I do care about the money I spend. Our family plans a zero-balance budget every month, meaning we track every dollar. I still end up getting Starbucks once or t

I do care about the money I spend. Our family plans a zero-balance budget every month, meaning we track every dollar. I still end up getting Starbucks once or twice a week. That would fall into the "snacks and candy" category. I do not go to Starbucks for "good coffee." Ironically, I have given up on finding "good coffee" in the US for one of the reasons mentioned in the article: going somewhere else is a gamble and I have yet to find a decent cup of espresso. I go to Starbucks for exactly the reason that he mentions: it is a known quantity. I want caffeine and I know Starbucks will give it to me in a drink that is consistently good. It is not great and it does not really qualify as coffee, but it tastes good and it does not change (if it does they remake it free of charge). The main point I took from the article is that comparing a cup of coffee to an app is not a useful comparison. Even though the marginal utility of both is low, the pattern of buying is very different. People don't get in a habit buying their daily app like they do coffee. Personally, I ran out of apps I wanted to buy on my phone--or even download for free--about three days after I got it. Now I only go to the app store when I hear about something that sounds interesting or I think of something new I want my phone to do. I do agree with a higher price point than $1. If one of the problems with app purchases is finding a well-made app amidst the crowd of crap, then using price to signal higher quality makes sense, from both a marketing and business perspective.