How Convenient
When a missing coffee maker turns into a full-on thought exercise about modern convenience
Our friend group arrived at the beach house, and I immediately noticed there was no coffee maker.
One of my favorite things to do on a beach vacation is enjoy my morning coffee outside. As seems to happen to all men in their 40s, I’ve become an amateur birder. Sipping strong coffee, listening to the birds, and enjoying the morning before the sun starts beating down with that summer heat is just about as good as it gets to me.
The realization that our rental had no coffee maker was a bit of a bummer. Luckily, we live in a time where just about anything can be delivered, often with free shipping, within a matter of days. Sometimes within the hour. I opened my phone, scanned Amazon for the cheapest coffee maker, and saw it was available for $28 and could be delivered between 7-11am the next day.
I let the group know I’d solved our problem, though none of them seemed to have even gotten to the point of caring about tomorrow’s coffee. But in my mind, I was a hero. Just as I was about to hit add to cart and buy, Jamie said, “Don’t buy a coffee maker. That makes no sense.”
That was the first time since I worked out the coffee problem that I questioned whether it made sense to buy a coffee maker for a long weekend or just plan to go find coffee each morning. So like the accountant I am, I did the math.
Eight adults, three mornings. Even if the coffee maker couldn’t be delivered in time for the first morning, we’d still use it at least two mornings, possibly three, with potential for any afternoon pick-me-ups too. We were likely looking at anywhere from 16-24+ cups of coffee.
For a $28 coffee maker, my cost per coffee would be $1.75 or less. Hard to find a cup of coffee as cheap as that anymore, so the math for buying made sense.
Beyond the math, the coffee would be available whenever I wanted it, at the home I was staying in, and refills were only limited by the amount of coffee grounds I had on hand. Seemed like a no-brainer to me.
I explained to the group I’d done the analysis and it made sense to just buy it. They were almost paying attention to our coffee problem at this point, and I may have heard at least one person agree. So I added to my cart and purchased.
The next morning, I was waiting for the coffee maker to be delivered when one of the others in our group happened to find a coffee maker hidden in the downstairs bathroom closet.
The coffee maker had been there the whole time.
I’d done a quick sweep of the kitchen but had stopped looking that hard once just ordering one seemed easier and more convenient. The truth is, the cheapest and most convenient option would have been to find the coffee maker that was already there.
In my defense, the downstairs bathroom closet is not the first place most people would look for a kitchen appliance. But I also hadn’t looked especially hard, asked the rest of the group to help, or contacted the owner to see whether one was available.
Once I saw that another coffee maker could arrive the next morning for $28, continuing to search no longer seemed worth the effort.
Have you noticed how much convenience has changed our threshold for effort?
A short drive begins to feel like too much when delivery is available. Waiting a few days feels unreasonable when next-day shipping is an option. Looking for something, repairing it, borrowing it, or asking whether someone else already has one can feel like more work than simply buying another.
There is real value in convenience. Money is not the only limited resource in our equations. Time, energy, patience, and attention matter too.
Financial independence shouldn’t require us to perform every task ourselves or choose the cheapest possible option. Part of the reason many of us want financial flexibility is so we can spend money to make life easier when doing so is worthwhile.
But be careful. Being just a few clicks away makes it easy for us to default to convenience. Think about how many ongoing subscriptions you may have. The grocery and food delivery services. The Prime and next-day delivery fees. Ride-sharing and streaming bundles.
We’d all be surprised how much we spend on convenience throughout the year. And the future is only going to continue to get more convenient with less effort.
If you haven’t thought about some of those convenience charges you might be paying each month, start with the big-ticket items and work your way down. If the value exceeds the cost, and you have the flexibility in your budget, no worries. But if things feel a little tight or you feel like your money isn’t working for you as much as you want it to, this is an area that could free up some cash.
Don’t be too quick to just go with what feels convenient at the time. Likewise, don’t overburden every decision you make out of convenience. You don’t have to analyze and justify everything. Sometimes convenience is just that.
Yes, this level of analysis was a bit of overkill for my morning coffee concerns, but the general point is still beneficial for most things where we’re quick to sign up, add to cart, or swipe on a card.
A little more effort on my end may have solved the problem for me for free, but who knows if I ever would have thought to check the bathroom closet on my own.
Luckily, I have free returns and was able to send the purchased coffee maker back without even opening the box. Just one more convenience that sometimes can do more harm than good.
But I’ll take it this time.
— Brad
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This is meant to help you think through financial decisions and tradeoffs—not tell you exactly what to do. It’s general in nature and not personalized advice (see full disclaimer).