How giving up coffee for a month could pay for a holiday

Updated
Amalfi coast sea Amalfikuste Italy Europe Positano foreground hotel terrace
Amalfi coast sea Amalfikuste Italy Europe Positano foreground hotel terrace


Stop! Don't buy that coffee! Ditch your daily caffeine fix for less than three weeks, and you could afford a flight to Italy instead - where you can sip coffee somewhere much more inspiring.

The figures have been released by flight comparison website, compareandfly.com, which has been working out just where we could travel if we ditch our expensive little habits.

The coffee sacrifice is the one that adds up fastest - assuming a £3.50 coffee is part of your daily life. The site says that if you give up just 18 of them, you can buy a return flight to Pisa with Ryanair for just £63.43, so you can be sipping espresso while gazing up at the leaning tower - as opposed to the back of the commuter in front of you.

It also put together other little sacrifices. If you're partial to a Guinness or two during the week, or example, giving up nine pints of the black stuff (at an average price of £2.40) to afford return flights to Dublin for just £39.01 with Ryanair. It suggested giving up 3.5 bottles of fake tan in exchange for a chance to top up a real tan in St Tropez (with a £72.16 flight to the French Riviera with Monarch). Alternatively you could ditch three and a quarter takeaway pizzas (at £17.99 each) for a flight to Rome with Ryanair for as little as £60.96.

It's a great way of demonstrating how cheaply you can buy budget flights if you book plenty of time in advance and shop around. It's also an indication of the shocking sums we waste on habits that we could easily do without (and in many cases have stopped really appreciating).

But it doesn't stop here. Using the same approach, you could follow in the footsteps of the Royals and save for the trip of a lifetime to Australia within a year. Let's assume you are flying to Sydney on Korean Air and need to save £900 to get you there. This is perfectly possible if you give up your morning coffee, your Sunday paper and one takeaway a month.

Assuming your coffee costs £2.50, and you have it only on weekdays, that's a saving of £650. Assuming your Sunday paper costs £2.50, that's a saving of £130. And assuming your takeaway costs £15, over the year that's £180. In all you've saved £960. That's enough for the flights, plus a coffee, a paper and a pizza at the airport if you're so inclined.


Advertisement