Affiliate Disclosure

Be Your Own Barista is reader-supported. Some of the links on this site — mostly in gear reviews and budget-tier buying guides (the "$150 Setup," "$500 Setup," and similar) — are affiliate links. This page explains what that means, in compliance with FTC guidelines on endorsements and disclosures.

What an affiliate link is

If you click certain links on this site and go on to buy something, we may earn a small commission from the retailer or program (for example, Amazon Associates, or a direct affiliate program run by a gear manufacturer). This costs you nothing extra — the price you pay is the same whether you use our link or go to the retailer directly. It's how we keep this site funded without charging you or running intrusive ads.

Where you'll see a disclosure

Not every page has an affiliate link, and we don't disclose sitewide once and leave it at that. Any specific guide that carries a real, live affiliate link shows a short disclosure notice near the top of that article — above the content and before you'd reach the link itself — not buried in a footnote at the bottom. If a page doesn't show that notice, it doesn't currently have a live affiliate link on it, even if it reviews or mentions gear.

How we decide what to recommend

We pick gear on its merits first and look for an affiliate program second — not the other way around. Whether a product has an affiliate link never changes whether we'd recommend it, and it never changes the price you're quoted or the honesty of a review, including telling you when a cheaper option is genuinely good enough. If we haven't personally tested something or don't believe in it, we don't recommend it just because it pays a commission.

Not every outbound link is an affiliate link

We also link to sources, retailers, and other sites for citations, further reading, or simply to point you to where something is sold, with no commission involved. The presence of a link alone doesn't mean it's an affiliate link — only pages with the disclosure notice described above currently carry one.

Questions

Email hello@beyourownbarista.com if you have a question about a specific link or recommendation, or want to know whether a particular page carries an affiliate link.