Owing Money Sucks

I drink Coffee.  It can be expensive if you don’t take the time to make it yourself.  Clearly you already knew that, and some of you will continue to spend more on caffeine this year than you’ll save for your retirement.  Alas, the purpose of this post is not to make you feel bad about failing to save for retirement.  It’s simply to outline the cost of coffee in my life, which may mirror your experience.

Prior to last week, I had been visiting McDonalds about 5 times per week for a cup of coffee, which costs about $1.80 for a 16oz cup. Coffee Cartel charges about $3.90 for a 12oz cup.  I am uncertain as to the discrepancy in price.  Could Cartel’s coffee be that much better?  McDonald’s tastes pretty good.

Either way, if I had to choose between the two that I like, Dunkin Donuts and McDonalds (let’s face it, Starbucks is just too bitter) then I’m going to go with Dunkin Donuts.  My primary gripe about DD is that their cups are sub-par and there’s a 33% chance that you’ll get one that drips on you.

On to the cost.  I purchased a 12oz bag of DD grounds which came to $10.20 after tax.  Filters for my coffee machine come in packs of 40 for $1.99.  DD coffee instructions say to measure one TBSP per 6OZ cup of coffee expected.  That’s marketing for you.  That way they can say there are 24 servings in a bag.  But who drinks 6oz cups of coffee?  Please.  My mug holds exactly 16oz with the lid on.  That amounts to more than 2 TBSP per serving.  In fact, it’s exactly 2 TBSP + 2 TSP, or more efficiently, one shot glass fill to within 1/4″ of the top of the glass.  That’s the easy way to scoop.

If 24 TBSP of grounds makes 144oz of brewed coffee, that’s exactly 9 of my mugs for a total cost of  $1.13 per cup, not including a 5 cent filter.  That’s a reasonable savings per month on coffee, and I imagine I can get that cost even lower if I buy a larger bag of grounds.

Brew your own coffee, and don’t fall for the single-cup automatic machine ploy.  It takes too long to break even.