Starbucks certainly has a diverse clientel

While passing a Starbucks recently,<div></div>

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While in line at a Starbucks in Nashville TN a couple of weeks back, I took a look at

quivering caffiene junkies there with me...and thought of sheep.

What is Starbucks exactly?

Starbucks is a chain of coffee shops started in Seattle I think. They are posed to take over the world - there are already six of them in the rather small, low population area I live in. Good stock to own as they expand worldwide.

Starbucks is a way of life/culture that should be forbidden. It is part of making every corner/mall/city block first in the US now in the rest of the world look and feel exactly the same. Situated right next to an Anne Taylor store, a Gap, a Banana Republic, Armani Exchange, with a parking lot with SUVs outside.<div></div>

I agree with Patrick. Starbucks is a very negative development.

 

All they did was copy every minute detail of Peet's coffee in Berkeley EXCEPT the good coffee. Their motto was "most won't know the difference." Then they systematically dismantled all their competitors across the country.

 

I can understand why people abandon small businesses for corporate chains in some circumstances -- Walmart really is a lot cheaper, and many people don't have time to shop at multiple small clothing stores instead of the gap.

 

But to pay double price for a weak, mass-produced facsimile is strange. Sorry to be so OT.

"But to pay double price for a weak, mass-produced facsimile is strange..."

 

Not so strange if the only perceived option is the bilge water most office coffee services provide. The service my current outfit uses has come up with flavored options now.

 

Anyone want to try anchovy-oregano coffee?

Why is it when companies become successful they get attacked? This is a very European phenomenon and is often intimately connected with anti-Americanism (unless you are British and then success is always attacked whenever it appears). But it is prevalent among intellectuals everywhere. I see no reason to deride Starbucks quite honestly, if people do not like them and say away then they will close all on their own without all the pointless griping, but so far this has not happened has it?

 

The developed world is all the same and has been for many, many decades, since the advent of cheap airfares. That's bad too of course.

 

re Kerry's picture: I like trompe l'oeil images. I am making a collection of photos of them myself. I think you need to go closer though on this one.

There is something to the ctiticism, nonetheless. Starbucks bought out Cafe Paradisio in St. Louis. It had been a wonderful place with not only excellent coffee, but even a breakfast bar where you could get pancakes, crepes, etc. Now, it's just another Starbucks. Phooey.

"I see no reason to deride Starbucks "

 

You've got to warn others. I'm on a personal Starbucks veto on purely economic grounds. Starbucks' official definition of a Capucino is half fluid and half froth. I know that because I rang up their UK head office to clarify it after I was given that in their North Swindon outlet (the one in the Borders book shop). Given that they don't charge half price, I've decided they can make their money out of others. On the other hand, I can heartily recomend the Costa Coffee bar in the Cirencester Ottakars book shop (do you see a pattern here?) which gives a full measure of coffee with froth on top.<div></div>

Robin, why get so defensive and believe that the world is out to attack America (an the insult to the Brits while you are at it) becasue someone ventilates an opinion?!? You cannot seriously want that every corner of the world offers you the same experience?

 

My perfect example is Place De La Contrescarpe in the 5e Arr. in Paris. It used to be this amazing pictureque little square behind the Pantheon/Universite de Sorbonne. Along the square/place/piazza there was 2-3 small bistrots serving excellent food and drinks for all times of the day/night. It was even so idylic that I once saw Renault filming a car commercial there in this oh-so-picture-perfect old world Parisian square. Then Haegen-Daz marched in, completly took over/renovated a building covering 1/4 of the square and it now looks like something out of any American mall. Please...

I like the dog shots that Dale and Eric submitted, and agree with Robin that Kerry's photo has promise but might benefit from a closer perspective -- more mural and less edifice.

 

And I'll side squarely with Robin on the Starbuck's phenomenon, too. The claim that they all look alike is flatly refuted by the pictures themselves. My observation is that Starbucks has done better than most when it comes to achieving or preserving architectural harmony with existing structures, expanding outdoor/courtyard areas (which I like), and offering a reasonably comfortable place for coffee.

 

They don't all look alike, but they smell alike and taste alike, and they sound alike, too. That's all on purpose. Yes, they are expensive, but often not more expensive than locally-owned quality coffee shops who compete with them. And when I can, I go to those, too. In fact, I'll often go to those first, provided they are smoke-free, because I'm allergic to smoke, and even if I weren't, I'd much rather leave smelling like an expresso than a pack of Marlboros.

 

The "driving out the competition" talk sounds as though we're talking about Microsoft. Come on, fellas. We aren't.

 

And Beau, say what you will about Starbucks. Tastes are very individual and subjective. But do you really think the taste of Starbucks coffee is weak?

 

A Disclaimer: I don't own Starbucks stock. I never have.

 

A Lament: There have been a number of occasions on which I wished that I owned the stock and had passed on the coffee. (Too much of a good thing ...)

I�m with Patrick and Beau on this. Starbucks is corporate greed. Starbucks is homogenization. Bulldozing into communities with billions of dollars and running mom and pop out of town, replacing a good living with minimum wage. And although unaware, I�m sure they�re right up there with McDonald�s and the decimation of the environment and third world cultures. Starbucks is only good for the occasional photograph.

accept it is against Starbuck's corporate policy to take photos inside a Starbuck or photograph any of their employees/interiors.

 

Just the tough of using "corpoarate policy" and "coffee" in same sentence sums it up pretty well...

I agree w/Pat & Beau re: Starbucks representing homogenization, but I don't think that they're evil. Having been introduced to decent coffee in early '80s Berkeley, CA, I'm quite familiar w/Peet's, but the fact is that Starbucks has succeeded because most of their competition was pretty bad (unlike Peets, which is still in business), incompetent, or nonexistent, just as many of the small burger joints driven out of business by McDonalds, Burger King, etc. in the 1950s & 60s were actually pretty bad. I personally don't think Starbucks is that good (I prefer Quartermaine, a local DC roaster actually run by the folks who started Starbucks & were then forced out by the current management), but it ain't the worst that's out there. Besides, don't you drive an SUV, Patrick?

I most certainly do, filled with kids, double strollers, diapers - the works! As a snow loving Swede and former ski instructor who actually like/use the 4x4 function, although there is way too little snow falling in DC every year!

 

I should add that I'm not anti-Starbuck/revolutionary about it, I do buy a latte for my wife there every now and then. It is more of a sad observation.

This is a European phenomenon

 

Really, i thought they were for the 'stick out your little finger' brigade. Expensive coffee, in a sterile boring environment. I thought they were a Mac Donald thing? Prefer MacDonald. Value for money.

 

Toddy Breaks, at a good and wholesome place, for the office machines.

 

European tradition...i thought it was a about having a pint, or a glass of wine in a place of life and atmosphere.

 

Glad i'm wrong with those wicked thoughts.

Isn't Peets becoming a chain also. I know of one in Santa Cruz. The secret of Starbucks success is consistancy, they all taste the same which is better than average. I know I can pull off the freeway anywhere in California and ask someone where the nearest Starbucks is and it usually is no more than 5 minutes away. Actually I quit coffee a year ago as part of a general health upgrade and let me tell you, this is one very addicting drug.

It's not so simple as hating a company when it gets successful. I admire a number of successful companies; many make money by making our lives better. Starbucks is an example of a company making money by making many of our lives worse.

 

As I understand it, the history of Starbucks is that, after copying everything about Peet's except for the quality of the coffee, they went from town to town, quietly buying up and then shutting down the most successful local and regional coffee shops. In Cambridge, Mass, as they were buying a beloved local chain called Coffee Connection, local citizens protested. Some high-ranking Starbucks executives attended a town meeting and, looking sincere in their blue jeans, assured everyone that they had no intention of changing such a great local tradition and pledged to be a hands-off owner of the chain. A few months later they closed all the Coffee Connection shops.

 

This is just a story I heard on Boston NPR, but I've heard a lot of similar stories (the one above about St. Louis, for example).

they all taste the same

 

And look the same; what a sad thought.

They *don't* all taste the same - to my taste, Starbuck's over-roasts their coffee, so it tastes a bit burned. I like Peet's much better, but both are better than watery coffee from most non-coffee-specialist outlets.

 

BTW I've had no trouble with corporate policy when taking photos in Starbuck's, even when working very obviously with ostentatious equipment.

George Howell sold Coffee Connection to Starbucks for $23M. The nerve of him - there

oughta be a law...

Starbucks is something of a mixed bag. As these sort of enterprises go they are rather caring of their work force with non standard benefit packages. Also I believe they are trying to do something about the coffee industry's more rapacious practices in the growing/ wholesale sectors. And their founder, in best Seattle tradition, gives lavishly and actively to worthy causes. On the other hand they are something of a blight on the landscape, a kind of coffee Borg. In Vancouver BC for example they once put two shops on opposite corners in an attempt to "corner" the market. And on Commercial Drive in the same city they invaded an eclectic neighborhood of italian coffee bars. Residents there, however, did not go quietly. Starbucks found it quite difficult to to keep glass in their windows. Personally, I can't stand this sort of mega-plague, although sometimes I find myself inside the belly of the beast despite myself.