How long can you last with 1 cup of iced coffee?
With spring in the air (and in the gale-force winds whipping through Boston), something else begins to percolate as temperatures warm: iced coffee. In last week’s issue of Grub Street, Kurt Soller wrote an article that explains why an iced version costs more than your regular cup of hot coffee.
Here are some quick facts:
- A cold cup of brew includes 62 cents worth of ground coffee vs. 35 cents worth of beans in a hot cup o’ joe
- Paper cups for hot coffee cost 6 cents, plastic cups for cold coffee are 9 to 12 cents each
- Renting an ice machine could cost 12 bucks a day (never mind when that ice machine breaks…)
- Are you a straw or stirrer person? Well, that’s another 1 or 2 cents added
- All included - total costs for a cold cup of coffee add up to about 80 cents
- To maintain profit margins, coffee places charge your morning energy boost on the rocks at $3 a cup
Don’t see the connection to SCBB just yet? Well here it is:
Every cent adds up to a value. Maybe the value is your ability to plow through another busy morning at work; maybe it’s the value of looking less haggardly after last night’s too-fun adventures. The point is, you are the one who decides the value of that $3 cup of 62 cent cold-brewed beans.
What if you gave that value to Ms. T and her family of teenage boys? Trust us, they don’t need any more energy and caffeine in that house. Instead, theirs is a need of sustainable value: a future that will last long after your final sip. Now that’s a BIG value. 100% profit margin included.
