You just rolled out of bed, and you need a nice, iced pick-me-up on the way to your 8am. Luckily, there is a Starbucks on just about every corner to drain your wallet.
Wondering why you’ve already blown your budget for the semester? Each of your tall Starbucks iced latte costs a whopping $3.15, which, if you were to buy one for every day of the year, would cost you over $1,100. The two coffees in the photo above are identical, yet the coffee on the left cost twice as much as the coffee on the right. How? Keep reading to find out.
We tested this genius Starbucks hack, and here’s how you can still enjoy your iced latte without going broke.
Step 1: Order a Solo Espresso
Espresso is the main ingredient in a latte, but unlike the full latte, a shot of plain espresso is much less expensive, costing around $1.90, as opposed to a $3.15 grande (small) latte. Also, ordering a plain espresso makes you sound very sophisticated.
Step 2: Ask the Barista for a Cup of Ice
When you order the espresso, order your shot under ice (not over ice). They will pour in the shot, then top it off with ice — this costs the same as the espresso, plus you save the planet by reducing the amount of cups used. You’ll wanna order it under the ice so that the espresso cools down quickly without melting all the ice.
Step 3: Add in Milk
A Starbucks grande latte is simply a single shot of espresso with milk. However, when making an iced espresso, the barista will skip steaming the milk, since the drink is going to be cold anyway. Therefore, your own latte creation is no different than the one you would’ve paid extra for. You can use the milk offered at the milk/sugar/trash table.
Voilà! We put this hack to test, and we saved almost 40% on an iced latte.