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Americans are pretty fucking disgusted that the CEO of Starbucks takes a private jet to work in Seattle from his home in California. Eat the rich.
Starbucks has moderately tasty food, and disgustingly bad coffee. If they put enough sugar into it, it's fine... But going elsewhere yields better results.
Dude I live in an armpit of a city and even I can find a small mom and pop shop that sells better food than Starbucks, prepackaged microwaved slopass shit. You gotta have been stuck in the woods chewing on bark to think that shit is tasty.
I haven't had a single good Starbucks experience. The biggest thing for me is that they aren't even cheaper than a local shop. I'm sacrificing quality for what, the "convenience" of using an app to order?
Good. Who wants to drink burnt coffee from a megacorp when I can drink coffee that's actually good from a local business?
Do it like me and make awful coffee right at home 🚀
I don't drink coffee, but I hear you can make it yourself.
People can cook for themselves, too, but sometimes they like to go out for food. Same with coffee. It can be nice to get out of the house and go for a cup of coffee, or grab a cup when you happen to be out. Ever tried making a cup of coffee on a road trip? Not impossible, but not super practical for most people. If you want a latte but you don't own an espresso machine you're kind of out of luck (unless you want to get an Aeropress). Anyway, there's lots of reasons why you'd go to a coffee shop.
Shit, I'm a four star chef, and most of what I eat is Taco Bell. Why? Because cooking for one person is a damn PITA, and I like Taco Bell.
I don't drink the zombie bean though. I will say that Starbucks smells slightly burnt, compared to the local coffee shops.
I am not a four star chef. And I would never eat at taco bell.
Yuck.
Of all the fast food, as a chef you know everything they make can be made at home in 10 minutes and with real ingredients.
And then you have to do the dishes too, of which you would need multiple if you are adding in all the same ingredients as taco bell menu items and getting it done in 10 minutes.
Starbucks is shit, it has always been shit, it will always forever be shit.
There's a reason it failed in Australia. There's a reason it only exists still in Australia and that's only to cater to tourists who don't like coffee but like coffee-flayoured milk bevetages - you'll never find Australians in there except maybe if working and forced to make shit drinks. Literally everywhere else is better, including fast food places.
I'll give it some credit as a "third place" but literally every other coffee shop is too and they serve actual coffee.
It's not a third place anymore. They changed that policy about a year ago.
It's absolutely always been shit. I've hated it since it gained popularity. There was a time when people would treat you as a coffee snob for hating it, but that seems to have waned as more people realized that it's shit, even by fast food standards. I'd rather drink local, but hell I'll take McDonald's coffee over sbux
Anti-union strike-breakers are losing business? Say it ain't so.
Starbucks was an amusing rise and fall.
- Put one on every street-corner, possibly across the street from each other.
- Run all the other coffee shops out of business
- Let your stores fail because they can't sustain themselves
- Competitors notice this, and move in with drive-through-only stores
Of course the competitors are small chains and the original shops were indie, but that's just the free hand of the market fisting some folks without lube
I can tell you exactly why people aren't going to Starbucks anymore: the quality has declined from lack of training, it's now overpriced coffee for what it is, and their shops aren't even good "3rd places" anymore - their furniture isn't comfortable and the space design implies "give us money, then gtfo". Starbucks as just turned into an overpriced fast-food coffee company
I used to frequently go to a Starbucks in the town I went to uni in; To the point where the baristas knew me by name. I went a lot because it was that 3rd place I could go and study / get work done, with readily available snacks and beverages. However, they ended up closing that shop, even though it was one of the highest rated shops in either the town/province because: they couldn't put a drive-through in at that location 🤦
It's ironic how at that old location, they used to write / draw stuff on the cups for their loyal customers because there was an actual friendship between the employees and the regular customers. Now they write generic stuff on the cups as "corporate mandated fun"
The coffee has always been bad.
The coffee is burnt, the milk is thin and overcooked, and this has just been a constant part of the experience forever.
What's really changed is there's other places to compare with, and it's now obvious what coffee can taste like and where to go if you want one that's half way decent.
There are two mom and pop food trucks with pretty good coffee (bean grinding, not Folgers) within reasonable walking distance of my house. There are a bunch of both food trucks and sit down joints with coffee, breakfast pastries/sandwiches, and good branding within reasonable driving distance. Even my shitty hometown has a coffee shop now and that place is garbage.
Starbucks showed that there was an appetite for coffee that isn't just white label drip diner coffee that will strip the paint off the walls. It normalized it so that it wasn't as pretentious looking. They normalized coffee shops. But you're absolutely right, it's just terrible until they add 1000 calories of dessert to it.
The local shops in my area are making a huge comeback. Starbucks killed most of the local little independents around 15 years ago. They did it by providing consistent quality and reasonable pay to their employees.
Recently local chains/independents have made a resurgence. Their secret, heavily recruiting the experienced trained Starbucks employees full-time at better pay and benefits.
Starbucks traffic is plummetting while local companies are expanding rapidly.
This morning I went to the bank and gas station right next to a Starbucks that has been there for 20 years and a 4 month old local chain. Starbucks had one person in the drive-through and maybe half a dozen people in the store. The local chain had a 10 car line and a full parking lot.
Who wants to wait in line to pay that much? Starbucks is a luxury in my eyes now. I get organic instant coffee in bulk because it's cheap and convenient. I get over 10 cups of good organic coffee for the price of what 1 cup would be at a coffee shop.
Starbucks feels like the Blockbuster of the quick-stimulation market. Once there were no alternatives, now there are loads, often cheaper and better. Without constant customer flow, it’s suddenly just vast amounts of premium real estate that need paying for. And unlike smaller competitors, it doesn’t have much room to pivot. Watching how that unwinds will be interesting.
Starbucks is just not what it was. Wife gets them for a treat but we bought a kick ass ninja coffee maker and a grinder and have been doing it all at home. The savings allows us to buy the more expensive beans.
Plus I can now buy beans roasted in Canada and not support an American company.
I live in a rural area and while we have a Starbucks, it’s pretty awful. Dirty seating, long lines.
Across the street is a great espresso with seating.
A block away is a Vietnamese coffee.
Starbucks is dying as a company. They might live on a few more years until everyone figures out how much better other places are for coffee.
They just opened two new stores in my town. That said, they’re not busy.
Their blended drinks cost over 6 bucks. That’s crazy.
They didn't revolutionize coffee culture, they just capitalized on it.
I don't like coffee that tastes burned.
I got news for you... it's all burned
False. It’s all “cooked”, but to varying degrees, just like steak can be cooked blue, rare, and so on all the way past well-done.
It doesn't all taste like it though.
Likely you've become accustomed to it and I'm a little jealous. As a non-coffee drinker, when I have rarely needed it, it's always a burnt flavor, no matter how mild the roast.
Because it is. They burn the beans. Some more than others though and thats where the flavours come from
They roast the beans. You wouldn't call cooking "burning the food" either. You can burn food too but then it tastes like shit - just like burnt coffee beans.
I encourage you to eat a bean straight and report back on the flavor
I'm not paying $5 for black coffee
Not to be the Debby downer. My city hundreds of local coffee shops, and they all charge $4 for black coffee. The price isn't the issue.
It's what they do with it. Like as the other comments say... Private jets and union busting.
What's wrong with you? The CEO needs that money to fly on the company's private jet! /s
Of course the company claims it's for security reasons. I think the $90 million per year compensation must also be for security concerns following that logic.
Why do people even go to starbucks? I've been there once. The coffee is sugarry slop, the atmosphere is the same fastfood atmosphere as anywhere.
If I want to go out and have a coffee on my day off, I 'd much rather go to some local coffeshop somewhere and experience their unique atmosphere, sight, sounds, smells, tastes and everything they have to offer. It's probably cheaper as well, except that I'm usually inclined to buy a bite as well and mayne some more.
Sometimes I just crave an OrangeMoccaFrappucino.
My best friends had one once and then they perished in a freak gasoline fight afterward. I’m still haunted by the events to this day.
sugary slop
That's why people go there.
Yeah. Cause Starbucks over roasts their coffee to ensure consistency across the brand. It tastes like shit. Gas station coffee is better. You go to Starbucks for the milk shakes made in a coffee shop. You get coffee somewhere else.
Dunkin is literally better, unless things have changed, their policy was to always have a < 15 minute pot of coffee ready. Any longer and it starts to spoil. Freshly grinded beans and a freshly brewed is probably the single most important part of coffee, inexpensive beans can taste good.
This is true at Starbucks too, the freshness of the brew is not why their coffee is bad. This is the company that sold charcoal as French roast for years before anyone noticed it was so overroasted it tasted like bad fish and ash. (I've never had a more difficult roast to find a pairing for - Smore's is the answer, if anyone cares, to make starbucks french roast not taste awful)
I never understood why they roast it so hard. Who is asking for that?
Buying regular coffee beans at the supermarket is just as expensive as going to starbucks. We need to fix the Planet or we will lose coffee.
Who fucking cares? And especially from Starbucks! You have to be idiot to live in America these days.
this post was submitted on 31 Jan 2026
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