The Price of a Cup of Coffee (update)

Last month I wrote an article in Flavors of Brazil about the tremendous difference in the price of coffee between Brazil and North America (click here for the article).

Comparing prices between countries depends not just on local prices, but also on exchange rates of course. So when I was at my local supermarket last night, and noticed there was a super-sale on my favorite brand of coffee, Santa Clara premium, I not only had to buy some, but had to check the dollar equivalent of the sale price.

Coffee here in Brazil is normally sold in packages of 250 gr. (about half a pound). The sale price that I paid last night was R$1.99 reais. Using this morning's official exchange rate, and converting from grams to pounds, that works out to USD $2.04 and CAD $2.09 per pound.

I figure that means that my pound of coffee here costs about half the price of a Starbuck's venti coffee latte. Makes you wonder, doesn't it?