Spend Less; Live More

How to lower your coffee costs and reclaim your soul

Whether home or traveling, I love to go to a local coffee shop. I set meetings at local coffee shops, I try all of the local coffees I can find anywhere I go, and local coffee shops are the best place to learn about a community. But they aren’t cheap. I want to go to them when I WANT TO go to them, not every morning as a necessary expense. When I find myself forced to grab a morning coffee at a coffee shop, the cost, time and stress takes so much joy out of my morning coffee. I’ve found I much prefer to make it at home, exactly how I like it, and the ritual itself helps me center myself and prepare for my day.

Brewing better coffee at home to make it better, cheaper, and more fulfilling

The difference between a cafe coffee and a home-brewed coffee may seem vast, but actually the secret is just some really fresh roasted whole bean coffee and a good conical coffee grinder (for a nice even grind on fresh beans). There’s nothing better. And it's way cheaper and doesn't take as long as you think. Even if it does take more time, maybe it's worth investing the time in a slower start to your morning to add years to your life.

Let’s run the numbers:

• A daily coffeeshop habit runs ~$1,500/year.
• Brewing Young Buck Coffee at home costs ~$398/year.

Coffee mathing
A 16 oz speciality coffee drink per workday costs about $6. Using 250 workdays in a year as the base (52 weeks × 5 days, minus about 10 holidays/vacation days) = $1,500/year. 

A 16 oz cup of Young Buck coffee uses 1 oz of whole bean coffee (1:16 brew ratio), which costs $1.59 (12 oz bag of Young Buck Coffee is $19, which is $1.59 per oz). Multiply that cost by 250 days and you get $397.50.

Even if you get drip coffee at the shop, you’re paying twice as much
Let’s say you don’t get a specialty drink like a $6 latte and instead you get a $3.50 black drip coffee. That’s still $875 dollars per year, more than twice the cost of making it at home, and that’s not even calculating the cost of your time. 

Sweeter coffee means longer life

Off rip, this headline sounds impossible. How can sweeter coffee be healthier? Because we’re not talking about adding sweeteners, we roast sweeter coffee. 

There are three primary differentiators in how Young Buck Coffee is roasted compared to other specialty and commodity coffees:

1. We roast in small batches. This way we aren’t stockpiling roasted coffee, we’re getting it to you as close to the actual roast day as possible, often packing and sending it on the day we roast it. This means a fresher, more flavorful coffee experience than any grocery store coffee can provide and it’s even fresher than other local roasters or coffee shops can provide.
   
   
2. We roast all of our coffees light-to-medium. By not roasting coffees too dark, we reduce the amount of bitter carbon and bring forward more of its natural properties, including flavors, anti-oxidants, and caffeine density. Darker coffee IS NOT stronger or more robust. Darker coffee has less flavor, less caffeine, and more bitterness.
   
   
3. We roast slow and low to prolong the caramelization of the bean, which brings forward the bean’s natural sweetness.
   

When your coffee is naturally sweeter, you need less milk and sugar to get it to the flavor you enjoy. You may even find that when the coffee isn’t burnt, you enjoy it black! Less sugar and milk means less money spent on these ingredients, but more importantly, it adds to your lifespan. Studies show that drinking black coffee instead of coffee with cream and sugar every day can add ~2 years to your life!

The science
According to the NIH, black coffee is significantly healthier than coffee with milk and sugar because it preserves the coffee’s natural antioxidants and is linked to a 14% lower risk of death from all causes, whereas sugary, milky coffees add empty calories and block antioxidant absorption. Read more about this landmark study on the NIH website.

Black coffee is a fermented food and great for your gut health. Young Buck Coffee is roasted to enhance these benefits and be better for your health and your coffee experience.

Your morning coffee and mental health

A 10-minute morning coffee ritual can change your life. I obsess over personal health and can share dozens of physicians on YouTube that talk about physiological reasons to drink better coffee, but none of these factors have made a meaningful, ubiquitous impact on my personal health more than my morning coffee ritual. I feel better every day, my energy level maintains well into the night, and I have a more joyful outlook on everything I experience on a regular day. Basically, I take coffee time before I look at any screens. It slows me down and lets me center myself on my terms instead of by the demands of my notifications.

10-minute coffee ritual:

1. Measure and grind the coffee, putting it into the brewer with filter (1 minute)
   
   
2. Put the kettle on. While the water is heating up, I jot down my top priorities for the day with pen and paper. (5 minutes)
   
   
3. When the water boils, I turn off the stove and slowly pour the hot water into the fresh grounds in the brewer, breathing in the incredible smell of the fresh-roasted coffee as it wafts into my face. (3 minutes)
   
   
4. While it’s brewing, after the water is poured in, I start to look at my messages and catch up on what the new day holds. (1 minute)
   

When the coffee is ready and the weather permits, I take my cup outside to listen to morning birds, sip coffee, and catch up on emails, social media, news, etc. This puts me in a relaxed, deliberate, mindful setting for my day. I hope you have many great days ahead!