I decided to get AI to run some numbers to see how much my daily habit has actually cost me.
For context, before getting an espresso machine, my wife and I only drank about 6 café lattes a week combined. Since December 2022, we’ve been making 2 lattes a day at home (14/week, minus holidays). I plugged in my rough costs: £25/kg specialty beans, milk (£1.60 for a 4-pint jug), 300ml bottled water per day (£2 for 5L), and power.
The Numbers (~3.5 Years)
Cost per latte at home: ~70p (all variable costs included)
Total spent at home (~2,500 lattes): Roughly £1,770
What our OLD habit would have cost at cafés (~1,080 lattes): ~£3,800 to £4,000
What 2,500 lattes at a café WOULD have cost: ~£8,800 to £9,400
Actual Net Savings: ~£2,000 to £2,250 saved versus our old routine, even while drinking more than double the coffee.
The classic “espresso machine math” trap is assuming you’d buy 2 café lattes a day if you didn’t have the machine. But even accounting for the consumption surge, paying ~70p a cup still beats high-street prices.
If you go higher on the price per kg the numbers change
£30/kg: 79p per cup
£35/kg: 88p per cup
£40/kg: 97p per cup
£45/kg: £1.06 per cup
£50/kg: £1.15 per cup
£70/kg: £1.51 per cup
£100/kg: £2.05 per cup