Dear colleagues,
Today I am going to write about something completely different. After weeks of spreadsheets, budgets, fte’s, and housing issues, I will look into…the coffee habits of the CES employees! Every month I have to approve the bill for all the hot drinks ordered on CES employee cards, and that is a far more interesting invoice than the bill I receive from Xerox! Let me reassure you, I only get the total overview and it is impossible to see who has ordered what from which machine and when. No big brother activities here.
Some of you may know that I am a tea-drinker, I just don’t like the flavour of coffee. When I was a student in Utrecht I loved the smell of coffee roasting in the Douwe Egberts factory, but I can’t drink it. Believe me, not with sugar or any of the various ways of adding milk (hot, cold, foam, chocolate…). So, looking at this invoice always opens an unknown world to me, especially the almost impossible range of options that these wonder machines seem to create by changing the proportions of the six ingredients that I see the coffee-man put into them: coffee beans, milk powder, sugar, cacao powder, water and something called ‘tea’.
So, what does that overview tell me? Well, in February of this year a whopping 4486 drinks were ordered from the machines. In that same period, 199 employees worked at CES. That means an average of 22,54 drinks per person per month, or 27,7 drink per fte. February had 21 working days, so it would be 1,3 drink per fte per day. That sounds a lot better than the 4486 drinks in total! I actually wonder if you remain hydrated during the day…
So which drinks are popular? A very clear winner with 1299 is the regular black coffee, no sugar, no milk. It seems the CES employees are purists where their coffee is concerned. It is interesting that there are hardly any regular coffees with milk and/or sugar. If it is not black coffee, you will opt for something more interesting! And that is mostly the cappuccino, with or without sugar (together 987 cups). The other milky options like caffe macchiato, latte macchiato and café au lait follow behind. Then there are those who need a caffeine shot: espresso! The double espresso is more popular that the single and most are drunk black; 316 of them. What puzzles me is the one cup of decaf espresso… as said, I am not the expert, but does this not defy the purpose? Talking about decaf, only 61 decaf products (coffee, macchiato, lungo, café latte, wiener melange) were consumed.
Then there is chocolate! That I can relate to, although I like to eat it more than drink. Once the variety is great: hot chocolate and hot chocolate crème (together 361). The first seems to be preferred but both are soundly beaten by the chocochino which at 323 cups is at the same level as espresso. I had to look up what it was though, and no, there is no coffee in it! Then there is the mysterious wiener melange: half coffee and half hot chocolate, also available in decaf in case you are interested!
The final drink I want to mention is my own personal favourite: tea 😊I am utterly confused that there are actually colleagues who drink the so-called ‘fresh-leave tea’, no less than 30 cups! To me, this drink has nothing to do with tea, but I do hope that you enjoyed it. It is however heartening to see that there are also many orders to Maas (the coffee suppliers) for tea bags, some for teas like Moroccon Mint or Cinnamon, but I am very happy to see good orders for my own favorite Earl Grey!
So, was there anything I wanted to achieve with this letter? Are you now expecting that I will say that we should spend less on coffee? Or announce that you can use your employee card at Starbucks which was the Christmas wish of several of you? No, it was just intended as mild amusement, and of course as an invitation to come and have a cup of coffee of whichever composition with me! Just contact Nel Beute to plan an appointment!
Best wishes
Lieke
