Coffee Protocol

Okay, so I'm putting this out there.

I admit that I'm a little petty about etiquette.  (Like on the train: when seats are empty, people should sit diagonally from you as opposed to next to you.)  But I also think that if there's a standard etiquette-related protocol, people should know about it.

The big thing about this [media] industry is that everyone takes people out for coffee, whether it be for networking, or meetings, or when you're in that awkward stage of just starting your career, and you want to pick someone's brain for their "tips and secrets to making it big."

I've had a few instances now of being invited to coffee for specific industry reasons (by people I didn't really know), and then I have to pay for my own, or in the more unusual case, I'm COMPLETELY left without a beverage.  This happened the other day, and then I realized that it happens to me too frequently.


Here's where I think you're in charge of picking up the entire tab for coffee, especially for someone you don't know that well:

• you're the one who invited the other person out for a specific reason
• you used a phrase somewhere in the initial correspondence (leading to the coffee meeting) such as:
• "I'd like to pick your brain about .... xyz"
• "I wanted to know what you thought about ..."
• "I have this show idea and I wanted to run it by you, seeing how you're a development executive, could you comment?"
• "I'm new to the business and am looking for some advice ..."
• "I was hoping you could walk me through how to ..."
• "I wanted to run something by you ..."
• "I have a show idea and wanted to see if you'd like to work on it with me"

• you're pitching someone on the idea of working on something for free

It's not the cost of the coffee, it's the principle of protocol.  A coffee is a small courtesy for to "repay" someone for their time.