Real Customer Story

How I Stopped Trading Sleep for My Morning Treat

Lucy H.Deloitte Account Manager & Loyal RUME Customer

I used to wake up early for my latte.

Not dramatically early. Not “5 a.m. wellness routine” early. Just early enough to get dressed, leave the house, adjust my route to sit in the drive-thru or wait for my mobile order, and still make it to work on time.

In my head, it made sense.

I needed my morning drink.

I liked the ritual. I liked the first creamy sip. I liked having something sweet and comforting before the day started asking things of me. My latte wasn’t just caffeine. It was a little treat. A mood-setter. A small pocket of calm before everything else started — the thing that made me feel like I could become a functioning adult.

So for a long time, I never questioned the fifteen minutes I was giving up to get it. I thought of it as part of getting ready.

Then I came across something that made me rethink the whole routine.

A 2019 Sleep Health study followed 130 working adults over eight days and looked at how sleep shapes the next day — specifically that scattered, foggy, hard-to-focus feeling that quietly follows you around. The finding that stuck with me was that sleeping just sixteen minutes less than usual was linked to more of that fog the next day.

Sixteen minutes.

That was almost exactly my coffee run.

And suddenly the tradeoff felt obvious. The thing I was doing every morning because I thought it helped me function was also costing me the sleep that might have helped me feel clear in the first place.

That was the part I couldn’t unsee.

I was waking up earlier to buy the thing I “needed” because I was tired. But part of the reason I was tired was that I was waking up earlier to buy it.

I didn’t want to give up my latte

To be clear, this is not the part where I tell you I gave up lattes — I’m not insane.

I didn’t want some boring black coffee at home or the cheap espresso machine at my office. I also didn’t want a sad “healthy alternative” that technically checked the box but made my morning feel worse. I didn’t want to replace my morning treat with something that felt like homework.

Because as a normal woman with a job, a calendar, and a life, I know my morning drink is more than fuel.

It’s comfort. It’s routine. It’s the tiny reward before the emails, meetings, errands, decisions, and obligations begin.

So the problem was never the latte. The problem was that I’d built my morning around leaving early to get one.

That’s how I found RUME.

The latte that made my coffee run feel unnecessary

At first, I was skeptical. I assumed it would be one of those swaps that sounds good in theory but doesn’t actually satisfy the craving — the kind of thing you buy because it feels responsible, then secretly resent every morning because it’s not the thing you actually wanted.

That’s not what happened.

The Vanilla Latte became my go-to almost immediately. It was creamy, sweet, and actually felt like the treat I wanted in the morning. Not “good enough.” Not “fine for home.” Just genuinely delicious.

The biggest difference was that I didn’t have to leave early for it. No drive-thru. No mobile order wait. No standing around while my drink was “almost ready.” No waking up earlier just to buy the thing I needed to make waking up easier.

Whether I’m feeling hot or iced that day, I literally make it in sixty seconds. It’s a powdered latte with the milk already measured in, so I just add water, mix it up, and it’s ready.

I could stay in bed a little longer, make my latte at home, and still start the morning with the part I actually cared about: that first sweet sip.

And once I got used to it, my old routine started to feel a little ridiculous.

Then I looked at the sugar...

A few weeks later, I grabbed a Starbucks vanilla latte again while I was out. I expected it to feel like a treat. Instead, I remember thinking: I cannot believe I used to wake up earlier, wait in line, and pay $7 for this.

Especially once I looked at the sugar.

A grande Starbucks Blonde Vanilla Latte has 35g of sugar, according to Starbucks’ own app. A RUME Vanilla Latte has 7g. I had no idea how much hidden sugar I was drinking.

By drinking RUME every day instead of Starbucks, I’m taking in 840g less sugar every month. 840g isn’t some little “better-for-you” difference. That’s almost like filling up my entire 40oz Stanley with pure sugar and chugging it.

Once I thought of it that way, it became really hard to look at my old latte habit the same way. Because I wasn’t just “getting coffee.” I was waking up earlier for it. I was spending real money on it. I was taking in an extra 28g of sugar every day for a drink that honestly tastes way worse than RUME.

And then I’d wonder why I crashed mid-workday, why my skin kept acting up, why I always felt a step behind and like I was scrambling to catch up. And somewhere along the way I’d quietly decided that was just… me. That I was the one who couldn’t keep it together.

It wasn’t me. It was the cup.

I’m not saying one latte ruins your day. But when it’s every morning, it isn’t one latte anymore. It’s your routine. And my routine had quietly been working against me.

The Compounding Benefits

The fifteen extra minutes in the morning were what made me try RUME. But the more I used it, the more the unexpected benefits started stacking.

I wasn’t rushing out the door for coffee. I wasn’t spending $7 every time I wanted my morning treat. I wasn’t starting my workday with 35g of sugar and then dealing with the crash when I still had meetings, emails, and actual work to get through. I wasn’t looking at my skin and quietly wondering if my “little treat” every morning was secretly part of the reason I felt puffy or dull.

And I wasn’t giving up the latte moment.

That last part matters most.

Because most “better morning” advice sounds like it was written by someone who doesn’t understand the emotional value of a treat. It’s always: wake up earlier, drink plain coffee, cut the thing you enjoy, be more disciplined.

That was never going to work for me — and honestly, I’ve stopped feeling bad that it didn’t. I didn’t need to overhaul my life or white-knuckle my way into some stricter, less fun version of myself. I just needed to stop settling for the worse version of the thing I already loved.

RUME worked because it didn’t ask me to give up the part I liked. It just removed the part that was costing me.

And honestly, that’s why I feel so good about the switch.

Getting 7.5 extra hours of sleep each month feels good. Consuming 840g less sugar every month feels good. Saving over $60 every month feels good. Those savings are basically a free dinner, a workout class, a new top, a manicure, or just a little extra breathing room in my budget.

And maybe this sounds dramatic, but it genuinely makes me feel more put together. Like I found one of those rare swaps that doesn’t feel like punishment or compromise.

I still get the sweet morning ritual. I still get the drink I actually look forward to. But now I also get more sleep, less rushing, less sugar, less spending, and less of that midday crash feeling.

It’s one small decision every morning that makes me feel like I’m taking better care of myself — without becoming the kind of person who pretends black coffee is dessert.

I didn’t give up my morning treat.

I just stopped settling.