Are you fanatical about your flat white, crazy about your cappuccino or desperate for decaf?
Coffee seems to be the drink on everyone’s lips these days. Whether you can’t function until you have had your first cup in the morning or spread your coffee load throughout the day, coffee seems to be the brew that illicits emotion and conversation. Ever wondered what your coffee choice says about you?
The answers from the National Coffee Choice Report, commissioned by DéLonghi may surprise you. The findings, which pertain to Australia, are reported in this article from the Adelaide Advertiser and indeed many other Australian online news outlets. No need to spend your hard-earned dollars to talk to a therapist to reveal your personality type or anyone elses and no need to waste pesky time actually engaging with others, just focus on the drink.
The report reveals that if you are a flat white drinker, you are likely to be considered down to earth, laid back and boring. Order a latte and you’re high maintenance but make sure you hang around with cappuccino drinkers who are considered fun. Alternatively, you can bask in the success of an espresso-lover, but be sure to stay clear of those arrogant macchiato mavens.
All very interesting and somewhat disturbing. Have we really progressed to judging ourselves and others not by their depth, but by the depth of their coffee cups? Has coffee become the new Rolex?
Apparently so, according to the findings in this report, at least in this country, because the Report apparently also found that bankers and accountants admit to showing off by ordering stronger coffee and that people change their coffee order depending on who they are with. So perception really is more important than reality.
Just like in the great Steve Martin coffee ordering scene from LA Story, below.
What would Steve Martin’s coffee order say about the character he played in the movie? Creative, trend setter or just disorganised and confused?
And what about these favorites?
- Turkish/Italian espresso – spoon contortionist or fashionable leader?
- Hot chocolate with marshmallow – a push over or a sweet-toothed nurturer?
- Decaf – a passive aggressive faker or health conscious intellectual?
- Coffee drunk really hot – a person without taste buds or boot camp lover?
- Coffee drunk weak – coward or individualistic and head strong?
- Irish coffee – sneaky or fun-loving?
No doubt there are many others.
Up to this point, I had no idea that I was being judged on my coffee choice.
What disturbs me is that this is not a fluffy phone poll undertaken by a lifestyle magazine, but a piece of research commissed by a coffee machine maker who will no doubt use this report to make marketing and manufacturing decisions. It indicates that we really do judge others based on the superficial and that we feel compelled to change our personal preferences to play to perceptions.
I think I’ll stick to my choice of cappuccino and lattes. In fact, what does it say that I mix up my coffee preference? There goes Judy, she’s just such a maverick [sigh].
Note to self: as an espresso hater avoid all future meetings with bankers and accountants.
Supplemental note to self: the last meeting I had with a banker he asked for a cup of hot water. As in no coffee. Was he really an alien?
Are you game enough to reveal to us your coffee preference?
Raising the Curtain 
I’ve found that I like the chocolate chip coffee drink that McDonald’s has, and normally I don’t even LIKE coffee! How’s that for irony? And I wonder what the coffee culturists would have to say about that.
I’m primarily a tea person. I love to try different teas such as chai tea and pomegranate tea. Mmmmm.
What the advertising folks will do to catch our eyes! I am having a half decaf dark brew with cream and sugar this morning!
Judy, I can honestly say I have never been impressed or unimpressed by what someone orders at a coffee shop or anywhere for that matter. Having said that, I am impacted by how someone treats the wait staff at various places. There is an old piece of advice for men and women. Watch how your date treat the waiters and waitresses. If the date treats them poorly or unfairly, then you may want to move on to someone else. Just two cents from an Old Fart. BTG
Best advice I’ve seen in ages! More apt these days I would expect, when treating staff like personal slaves seems to be the norm.
I have never been able to drink coffee. I’ve tried it twice, and both times I urped. (Sorry, TMI, I’m sure…) So I stick to tea and diet soda (I know, I know) for my caffeine take. I don’t even want to know what the coffee judgers would say about me…
I drank coffee all day when I first started working, then I switched to tea for about 40 years. About ten years ago I switched back to coffee again and for the past year drink it black–but not espresso. Now I am choosy about what brand of coffee I drink because I can really TASTE it.
So call me snobbish but I’m really n.o.t. Honest.
I don’t buy coffee out – firstly, we don’t live in a place with those fancy expensive chain shops, and secondly, no one here makes it as good as I do at home. I cringe at the idea of having to figure out Starbucks coffee-speak. Like learning a whole new language.
What an interesting post Jude. Yep – I’ll come clean I have usually a skinny milk Latte or Cappuccino. I prefer ice – coffee (e-gads does that mean anything??) Mr. S has a standard De-Caf flat white – only because a bit of bouncy ticker and ‘normal’ (is there such a thing now) sets it off. I am not an avid coffee drinker though I could easily have ice-coffee 2-3 times a day. Thanks for posting Jude, I’m cancelling my therapy session for next week 😉 xx
Well, I only drink decaf, caffeine has become my enemy over the years and if I want any type of taste of coffee, it has to be decaf… I miss real coffee… DAF
Probably I should delete my tweet – about being a boring flat white addict. Actually, I had tried to match varieties of coffee common in Austria to this list. And Flat White was as close as it can get to the Austrian ‘Melange’. Of course Google immediately gives me an English article about Austrian coffee specialties 🙂
http://www.tourmycountry.com/austria/coffee.htm
I live in the quintessential coffee city of the world–the home of Starbucks–where you can find a coffee shop on every corner, inside grocery stores and even at gas stations. McDonald’s now serves espresso. This is the town where people don’t just order a latte or cappuccino. Oh no, they must have a “tall, skinny, extra dry, half calf with a dash of hazelnut.” What do you suppose this says about our citizenry? As for me–just make me a single tall 2% latte.