I have been involved in the coffee industry for a while and am starting to accumulate a little knowledge about what motivates employers to get quality coffee for their staff. There are a number of reasons. Some employers value the positive impact on human resource management by rewarding employees with premium coffee in the office.
Others consider reducing their environmental footprint by eliminating the use of disposable coffee cups that would otherwise be used if the coffee was sourced from the local café. But the most common reason, especially in these tough economic times, is often financial gain for both employees and the employer. So I decided to do a bit of economic analysis on this aspect and found that the cost of coffee breaks to the economy is quite impressive. To understand it better, consider, for example, a small office with 10 employees. Following the analysis for our case study office
Employ perspective:
Our average small office example has 10 coffee drinkers. Each one drinks an average of 2 cups a day. The average wage is $ 30 per hour. Each coffee break requires a trip to the local cafe, waiting in line, paying, and returning to work. Typically the journey also involves waiting for the elevator (twice), waiting at the crosswalk traffic lights to cross a busy street in the city’s business district (twice). All of this while juggling the city crowd with piping hot coffee in hand. At best, this quick trip takes at least 10 minutes. 10 minutes twice a day for 10 workers, it ends up being 52,000 minutes a year (paid by the company). At the assumed hourly rate, this translates to a cost of $ 26,000 per year to the economy!
Employee perspective:
Let’s look at the same situation from the employees’ perspective. The average cost of a regular coffee in Sydney is about $ 3.50. 20 coffees a day for 260 business days add up to $ 18,200 per year! On average $ 1,820 per employee!
Conclusion:
Combining the two perspectives, we can see how the true cost of coffee breaks costs our average small office $ 34,000 per year. It is difficult to project these figures onto the total number of offices in Australia. However, a conjectural figure published by the Sydney Morning Herald (Coffee in Figures – July 18, 2006) indicates a possible 1.23 million cups served in Sydney alone every day. You can do the math and make a conclusion about the total cost of your coffee breaks.
An intern office coffee solution Instead, it would take a maximum of 2 minutes per break: walk to the kitchen, make your coffee, go back to your desk, and enjoy. You can get an office coffee solution to conveniently provide cafeteria-quality coffee at your workplace at a fraction (starting at $ 0.80 per cup in Sydney) of the price you would pay otherwise.