Live data from Hacker News

For $45 Per Month, All the Coffee You Can Drink

businessweek.com

51–60 of 119 posts

Re: For $45 Per Month, All the Coffee You Can Drink

#51
post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I own 3 espresso machines and have access to 5 no matter where I am (Splitting my time between Tel Aviv and the bay area) and I still drink coffee outside.

I find it's really hard to make a homemade espresso that comes close to the one you get from a café around here. But then again maybe I should invest 10k on a new machine (and then 20k to renovate my kitchen to fit it in).

I got mine second hand (insolvency auction) for $900 for a machine that would have cost $6,000 when it was new a couple of years ago, and later I spent $400 on a grinder that goes for $1200 new. Both in good working order, apart from having to replace the hopper on the grinder ($70 for a piece of plastic was annoying).

Totally worth it though. The grinder (and coffee beans - buy them no later than a week after roast) are the most important part really.

Re: For $45 Per Month, All the Coffee You Can Drink

#52
post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Coffee is very good for you. Water from the tap is not free, it is a cost everyone pays in some way or another (built into rent or part of property taxes). Even if you still live with your parents, a dollar they spend on the water bill is a dollar less for you.

Tap water for drinking is effectively almost free, and free water fountains are indeed ubiquitous. It's the two 30-minute showers a day that kill your parents water (and heating) bills.

Actually more than anything it's the condo pool (and the dozens of owners who have not yet moved to low-flow toilets) that kills our water bill. :P

... also coffee is almost entirely water... so by your logic it's "almost free" as well.

Re: For $45 Per Month, All the Coffee You Can Drink

#53

This will only exacerbate an existing problem at coffee shops in NYC: The "Coffice" phenomenon where people use the coffee shop as their office. Now these people will feel justified basically becoming a tenant of coffee shops and leeching 4-5 coffees a day, leaving this startup with the empty CUPS. :)

I think their counting on gym membership style thing. Though even if people drink a lot of coffee.. it still is just coffee.

Re: For $45 Per Month, All the Coffee You Can Drink

#54
post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Coffee is very good for you. Water from the tap is not free, it is a cost everyone pays in some way or another (built into rent or part of property taxes). Even if you still live with your parents, a dollar they spend on the water bill is a dollar less for you.

Tap water for drinking is effectively almost free, and free water fountains are indeed ubiquitous. It's the two 30-minute showers a day that kill your parents water (and heating) bills.

if you really wanted free coffee you could probably find it somewhere.

Re: For $45 Per Month, All the Coffee You Can Drink

#55
As someone who works out of coffee shops a lot, there is pretty much ZERO appeal for me to use this kind of service, since I view my coffee costs as "rent" and prefer to pay full price plus a tip to be viewed as a good customer.

Bringing in an app saying "I'm a cheapskate that doesn't want to pay full price" is not the message I want to give to coffee shop staff.

Re: For $45 Per Month, All the Coffee You Can Drink

#56

This will only exacerbate an existing problem at coffee shops in NYC: The "Coffice" phenomenon where people use the coffee shop as their office. Now these people will feel justified basically becoming a tenant of coffee shops and leeching 4-5 coffees a day, leaving this startup with the empty CUPS. :)

I never understood the coffee shop thing. I hate working at coffee shops, people nosing around at what you're doing, never enough desk space, that feeling of guilt once you stay there too long, etc.

Re: For $45 Per Month, All the Coffee You Can Drink

#57
Are margins on coffee good enough to support this long term? High end coffee is quite expensive as is square footage in small trendy coffee shops.

I suppose the odd abuser who parks their butt for 3-4 hrs a day in the coffee shop can be dealt with in other ways e.g. they must order food to keep a seat. If they are forced to walk to the coffee shop each time they will likely max out at a few coffees a day.

Re: For $45 Per Month, All the Coffee You Can Drink

#58
post #35

How does this improve over a french press and $15 of coffee grounds?

Time saved in procuring said grounds, making the coffee, cleaning the press, increase in variety and availability (many locations) and likely increase in quality depending on your skills/preference.

Re: For $45 Per Month, All the Coffee You Can Drink

#59
post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Those health benefits are more for people in their 80s. The coffee bean is actually a poison that the coffee plant uses to deter herbivores. Not to mention a recent Danish study that suggests pregnant women should abstain from caffeine as it's lethal to the fetus.

Your first claim is illogical. THC is an insecticide, yet not a single human has ever died from consuming cannabis. NOTHING is "Good" or "Bad" without proper context. "Suggest" is not a very convincing word to me. Sounds more like a hypothesis than a conclusion. I highly doubt any ethics board would approve a double-blind clinical trial exploring how much coffee consumption is required to kill a human fetus in utero.…

You're absolutely right -- everything turns to poison in excess.

Fun fact about THC though: "[...] babies of women who used cannabis at least once per week before and throughout pregnancy were 216 g lighter than those of non-users, had significantly shorter birth lengths and smaller head circumferences."

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11843371

Post reply on HN