U.S. Coffee Drinking ‘Stable’ Amid Recession, Industry Reports
By Yi Tian (link to original Bloomberg article)
March 20 (Bloomberg) — U.S. coffee consumption was “essentially unchanged” in the past year, with more Americans drinking at home to control costs during the recession, according to a National Coffee Association survey.
About 56 percent of respondents 18 or older said they drank coffee the day before the survey, compared with 59 percent a year earlier, the New York-based industry group said today in a report. The results are within the survey’s margin of error, signaling “stable” consumption, the association said. Eighty- six percent of those prepare the beverage at home, up 4 percentage points from last year.
“Americans are consciously maintaining the coffee-drinking habits they developed prior to the recession,” Michael Edwards, a senior vice president at consumer research company Hotspex and part of the team that conducted the study, said today at the association’s 99th annual conference in Dana Point, California. “That’s exactly why things are stable.”
The data was compiled in an online survey of 3,000 people conducted in January and February.
The U.S. is the world’s biggest coffee-consuming country, according to data from the International Coffee Organization in London. Brazil and Germany are the second- and third-biggest consumers.
Arabica-coffee futures in New York have climbed 14 percent in the past year as exports dropped from Brazil and Colombia, the world’s largest suppliers of the bean variety.
To contact the reporter on this story: Yi Tian in New York at ytian8@bloomberg.net.
