Should You Save Money on Coffee?
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Money in the 20s is a blog about personal finance, investing, the economy and business school. |
Do you drink a cup of coffee in the morning? Are you worried about the latte factor? Should you start saving that pocket change and look towards building your wealth?
It’s time to debate what is arguably one of the most popular topics in the frugality realm, the cup of coffee. When I first started writing about personal finance my advice was simple. You know? Don’t drink expensive cups of coffee in the morning if you want to save money. Restrict basically anything fun and you’ll be rich.
As I progressed through college and my own financial life, I realized that the cup of coffee advice was useless. Why? For starters, I often drink more than one cup of coffee when I’m out during the day. Also, there are better ways to see bigger results. Enough of the introduction, it’s time to get into things.
Should you save money on coffee? Is it worth buying coffee?
Should you save the money and put it in a coin jar?
If you save $2 a day, you’ll save a ton of money in your lifetime. The calculations can be pretty scary actually. The problem is that you can say this about anything. Why go out when you can save the money? Why bother with traveling when you can just save? Why eat well when you can buy cheap food?
The point is that you can always use the scarcity mindset to save money. You can cut back on everything in your life. It’s not fair to simply look at price only.
What if you need that boost to start your day off?
Let’s assume that you want to cut back on caffeine due to financial or health reasons. The only problem is that not having a cup of coffee in the morning leads to you being tired all day (it happens to me). What can you do?
You can always try these alternatives for getting a boost in the morning:
- Working out.
- Eating food that provides plenty of energy (bananas or almonds).
- Sleeping more.
- Drinking more water.
I’m a daily coffee drinker so I’m in no position to be giving advice on coffee alternatives. When I don’t drink coffee, the tips above work well.
At the end of the day you need to find the perfect balance. Don’t listen to what a blogger tells you. Try out a few techniques and see what works for you. I couldn’t have gotten through college and working full-time if it wasn’t for caffeine. Perhaps you won’t need coffee to get by.
What if you don’t want to make your own coffee?
Whether you need the caffeine or not in the morning is highly debatable. The common advice in the personal finance community on coffee is to make your own coffee. Well here’s a newsflash: not all of us want to make our own coffee or cook our own food. It just is what it is. You can live in the way the world should be or you can accept it for what it is.
If you don’t want to make your own coffee in the morning, there’s nothing wrong with buying coffee. There’s no need to feel guilty. Guilt doesn’t lead to anything productive. You need to work with your weaknesses and move on from there.
I want to leave you guys with this key takeaway– focus your energy on what truly matters. Save your money where it counts most. If you hate being stuck in traffic and then having to pay $15 for parking, you can try taking the bus. If you enjoy a cup of coffee with friends in the morning, why deprive yourself? Find other ways to save money.
