Coffee trends in the workplace

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On September 27 Dunkin' Donuts and the job search engine Careerbuilder.com announced the findings of their first joint survey to understand coffee's role in the "daily grind."

The market research company NPD Group's Consumer Reports on Eating Share Trends (CREST) found Dunkin' Donuts is "the number one retailer in the hot regular/decaf plus flavored coffee and iced coffee categories."

The Dunkin' Donuts/Careerbuilder survey took place August 17 through September 2 and polled 3,600 workers across the US to determine what professions need their caffeine fix the most. Here are the top five jobs: nurses, physicians, hotel workers, designers/architects and financial/insurance sales representatives.

Additionally, "more than two-in-five American workers claim they are less productive without coffee," whereas more than 40 percent of young workers (aged 18-34) said "they can't concentrate as well without coffee" and "have lower energy if they don't drink coffee."

And, 24 percent of the same coffee-drinking age group "buy coffee as a way to treat themselves for a job well done."

This poll has also found 75 percent of American workers rely on coffee convenience and will "only travel a quarter mile or less for their daily brew," thus explaining the need for multiple Starbucks locations on many urban blocks.

In the September edition of the magazine Food Technology, the Institute of Food Technologists (IFT) noted niche coffee flavors (such as coffee berry) are an emerging international trend in 2010 exemplified with "cappuccino wafers or chocolate latte macchiato cookies."