Starbucks
Our roving reporter notes a Teamster picket outside the Starbucks at 755 Boylston St. this morning. He says the issue is not the taste of the coffee but "SB's supplier DPI has fired employees for trying to organize a union. DPI supplies SB with everything except the coffee beans." Read more
Megan Johnson reports that whenever she goes there, there is always this older guy at the corner, sitting in a Mercedes convertible just reading. Hermoves takes his picture.
Tammy loathes the lids Starbucks now slaps on its cold coffee drinks, because they wind up crushing the straws you put through them:
... I hate it. Especially since I get a Caramel Macchiato… and one of my favorite things about this drink, is that the caramel settles at the bottom of the cup and then gets sucked up through the straw. However, when the straw collapes like this, the caramel gets stuck on the other side of the crease! ...
With shocking photos of a straw being crushed.
Because I refuse to get a CrackBerry, I didn't get the last minute e-mail that the guy I was supposed to meet at the Starbucks at School and Province streets this afternoon got pulled into a sudden meeting. So instead I spent 20 minutes inhaling pure diesel fumes and carbon monoxide. Inside the Starbucks.
An NStar crew was doing some work down a manhole right in front of the place. They had their truck running the whole time. The truck was in bad need of a tuneup, or something, because it emitted a constant fog of smoke and fumes - except for when it would belch every so often and put out even more smoke and fumes. The exhaust pipe was pointed right at the front entrance of the Starbucks, maybe four feet away. Whenever somebody walked into the Starbucks, you could see the smoke come in with them. After awhile, I neared my limit and went outside for some fresh air. Still not knowing the guy wasn't showing up, I went in the back entrance for one last look. It was like walking into the Back Bay Station waiting area right after a commuter train has pulled in. Gag.
I pity the poor workers, and wonder where I can get my lungs washed out.
Alicia goes down to the Quincy Market Starbucks with a gift card, buys one of its new fruity Vivanno drinks, reports:
... The smoothie had a unique taste to it; it definitely didn't taste like oranges, mangoes and/or bananas, but it was sweet and I became slightly nostalgic drinking it. About halfway through the drink, I realized what it tasted exactly like: amoxicillin! Amoxicillin is the pink bubblegum flavored medicine I used to take for ear infections, and it was delicious (for a medicine.) I'm not sure if drinking Vivannos will cure a bacterial infection, but they sure taste like they will.
By developing a line of tasteless breakfast sandwiches that drip grease on your shirt - but still with that classic Starbucks faux-European name - Brian Kane reports:
... Even though their turbo oven is supposed to make things nice and toasty, this sucker was like half-cooked pie dough when I got it — not firm enough to retain its shape when picked up, so that it sort of drooped on my fingers like Silly Putty, but just firm enough to start to crumble when I tried to fold it up a bit. It was also almost completely devoid of any discernible flavor. ...
Cleary Squared goes to the new Staples in Roslindale Square, reports that if it wants to retain any customers on the weekends, it's going to have to instill some pride in the sullen, put-upon teens apparently running the place on Saturdays and Sundays.
Dan Miller reports he only goes to the School Street Starbucks because he needs his morning coffee, not because he enjoys "being held hostage by the designated drink maker, who thinks he's Tom Cruise in 'Cocktail.'"
The Missus reports the guy behind her today at Starbucks ordered his "usual" - six shots of espresso with "a little bit of ice."
Petition to try to convince Starbucks to close the Starbucks on Centre Street in Newton Center instead of the one in the Union Street train station:
Mr. Shultz, please be advised that I will NEVER spend a dollar at the Center Street location, nor any other Starbucks for that matter. There is a Peets Coffee and Tea location in Newton Center as well, and they will be getting my daily business going forward if you proceed with this closing. ...
Via The Missus, who writes people go to Starbucks for the ambiance, not the awful coffee and stale pastry.
At least, when it comes to Starbucks outlets.
Cosmo Catalano explains why the Starbucks on Church Street in Harvard Square sucks while the one on Newbury Street in the Back Bay between Dartmouth and Exeter is just divine. It's all in the baristas they hire.
Theresa has enough of "corporate coffee" and so tries out locally owned shops in Newtonville.
That shutdown yesterday? Starbucks used the time to introduce its workers to its new guarantee (customers who find their coffee less than perfect can return it and a barista "will make it right") and to announce it's going back to its old policy of pouring espresso into shot glasses before pouring that into the paper cups customers get.
Could somebody notify Associated Press that that's all we really needed to know, rather than the the Epic of Gilgamesh it brewed up?
Christina Mallozzy, a pharmaceutical saleswoman, looked miffed when she walked up to a Starbucks on Manhattan's Upper East Side only to find out it was closed. "I'm not furious. My life's not going to end," said Mallozzy, 25. She was, however, annoyed because she had gone to the trouble of snagging a parking space.
I suspect your reaction to Endangered Coffee's report will depend on whether you have a kid:
All in all, the incident ended badly, although it could have been much worse. I had to talk Mrs. EC from running back into the Starbucks with her dark roast and my cappuccino and dumping them on the floor. I had to convince her that there was such a crime as creating a disturbance that could have conceivably led to her, me and [Baby] EC ending up in the slammer. As it was, the incident ended with the Mrs. calling a Starbucks employee a f#@$@%! b%^&$ as we headed out the door and me lugging [Baby] EC behind her, yelling that I was going to let him piss in their cappuccino machine. ...
Now comes a study of Boston-area coffee shops (via MetaBoston) that concludes:
... [F]emale customers wait an average of 20 seconds longer for their orders than do male customers even when controlling for gender differences in orders.
Author Caitlin Knowles Myers, an assistant professor of economics at Middlebury College, says the wait was even more pronounced in shops with male employees - women workers were less likely to try to hold women customers up. Not only that, but the baristas seem particularly disgusted by ugly customers - they had to wait longer for their orders than the beautiful people.
Myers acknowledged in the study that women customers seemed to be more likely to order "fancy" drinks that would take more time to prepare (75% of women vs. just 55% of men; no discussion of the complexity of orders by ugly people), but said that even when this factor is taken into account, women and ugly people still had to wait longer than pretty boys (although you'd think the reverse would hold: Workers would rush their orders to get them out of their face).
She says possible reasons for the discrimination include male workers trying to get more money out of women customers (the report does not say how); male workers hating women customers (in part because of a conception that they're lousy tippers); or male workers "garnering utility" from female customers (i.e., they want to get to know them better). However, in all cases, it's discrimination against women, she writes.
The report is based on 295 observed customer interactions in visits to eight unnamed coffee shops in "the central Boston area" by a professor and five students this past January; they were selected based on whether they had seating arrangements that let the "enumerators" spy on observe workers without letting them know somebody had an eye on them. So I'm thinking Dunkin' Donuts was not included, because it'd be hard to not look out of place staring at counter workers at a Dunk's.
Should you wish to verify the results, Myers provides detailed instructions on how to properly conduct such a study: Read more
Jimbo has the (dark roasted) scoop.
On a blog called Boston Food & Whine, you'd expect a good whine from time to time. Tammy unleashes today on the Starbucks out by the Dedham Mall, which puts the "suck" in "Starsucks," apparently:
... Another issue is more often than not, there is residual coffee under the lip of the lid, so that when I grab the cup from the drive-thru window, it inevitably drips all over my clothing. ANNOYING... How hard is it to put a dome lid on a cold cup that is too full???
Next, the staff is horrendous. They are ridiculously slow -- especially when you actually go in. I once waited (I kid you not) FIVE MINUTES for the Barista to even begin making my drink... and I was the only person in there! They were lolling around, talking, wiping the counters, etc. I finally had to say something. You would have though that I actually asked them to do their job or something...
Not only are they slow and incompetent, but they are rude. ...
The Missus gets right to the point:
... What the hell is wrong with you people? ...
Actually, she uses some choicer words to roast them, and provides photographic proof of their suckatude.
The Metropolitan Princess rates four different Starbucks:
... I have squeezed my way into Dartmouth Street, been ignored at Copley, waited for an insane 15 minutes at Boylston, and been run over with a gym bag in Newbury. All in all it was worth it to find the best and ensure a better start to my day. ...
Sure, laugh all you want about brown-tinged swill or 17 sugahs or trans fats or that smirking Joker lookalike known as Rachael Ray, at least I never have to worry about being sneered at by some barista with an overendowed sense of importance who so cows me that I vow to get what he wants me to next time, that is, if I can ever summon up the courage to step foot in his store again.
... "Here's your ICED venti americano," he says, with a look of revulsion. ...
More