To celebrate the third anniversary of the Square Point of Sale in Australia, the global payments platform has released the 2017 Square Australian Coffee Report.
The 2017 report summarises data collected and analysed from the millions of cups of coffee sold on the Square platform at hundreds of cafes and coffee bars across the country. It identifies the most popular drinks in each state and territory, the average price we’re paying for our favourite coffees, as well as the new flavour trends taking over menus.
The report features a deep dive on the latte capital of Australia – Melbourne – looking at different suburbs and surrounding regional towns to see what residents are spending on their favourite brew.
Here’s what Square found:
Pricing
The report shows that customer demand and spend can vary dramatically by state, as seen by latte drinkers in the Northern Territory, spending on average almost $1 more than those in New South Wales.
Across the country the most expensive coffees were of the iced variety, tipping over the $5 mark in every state. While Aussies were also spending more on mocha and chai, the cheapest coffee across the board was the traditional long black, the only coffee with a national average spend of less than $4.
Around Victoria the average spend for a latte in Bendigo, $3.80, is around 20 per cent less than what residents are spending in Melbourne’s trendy northern suburbs on the same beverage.
Popular brews
The latte is still the most popular coffee choice across the board, especially in Victoria where it made up almost half (47 per cent) of all cups sold.
Across the country sales of flat whites have been steadily increasing, up by more than 22 per cent since 2015, with cappuccinos (up 15 per cent) and long blacks (up 6.6 per cent) also on the rise.
The past two years have seen a surge in popularity of coffee infused with on-trend flavours, like chai and matcha. From October 2015 to October 2017, there was a 120 per cent increase in the sales of chai lattes and a whopping 360 per cent growth in matcha-infused brews.
This year also saw more adventurous latte flavours introduced on menus – including beetroot, taro and turmeric. While they all started to show signs of growth in 2017, the biggest spike was seen in turmeric lattes, more than doubling in popularity (120 per cent growth) between April and July.
This infographic illustrates the report’s findings: