Skip to main content

Starbucks Abandons Fidelity


In a previous blog entry, I wrote that Starbucks was at risk of becoming Dunkin Donuts.  While the green giant is undoubtedly more successful than its northeast competitor, my suspicion that they were sliding off the fidelity axis and reaching down the convenience axis (there is, after all, usually a larger market share on the convenience axis) was recently confirmed during a recent trip back to Boston.

The coffee served at conferences—is predictably lousy.  Therefore, I knew that I didn't want the complimentary coffee provided by the Westin Boston Waterfront hotel, and instead made my way up and out to a nearby Starbucks (the only coffee shop within walking distance).

I waited in line, and then ordered my usual; Double Americano, No Room.  Despite the short walk, I was still foggy, and was eagerly awaiting my caffeine fix.  Given the size of the line, I told myself that it might be a few minutes before my drink arrived.  To my astonishment, they had my americano in my hand in under 30 seconds.  I wasn't counting...I was actually aware of the time because there was a horrible cover rendition of the famous song "Rainbow Connection" being played in the store that was making me cringe, and I couldn't wait to get out of there.

How on Earth did the barista—actually, he looked like a recent high school grad, not a barista—get it done so quickly?  I didn't even see him grind the beans, pack the grounds and turn on the espresso machine.  Did they give me coffee by accident?  I peered around the side of the employee area and saw, to my disgust, a fancy-looking machine that delivered a full range of coffee-like drinks—espresso, double espresso, americano, etc.—with the push of one button.  Simply put cup under spout, push button, get coffee drink.  This was the equivalent to a coffee soda fountain.  Gross.

Needless to say, the americano wasn't any better than the conference bilge that I later succumbed to (I wasn't about to pay Starbucks fidelity pricing for a mere convenience product when I could get something more convenient with only marginally less fidelity for free).  I half wondered if they were using their awful VIA Instant Coffee in their fancy new machines, which provided no view of the beans, and no sound of the beans being mechanically measured out and ground to order like other vendors offer.

In my opinion, Starbucks has fallen into the realm of fast food.  They are not merely Dunkin Donuts; they are the MacDonald's of coffee.  And since they still charge a fidelity premium for their coffee, which only has convenience-grade quality, I will actually make it a point not to waste my money there any longer when I can get comparable coffee for half the price practically anywhere.  Thankfully, I live in San Francisco, where I can frequent real coffee shops (Bello, Ritual, Four Barrel, Blue Bottle, etc.) and enjoy some high fidelity brew.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Social CRM: Putting Customers First

Last night I attended Social CRM: Putting Customers First , hosted by the San Francisco chapter of the Social Media Club .  It was a great event, and I'll briefly recap some of the discussion and my observations. The panelists were first asked why Social CRM (SCRM) was relevant.  Their answers were as follows: Vendors need to know who their customers are out there on the social web. Vendors need to be able to identify customer pain points from conversations on the social web.  Vendors need to know what to do with these conversations on the social web.  These discussions are the center of business today; their importance cannot be understated. The social web grows too fast for vendor solutions to keep up.  Therefore, vendor solutions must embrace the social web, and learn how to crowdsource.  There is no way that you can scale communities and community managers that fast. Customers don't care about your organization structure, they just want answers a...
1 comment
Read more

Product Parenthood

It has been a long time since I've been able to sit down and write a lucid blog post.  This one will not be one of them. I've come to realize that my full-time job as a Product Manager, my other full-time job as a husband, and my newest (and most demanding) full-time job as a parent (to a delightful son) consume roughly 100% of my time; leaving precious few moments in the day in which to gather and synthesize my thoughts.  Thus, I've been using Twitter more often and blogging less. " Blogging less?  What?  You only have 3 prior entries! " I used to blog quite a bit under a different moniker.  However, as a parent, I have come to the realization that composing longer, thoughtful essays are a luxury that I generally cannot afford. With that, I've added my Twitter feed to the left, and will make an effort to write "larger-than-micro" blogs here on at least a weekly basis, if not more frequently. And now it's back to full-time job #1, follo...
1 comment
Read more

Improving Win Rates

Still here at the Gartner Local Briefing. In a session with Richard Fouts about customer win rates. Sharing Win/Loss Data Sales teams tend to advertise their wins, yet contain their losses. Why is this so? Q:  How many global IT companies conduct win/loss on an enterprise scale? Less than 5%? About 10%? About 20%? A: Less than 5% Why? CEOs and Sales people say "I know why we win/lose".  Some politics are touchy; people don't want you to expose what they did well/not (especially in competitive environments).  "I clicked the won/loss checkbox in Salesforce.com" One company evaluated their win/loss data. They looked at 140 wins, and 55 losses. Looking at this data, they noticed a correlation between the wins and the fact that they beat their competition to market with compelling announcements in over a third of the scenarios. An IT services firm attempted to sell a more sophisticated solution. Upon evaluation of the win/loss data, they fo...
1 comment
Read more