> but it’s unfair to say that the only thing expensive coffee is buying you is uniqueness
I don't mean to be intentionally obtuse, but it does seem like you just described that what you get primarily is uniqueness or degrees of uniqueness.
What I was intending to say is that you can absolutely get within a negligible margin for far less than half the price of say, 85 euro per 250g, which is comically expensive, all equipment and other ingredients kept more or less the same in terms of investment. Not all fermented coffees run that high either, and a lot of the cost comes from rarer varietals that may or may not be unique, but just aren't inherently higher quality than high specialty grades of others. For example https://www.prototypecoffee.ca/shop/oxaofizuq8la2g7m9ercvtxv...
That's not to say they aren't worthwhile or in-appropriately priced novel occasional experiences, but in a similar fashion to what you said, there are various high-grade less expensive beans to be had from Ethiopia, Indonesia, Colombia, etc.. that can distinctly taste like watermelon, starburst, blueberry, cherry; they're still very expensive relative to even quite good blends from a local roaster, but they're not that high. Incidentally, if I wanted just cherry, actual cherries at their already high price would be wildly less expensive, but that's besides the point. Ultimately they're still subject to variation in brew consistency, palate, etc.. to the point that I'd prefer to get on average 98% of the way to the same cup with 1/2 the spend considering how likely it is that some of it won't turn out that great anyway, especially without a multi-thousand dollar grinder or custom recipe water.
The exception to my comments may depend on market too, I don't know how expensive some of the extremely fruity Indonesian beans may be in EU for example, or how much a Pink Bourbon might be in Aus.
For all of the best specialty coffee I've had, there's been at least one cup at the same price-point, same roaster, same cafe, that just wasn't anything amazing, and it's a silly amount of money to chase an occasional unique novelty as a regular thing imo. I'd rather have very good most of the time for much less than half as much.