As I moved to a new office, I met new colleagues and one of them brought her own coffee machine and placed it on her desk. It’s a bright red Nespresso machine, a kind of statement that the owner doesn’t drink the free coffee offered in kitchenettes on all floors:

Given that the company has a professional Nespresso machine downstairs (i.e. similar quality of coffee but with capsules of different shapes), I was wondering if this is really worth buying. The calculation is simple …

On one hand, the “public” Nespresso machine sells 1 capsule at 0.50€ and pours the water (through the capsule) in a cardboard cup.

On the other hand, the cheapest personal Nespresso machine you can buy in Belgium costs 199.00€. The cheapest personal Nespresso capsule you can buy costs 0.35€ (let’s forget for a moment you have to buy them in multiple of 10 and there are savings to be made if you buy large quantities).

Therefore the upfront cost of the personal Nespresso machine tells me it’s more expensive to have my own machine on my desk. But after how many capsules (i.e. cups of coffee) does it become cheaper to have my machine? The equation is easy: 199.00 + 0.35 * x = 0.5 * x (where x is the number of cups of coffee). Solving it tells me I need to consume 1,327 capsules from my machine in order to get my coffee cheaper than on the “public” machine. That is more than 3.6 years if I drink 1 coffee per day – only slightly less than a year if I drink 4 coffees per day (which is a lot).

Of course, this simple calculation doesn’t take into account electricity, water, cleaning cups or the cups themselves ; they are considered free in both situations (which they are, in practice). It doesn’t take into account neither the convenience of not having to stand up, go down a few stairs to the “public” machine. But, for the future, it doesn’t take into account neither the benefit of having moved more during office hours (more than just sitting the whole day).

So, given some assumptions, having my own Nespresso machine on my desk is probably not economically viable at a reasonable time horizon, unless I drink a lot of coffee and if I value the convenience of not losing a few minutes to go down to the “public” machine. But going downstairs for a coffee prevent me from sitting for too long at my desk and it allows me to meet other colleagues downstairs. I’ll keep this habit! 😉