If you’ve ever watched “Friends” (and if you’re not, are you a human?), you know coffee is basically the seventh star of the show. The characters spend a solid chunk of time hanging around in Central Perk, sipping on coffee and occasionally ordering muffins or scones.
We’ve all wondered how much dang coffee they actually drink — and how they afforded such big apartments — and thanks to one very dedicated British writer, now we know.
Kit Lovelace recently did the world a solid and watched all 10 seasons of the cult show, taking note of how many cups of coffee were consumed. Then, he made some pretty nifty charts to sum it all up. Kit, you’re the hero America needs.
Over the course of 236 episodes, the characters drank a total of 1,154 cups of coffee. The heaviest drinker turned out to be Phoebe with 227 cups, which is kind of surprising, but also explains her perpetually excitable attitude. In last place was Rachel with 138 — also odd, given that she worked at the coffee house, but hey, Jennifer Aniston would probably approve.
In between, you’ve got Ross with 188, Joey with 191, Monica with 198, and Chandler with 212. By the way, to figure this out, Lovelace watched all the episodes, focusing on the Central Park scenes and fast-forwarding through the rest.
Lovelace also did the math on how much all this coffee would cost, and used scenes from the show to back up his estimates. Monica’s receipt for a coffee and scone was $4.21 (remember, this was the 90s), so he safely assumed the coffee portion was around $1.50. He also added a 20% tip, since that’s what Chandler told Joey was an acceptable amount in the “The One With Unagi” episode.
All in all, the characters spend a total of $2,077.20 on coffee throughout the series, or between about $250 and $410 each. In New York, that 10 years of coffee and couch time would barely cover a month’s rent for Central Perk … sorry Gunther.
Lovelace told The Huffington Post he’s not actually a “Friends” superfan, but he is an avid coffee drinker and felt like there was a “significant gap in our shared pop culture knowledge.”
In case you’re wondering, Lovelace ALSO made a graph comparing each character’s drinking habits over the course of the show. Seriously, someone give this guy a prize.
