coffee shop

Starbucks Evenings: Bring on the Booze

March 20, 2014 By Jeffrey Strain Leave a Comment

Does Starbucks (SBUX) want to be your local bar? Not exactly, but they sure would love to be your destination for beer and wine…

Your local Starbucks may soon offer you something even stronger than a shot of caffeine. According to an article in Bloomberg, Starbucks plans to add alcoholic drinks to thousands of its stores over the next few years as another way to boost sales. They will be launching this initiative under the name “Starbucks Evenings.”

The company has already begun testing the Starbucks Evenings concept, and it hopes to expand it to 40 stores by the end of 2014. The results thus far indicate that the concept works, and it brings added sales to the stores during hours that aren’t normally as busy as other times of the day. The company realizes that the concept won’t work in all of its 11,000 retail outlets, but does hope to have it in thousands of its stores where it makes sense. The concept works better in urban areas where people are already out for the night, such as areas near theaters or restaurants.

In addition to serving beer and wine, the company will expand its food offerings for the stores where this plan is implemented. For example, in the Chicago test market where a number of stores have been serving alcohol since January 2012, you can get chicken skewers and truffle Mac & Cheese with your glass of Chardonnay. If that doesn’t whet your appetite, there is always chocolate fondue.

As you might imagine, stopping in to buy a beer or grab a glass of wine on a regular basis from a store where $5 cups of coffee are common won’t be a good way to save money or stick to your budget. That being said, it might be a way to save a bit of money on drinks while out on the town with a little ingenuity. A lot will depend on the pricing of the alcohol at the stores compared to other nearby establishments that also serve wine and beer. I can imagine opportunities to buy Starbucks gift cards on the secondary market at a discount. These are often available at a discount of 20% or more. If you’re able to get the gift cards at a good discount, that might make their evening offerings competitive with other establishments serving alcohol in the area.

Of course, by far the best way to save money would be to take the same actions that will save you a ton of money when it comes to buying coffee. Buy and make your own drinks at home. This won’t be possible in every circumstance, and it does take a bit more planning, but it will save you a ton of money over buying the same drinks at Starbucks or any other drinking establishment.

$5 Down The Drain: Day 20

January 21, 2013 By Jeffrey Strain 16 Comments

Despite my sister insisting that going out for coffee isn’t a real date, I had plans to meet a friend of a friend who was supposedly “perfect” for me at a local coffee shop. I had a few reservations about this, but decided that there was no harm in trying to prove my sister wrong while having a good time on this minimum wage challenge.

We decided to meet at a coffee shop in the general area where she lived. I arrived about 15 minutes early (I have always been one of those on time type of people), ordered a cup of iced tea ($2.25) and found a table to sit at. I didn’t bring my computer since I figured that wouldn’t make the best impression, so I just people watched for those fifteen minutes. As the meeting time approached, I started to make eye contact with every woman who entered the door with a smile (which really sounds kind of creepy as I write this, but it wasn’t meant that way) in case it was her. The time of the date arrives, but she still hasn’t. Not a bit deal since a lot of people run late.

Half an hour after the time we are supposed to meet arrives and still no sign of her. I start second guessing myself. “Did I go to the right coffee shop? Did I have the time right?” An hour passes with still no sign, and I begin to wonder if something bad has happened to her on the way here — a car accident? I don’t have my computer (and I don’t own a phone) so there is no way to check. Do I stay in case she still makes it, or do I go back to get my computer to try to find out what has happened? I decide to give it a little more time.

Two hours pass and still nobody. I decide to get another drink (another $2.25) and give it one more hour. My reasoning (which isn’t always sound in situations like this) was that if I was super-late trying to get somewhere and I finally got there and the person had left, I would be disappointed (not surprised, but disappointed). I slowly sipped my drink and about 15 minutes before I had decided I’d leave, a woman walks up to me. She had been sitting for some time at a table across the room. She asks, “Are you waiting for someone? and when I nod, she says, “Honey, she isn’t going to show up” (it’s at this point I realize I probably waited to long).

So, I drive back and immediately get onto my computer to try to find out what happened. I’m surprised (and a little concerned) to see there are no email messages from her. I send an email explaining that I was sorry that I had missed her and that I hoped I hadn’t gone to the wrong place and that nothing terrible had happened. About a half hour later I received the following:

“I’m so sorry. I got invited to a 49ers party with some really good friends and I decided to go to that instead. I sent an email to you last night telling you. Didn’t you get it?”

I thought that maybe the email had gotten stuck in the spam folder, but did a search and there was never an email sent to me. What do you think? Did she think that she really sent me an email or was that just a polite excuse to let me know she had totally blown me off? I try to give people the benefit of the doubt when mistakes happen because I have made far more than my fair share of them, but I also try not to look like a complete sucker at the same time. I wrote back:

“I must have missed the email, but it’s not a problem. I’m just glad that it wasn’t something serious. I hope you had a wonderful time with your friends — it was a great game.”

And left it at that. I figure that if it really was a mistake and she wants to try to go out again, she’ll get back to me to set up a new time to meet. If not, then she has an easy way out without me asking and her having to make up an excuse why she can’t go.

The worst part was that I ended up wasting 4 hours of the day (when I include travel time) which I could have used to do some fun exploring outside, and I spent $4.50 that I really didn’t need to spend. I know it the scheme of things it really isn’t that costly, but under this challenge budget, it’s one day’s worth of food. Luckily, that was the only spending that I needed to do for the day.

For future reference if something like this happens again, how long is it appropriate to wait before it’s okay to leave when someone doesn’t show up? Let’s hope that this isn’t an indication of what dating on a budget is going to be like this year.

Today’s Spending

Food: $4.50
Car: $0.00
Housing: $0.00
Travel: $0.00
Misc: $0.00

Total: $4.50

Total Spending

Food: $18.52
Car: $0.00
Housing: $0.00
Travel: $0.00
Misc: $17.50

Total: $36.02

Next article: Day 21: Clicking Clutch and Ghost Redwoods

(Photo courtesy of TheeErin)

Reevaluating Habits: Day 8

January 8, 2013 By Jeffrey Strain 1 Comment

We all have habits that we really need to take a hard look at to make sure the habit is helping us reach our financial goals. I know from personal experience that one of the most difficult aspects of personal finance is finding those habits (since they’re habits, we often do them without even being aware that we are doing them). Yes, changing them can be difficult, but actually realizing they are a habit can be even more difficult. I ran into one of those situations today.

I spend most of my time on the computer which makes sense since my main job is writing articles and blog posts. In order to do that effectively, it’s good for me to be in a place where I’m not too comfortable. For example, when I go to visit my parents or sister, I usually will head to the local coffee shop to do my work because there are just too many distractions that will keep me from being productive with my writing in their homes. Since I’m currently visiting my mom for the next two days, I headed out to the local coffee shop without even thinking about it (yes, it had become one of those habits that I do without thinking about).

In the past, this move made perfect sense and a few years ago I did analyze it to make sure it made sense. After looking at the improvement of my productivity, I came to the conclusion that even though I spend money on drinks and food while there, my increased productivity more than made up for any costs that I would spend there. With the minimum wage challenge, however, I have to reevaluate whether doing this continues to make sense. Here are a few of the choices I have and their pros and cons.

Stay at Home: I could stay at my mom’s place and work for free and there are no time limits, but I would not be as productive as I am when I leave and work from someplace else.
Coffee Shop: This allows me to be more productive and has long hours, but there is a cost (I need to buy something) in order to work there.
The Library: I could work from the library for free and be more productive than at home, but it isn’t open all days and has more limited hours than the coffee shop

What I plan to do is to evaluate all these options again in the coming weeks to see which makes the most sense going forward this year. With the new realities of my budget this year, maybe the tight budget will be enough for me to be able to stay more focused and be more productive at my parents’ and sister’s homes than I have in the past. I will try the library and see if I can rearrange my schedule to work with their hours to see if I can be productive under their schedule. I will also see if I remain more productive at the coffee shop, and if so, how I can reduce my costs going there so that they’re the least amount possible. After looking at all of these, I’ll see which of the options seems to make the most sense for me to adopt for this year (any other option suggestions?).

In the past, most of the days I would go to the coffee shop I would spend between $5 to $10 (depending a lot on how long I stayed there). Obviously, this is far too much to spend on a daily basis when visiting now. I believe that the least expensive drink is $2 which is still high (especially when I hope to keep food to $5 a day), although refills are cheaper (but I wouldn’t plan on getting any refills). I do have a coffee card (the coffee shop offers $20 cards for a 10% discount, or $18). I purchased my last one before this challenge came into being, so I feel that the use of that card is fair game, and it has $14.75 left on it. That means that I have 7 days if I can limit my spending to the least expensive drink where it won’t come out of my budget. I will need to decide within that time whether or not the better productivity I now get going to the coffee shop is worth the cost of the drinks there.

I’ve been doing this long enough now reevaluation is all a pretty basic part of my life which I do fairly regularly. While the thought of not being able to work where I prefer most is a bit unsettling, I’ve become pretty used to the reevaluating process itself. It takes some time to get into the habit of reevaluating, but it can help a lot with finances. It certainly took me some time to be comfortable with it, especially since as the above shows, reevaluations need to take place when circumstances change. It’s an ongoing process that never really ends. One way or another, I’ll figure out which of the three (or more if others have suggestions) looks to be the best choice, try that for awhile and then reevaluate again in a few months to confirm or make any needed changes.

Although I didn’t go anywhere “special” today, I do try to make sure I take daily walks as they are a time when I do a lot of thinking and preparation for the day. I headed to Rancho San Antionio Park which is near my mom’s house and is kind of my default place to hike when I’m out visiting her. Still, it does offer a nice view of the Santa Clara valley and I ended up meeting an old friend (I enjoy spotting birds of prey) that I hadn’t seen in awhile:

It was another good day when it came to spending money. The park has free entrance so there was no costs there. The iced tea I purchased at the coffee shop I put in the coffee card I’d already had so there was no out of pocket expense there. Food was free at mom’s (we made a deal a long time ago that I supply her with all her personal care products which I pick up for free / nearly free at CVS, and I don’t worry about food costs. While she probably has a 6 month to 1 year supply of most stuff, I will still pick up deals for her this year during this challenge), so in the end it turned out to be another no spend day (not in the true sense, but for me spending money minimum wage challenge money).

Today’s Spending

Food: $0.00
Car: $0.00
Housing: $0.00
Travel: $0.00
Misc: $0.00

Total: $0.00

Total Spending

Food: $7.39
Car: $0.00
Housing: $0.00
Travel: $0.00
Misc: $6.15

Total: $13.54

Next article: Day Nine: Am I A Sucker?

Shopping Lessons I Hope My Son Learns

October 29, 2009 By David G. Mitchell 11 Comments

The other day, I went out for coffee with my teen-aged son. My son and I went on a Sunday and I was not sure whether the bakery would be open as it was late in the day. My son asked why we were going to that particular bakery; since there is a coffee shop that he knew would be open nearby. I explained that I had seen on a local frugalista website that the coffee was being given away to get people to try to the bakery.

Upon hearing my reasons for choosing that particular bakery, my son gave me a dumbfounded stare and declared that (i) I was really weird for using the word frugalista and (ii) even if the bakery were closed, we could still get coffee at the coffee shop as it was their BOGO hour. I had to agree with my son on the use of the word frugalista but, more importantly, I was really quite pleased that he knew that the coffee shop had a BOGO hour and that we would possibly be arriving during it.

Even though my son may not be researching the best deals that he can find, he does seem to be learning a bit about maximizing the value that he can derive from his earnings now and throughout adulthood. He may not consider himself a frugalista, but he is at least learning that by planning his purchases, he can make his money stretch much farther than it would if he just spent money on full priced items.
There are a lot of ways that I have wasted money over the years, and a lot of lessons that I wish I had learned as a teen. As I look at what my son will be buying in years to come, I hope that he learns the following sooner rather than later:

Bigger does not Mean Better: When I was about fifteen, I bought myself a boom box. I remember going to Service Merchandise and buying the largest “portable” stereo that they had. I knew nothing about the stereo other than its size. I used it for several years but it was far from the best purchase that I could have made. It had more features than I needed and it was far too large for me to comfortably carry it wherever I went. As a result, it generally stayed in my room and I had to rely on my friends to bring a truly portable stereo when we played basketball or football. More importantly, as I learned years later, the speakers on my stereo were inferior to the much better quality speakers that I could have gotten for less money in a better quality stereo that had fewer features.

Appearance is not as Important as Function: I made a similar mistake a couple of years later when I bought a component stereo system. I remember driving to Lechmere (now defunct, but a store that I enjoyed) and purchasing a Fisher component system for $898. The driving force behind my purchasing decision was the color of the system. Again, I should have been paying attention to the speakers more than the color or anything else. The stereo served my needs for many years but, as with the boom box, I paid for features that I did not need and got inferior quality as compared to what I might have purchased.

Start with Low Tech and Work from There: I know that I need billing, time-keeping and other software for my new business, but I have no idea which programs I should be purchasing. If I make a purchase now, before I truly understand the merits of each option and the actual needs that I will have in my office, I will be making a purchasing decision based on guess work. Rather than make an uninformed decision, I am working with the lowest tech options available to me and I will upgrade later when I know what I need. The same philosophy, I have learned, works best for any kind of technology purchase. For example, if you do not know why you would need a particular feature on your cell phone, don’t buy it. If you have lived this long without it, you will probably continue to thrive without it.

Never Make a Major Purchase on the Day that you Decide you Want to Make It: Before spending any amount of money that you consider to be “a lot of money,” sleep on it for a day. Sometimes a deal may seem great on the day you see it but, after a day of reflection, it will not look so great.

Always Know the Return Policy: This is a simple lesson but one that I learned the hard way several times in my youth. Know the return policy before you pay for anything and always make sure you get a receipt. While this should seem like common sense, it is not always the case for young buyers (and some older buyers).

What lessons do you wish you had learned when you were younger? What are the hardest lessons to actually learn? Do we ever stop learning?