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Why Can't Starbucks Have Normal Drink Sizes?
For some reason, the Starbucks I visited yesterday (to purchase a delicious Green Tea Lemonade!) was packed with lots of tourists. As I was waiting for my drink, I watched a grandmother and granddaughter trying to remember what they ordered. Was it Tall? Venti? Mocha? Frappuccino? They had no idea, and were awfully confused.
Starbucks gets a lot of attention for wanting to be the "third place" - home and work are the first two "places" - for its customers. It has happy employees (a 82% job satisfaction rate, compared to the usual 50%!)...
But why can't they just call tall, venti, and grade small, medium, and large?
EDIT:
As this guy says:
Tall, grande, venti? "All it means," says Mark Pendergrast, author of "Uncommon Grounds: The History of Coffee and How it Transformed Our World," "is small, too much, or way too much. I refuse to speak Italian to order a size." He's not surprised, though, that so many of us do respond (25 million each week, generating $268 million in profits in 2003). "If you feel a bit humbled," he says, "when you approach the great Wizard of Oz Coffee Maker -- 'I'm so scared, can I get through this ordering process correctly?' -- that can be appealing. It's very clever marketing." [emphasis mine]
Perhaps it's clever marketing, perhaps it's the cult of the brand, but it still seems obnoxious to me.
Posted in on August 04, 2005, 09:33 AM | Permalink
Comments
The cult of the brand Mr. Kidder. I believe it's central in Sbuck's rise.
Posted by: Aaron at August 4, 2005 10:44 AM
Cult of brand aside, I feel that grandmother and granddaughter would much rather it be called small, medium, and large.
(editing entry since I can't make links here)
Posted by: skidder ![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://www.scottkidder.com/nav-commenters.gif)
at August 4, 2005 10:49 AM
That picture is fabulous. Did you take it?
Posted by: James Mullan at August 5, 2005 02:26 AM
I'd love to take credit for it, but I found it on Flickr. Click on it to see the source.
Posted by: skidder at August 5, 2005 06:12 PM
I sure as hell won't say venti or anything; in fact, i go out of my way to say SMALL, MEDIUM, or LARGE. I think it's just a marketing gimmick, similar to cars.. midsize, fullsize, H2, etc. scott, come back to MD so i can tell you about our exploits
Posted by: Robert Stevenson at August 5, 2005 09:38 PM
I couldn't agree more! I have fun with it when I go in, because they are required to repeat the drink back to you in starbuckese. For some reason, that amuses me.
Posted by: Andrew at August 8, 2005 10:47 AM
I'm a Starbucks Barista, and trust me, it irritates many of us just as much as it irritates you. The job itself is great. We sell a quality product. Just the marketing is a little weird.
Just remember when you go in to mess with the baristas, we didn't make it, we just sell it. We're still food service workers, the face of the company as they say, and as such we put up with a lot of people with bones to pick with Starbucks over which we have no control ourselves.
By the way, I agree with Mr. Pendergrast. Anything more than a Tall is way too much for anyone. Remember Starbuck's forgotten size! Short! Short is good! Venti is bad! Lol I HATE selling Venti's; I always feel like I'm contributing to American obesity.
PS Yes I know this blog is almost a year old, I just stumbled upon it while looking for images and figured I'd do my fellow baristas a favor and remind people that we don't make the rules, we just sell 'em.
Posted by: Ashley at May 28, 2006 03:14 PM
