There are diminishing returns there, and I'm assuming this was standard drop coffee, not a pour over. Is a Mr Coffee and some generic ground coffee going to be as good? Likely not (but if it's a generic coffee shop, it really is a toss up in my opinion). If you get a $1,500 grinder and then use something like a V60, that's more expensive in equipment than most people care to buy or can taste enough of a difference to make it worth while.

Also, most people don't care about their coffee enough to consider $1,700 "nothing".