, I do have a nice little Gaggia at home and none of that nasty pod rubbish either, proper freshly ground beans.
Get yourself a La Pavoni, you’ll never go to Starbucks again, except to tell them how crap their coffee is.
not bothering reading the story, I’m only here becuase HUKD is down……. hacked?
HUKD seems to be broked!
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same reason as to why people go to pubs
The cunt is here as well.
Fuck off Real Bob.
In regards the coffee, people only drink the shite because they are pretnetious bastards at heart.
ah well.
Tea is for civilised people.
Thats because Tea from shops tastes like rats piss. At least coffee masks the flavour.
I dont know many people, who go around to someones house, stick on a brew and drink coffee, mostly tea like.
Almost three-fourths of Brits drink coffee regularly.
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Almost two-fourths of Brits call three-fourths three quarters, as does the other eight-sixteenths !!!
I’d rather drink my coffee from a mug than a cardboard cup. Call me old fashioned
Oh dear, Guy’s nose is still out of joint, bizarre that he chooses to refer to himself as a “cunt”, how peculiar. One can only assume that either school kicked out early today or he had detention, can anyone tell me what “pretnetious bastards” are? Is is some sort of reference Pret a Manger?
Oops, reference TO Pret a Manger, foolish man.
“Or are we all just a bunch of lazy bastards?”
Or are just you the lazy bastard?
Please, does anyone know where I can buy Folgers coffee online with reasonable UK delivery.
I have been going mad trying to find some. Cheers all
John
“Almost three-fourths of Brits drink coffee regularly”
Cut Vince baby some slack, apparently he/she is from the States where they use such fractions.
I think the coffee machines are nice but extremelly overpriced, they are only that priced cause they are a fad
We had a £4k coffee machine at work, but it couldn’t keep up with demand. So now they have purchased an actual starbucks machine, same as in the shops, at £10k. Probably a good investment, as now no one has the excuse of ‘popping out to get coffee’, which I’m sure is the real reason people are willing to pay £3 a cup
We used so much Nespresso that the machine broke. Unfortunately that also gave the boss opportunity to stop buying capsules so we’re on boring old instant these days.
Expensive machines are crap. Filtered Jamaican Blue Mountain or any other 100% Arabica Beans will beat any muck produced in these machines in these rip off so called coffee houses and at a fraction of the cost.
Matt Beeching beat me to mentioning Nespresso- I got one of these from an HKUD deal on the Siemens machine. Think usual price is around £100 but it produces excellent coffee and the pods works out at around 26p which is a tenth of what i used to pay at starbucks and nicer though its a pain you can only buy pods online/at Selfridges. I use it all the time now and its great, i do have a cafetiere and a stove top espresso maker but i they don’t get used out laziness which is why i’d never spend £400+ on a machine even if i want to.
If you really want a “HIGH” from your coffee, buy some organic Marley coffee http://store.marleycoffee.com/coffee/ , brought to by the son of Bob….Yeh Man
Great information in your blogpost, I watched a report on the tv the other day about this same thing and since I am going to be married a few weeks from now and the timing could not have been better! thanks for the info!, I have bookmarked, thanks Minh Terrebonne
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