Why 'Shark Tank' Investor Kevin O'Leary Refuses To Spend $2.50 On a Cup of Coffee (cnbc.com)

An anonymous reader shares a report: Kevin O'Leary has invested hundreds of thousands of dollars in small businesses over the course of his tenure as a star and investor on ABC's "Shark Tank." But there is one business to which he refuses to fork over his hard-earned dollars: coffee shops. "Do I pay $2.50 for a coffee? Never, never, never do I do that," O'Leary tells CNBC Make It. "That is such a waste of money for something that costs 20 cents. I never buy a frape-latte-blah-blah-blah-woof-woof-woof for $2.50." Instead, he makes it at home. "I drink coffee, one cup every morning," he explains. "It costs about 18 cents to make it, and I invest the rest." That idea -- saving small sums and investing continually -- is central to O'Leary's personal finance advice. "The truth is, there is a lot of crap you don't need," he explains.

Comments

Hindustan Lever Vs Proctor and Gamble

[140Mandak262Jamuna]

Hindustan Lever is an Indian cosmetics/soap and shampoo giant. It sells shampoo in single use sachets. Back in the day it used to cost 5 rupees, or 30 US cents back in the day. Now it is probably 20 Rupees, same 30cents. Proctor and Gamble's idea of marketing was to some how convince the buyer into buying shampoo in gallon size jugs and they are busily hatching up plans to convince America why it is a good idea to buy shampoo in barrels instead of gallon jugs.

They both were locked into a serious battle in South Asian shampoo market. With all that might of P&G, HL was running circles around them

My niece is a big shot in that circle (now working for Estee Lauder India) she explained the basic difference. "There are women who can not afford shampoo. But once in a while something nice happens, and she feels great and feels like treating herself to luxury. That thirty cent sachet of shampoo is a luxury for her. She will never have enough to buy a whole bottle ever, and will balk at the cost of a bottle. But... on any given day there are about a million such women willing to buy a sachet of shampoo for 30 cents. I am selling 300K a day. 100 million dollars a year."

There are people for whom that 5$ coffee is a luxury they are treating themselves to. The American dream of owning a home and having a comfortable retirement is gone for them. They see themselves working till the day they are going to die. They see 80 year old grandmas trying to work as walmart greeters. From their perspective, "I have 5$ today, I am going to splurge!".

A country this great, this wealthy, with that much of despair among the young ...

Re:That isn't advice

[geekmux]

That's just the man's personality. As someone once said about writing code in a certain scripting language, there is more than one way to do it.

Paying $3 for a cup of coffee every morning for 40 years = $43,800

Paying 20 cents for a cup of coffee every morning for 40 years = $2,920

That's a difference of over $40 thousand dollars. It's a hell of a lot more than that if you took that money and invested it over a 40-year span.

This is advice. Financial advice. And the hipster masses perpetually carrying around a caramel-drizzled fuckachino bitching about always being broke would probably be wise to listen.