Why are companies spending $12 billion on coffee machines? 🤯
GrowthX | Sleepy Owl Coffee brings a surprise!
Welcome to the 123rd edition of the GrowthX Newsletter. Every Tuesday & Thursday I write a piece on startups & business growth. Today’s piece is going to 94,400+ operators & leaders from startups like Google, Stripe, Swiggy, Razorpay, CRED & more
‘Man, I really need coffee!’
’Ah, I just had my morning cup’
’Let kick-start the day now’
Does this happen to you?
I’m definitely guilty of this.
Coffee = energy & freshness 🧘🏻♀️
Much like Redbull, which associates itself with athletes in extreme sports.
Enter, coffee vending machines ☕️
In the past, offices were designed to maximize efficiency and productivity. Even walking to the nearby cafe for coffee was considered wasteful.
They could forbid employees from visiting cafes, right? 🥺
Companies had realised that their employees needed coffee, whether it was in office or a nearby cafe. Coffee in-house would not only make them happy but also reduce wasted time → increasing productivity.
Is productivity the only benefit? 🤔
No, there’s a lot more.
First, water cooler chat ☕️
Coffee breaks give employees the opportunity to take short breaks and engage in casual conversations. It helps them relax and talk about topics unrelated to work.
Second, casual face-time 🎙
It allows an informal setting for teams to bond with their superiors.
Third, subconscious solutions 🙇🏻♂️
Have you ever gone for a coffee break and suddenly an interesting solution to the problem you’re working on strikes you, without even actively thinking about it?
But, isn’t it a big investment?
Let's do the math for a 25-person company. The cost of the machine is typically ₹25,000 and the cost of beans per year ₹52,000. That's a total cost of ₹77,000 per year.
Now, the math for time-saved ⏱
Each employee spends approximately 30 minutes going to a cafe. With the vending machine, they save about 20 minutes per serving. Assuming a daily average of 3 cups, that's an hour saved per day. Assuming a salary rate of ₹100 per hour, that's ₹2,000 per employee per month, or ₹6,00,000 worth of time savings per year for a 25 people company. It’s like the coffee machine pays for itself.
What can you learn from this? 🎯
Ask yourself “Does my customer_”
care about productivity?
value time over money?
want to save cost or increase revenue?
Find the coffee machine feature for your business. It should help your customers either save time / generate more revenue. Voila! your product will earn the wallet share.
Plus, the interesting part ✨
Have you ever wondered why coffee/chai vending machines are sold at almost no profit by the likes of Cafe Coffee Day or Chai Point? The same logic holds true for water purifiers. That’s a topic for another newsletter issue though.
Announcing the GrowthX | Sleepy Owl giveaway 💙
It’s the devil to talk about coffee and not consume it. And, what if sharing this newsletter could give you enough supply of Sleepy Owl coffee? Share this newsletter with 15 colleagues & get a guaranteed GrowthX <> Sleepy Owl merch delivered at your office doorstep.
