Next Tuesday, Starbucks will close 7,100 corporate-owned stores early to implement a company-wide retraining session on how to make drinks. “The barista re-education is a ‘renewed focus on espresso standards,’ say Starbucks honchos.” We thought that’s why they bought the robot espresso machines—so they didn’t have to have trained coffee pullers anymore.
The training session is another move by re-instated CEO Howard Schultz to demonstrate a renewed focus on product quality, although it also sounds a little bit like a PR stunt:
“Our unprecedented level of commitment to and investment in our people will provide them with the tools and resources they need to exceed the expectations of our customers,” CEO Howard Schultz said in a written release. “We believe that this is a bold demonstration of our commitment to our core and a reaffirmation of our coffee leadership.”
(Thanks to Adam!)
“Starbucks closing 7,000-plus stores–for several hours — to retrain baristas” [Chicago Tribune]
“Starbucks stores to close for espresso training” [Wall Street Journal]
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I wish they would go back to the old machines. You can tell the difference easily between the two machine types. I use to live in Seattle and I would always opt for Tully’s coffee over Starbucks because Tully’s used the better machine.
@Dathmar: ABSOLUTELY.
@Falconfire: It’s only arabica. I can guarantee it.
“Blends” mean they use beans from different growing regions. As in, beans from Latin America and the Asia/Pacific area.
[www.starbucks.com]
There’s also no coffegeek mention of your taste test.
Plus, it would be retarded to not use arabica. Starbucks has been roasting coffee since the 70s using only arabica beans. Using arabica is an absolute basis for mimimum quality. Most shit roasters like Hills Bros. and Maxwell House only use arabica these days.
[www.starbucks.com]
@Dathmar: This is very true. With the automatic machines you cannot easily make adjustments to improve the taste of the coffee. In fact, since most new employees never used the manual machines, they wouldn’t even know what a good shot looks or tastes like. And I believe this is the cause of the decline of Starbucks.
@Falconfire: Are you making this up as you go along? Nothing on coffeegeek, and bean info is pretty easy to find on starbucks.com, it says the ONLY us Arabica beans.
I agree with someone that a big cause for the decline in both service and quality is the introduction of drive-throughs.
As for convenience stores and Dunkin’ – even if we accepted that it was better beans, they leave the coffee for hours, and never seem to clean the machines right. The same problem afflicts the Starbucks licensees. Everyone should just be grateful that Sbux never went for full out franchising. In many parts of the country there are also independent coffee shops with coffee well below Starbucks’ consistent corporate mediocrity. If they can get back to their previous no-great-but-at-laest-predictable standard through some re-education, I’m all for it.
@Chols: I know what you mean. There are three in a plaza near my house. THREE. One Target, one standalone, and one in Barnes and Noble.
Although it definitely does seem a bit like a PR stunt, you have to admire Schultz’s efforts to turn the company around. It’s going to be a long time before we’ll be able to judge how successful he has been, but it seems like he is genuinely trying to improve the customer experience — while racking up some good PR in the process. Kudos to him for trying, at least.
About time!
Yes I needlessly spend my money there..
How many times in a week can your Americano
be made incorrectly and the price vary each transaction?
Ummm… 5. 5X in a week. They have a beverage manual
that spells everything out. Here’s hoping Mr. Schultz can light a fire under his Baristas arses’.
@jesseraub: AMEN, fellow partner! Our most expensive drink is a Venti White Mocha and I think it tops out at $4.70 here. Now, you can bitch all you want but it’s not $6 unless you’re high-maintenance and add extra shots, syrup and soy.
That is all.
@meneye: There is only 1 by you, then. The ones in stores are basically owned by the stores, they are not corporate.
@Falconfire: So then you must work for a competitor and really hate us to slander us so…or is this libel? It’s so sketchy on the internet these days.
I only drink “coffee flavored coffee” -Dennis Leary.
The U.S. Military no longer uses Napalm, Starbucks must use it to roast its brewed coffee.
People here in Las Vegas argue over the best coffee/donut store, but I agree Tim Hortons-which we don’t have- is the best.
@cunnij98:Starbucks COFFEE costs the same as the coffee you get anywhere else (unless you’re getting coffee at Dunkin’ Donuts, which is more expensive). The espresso drinks cost more because they are made to order, and require more expensive ingredients. These two facts are ridiculously obvious to anyone with a triple digit IQ and rudimentary critical thinking skills. But whatever.
It seems that every time there’s a post about Starbucks here, half the comments come from people who never actually go there. Post away – it’s the Internet, after all, you do what you want – but what is the point exactly? You don’t like Starbucks, and most likely never will. So just don’t go there and move on. If not going there gives you a sense of smug self-satisfaction, great. But plastering that smugness all over the Internet – and backing it up with things that only exist in your imagination – really just make you look stupid.
@Falconfire: If I’m not Mistaken, you have proliferated this abject lie about the robusta beans a few times here, and you have been shot down every single time. Does this ever get old?
Of course, Mr. Schultz’s real solution, if he truly is committed to returning a “quality” association with the Starbucks brand, is to close at least 6,900 of those some 7,100 stores — never to reopen them. Then fire about 130,000 of the least skilled of their 135,000 employees. Replace their superautomatic machines with something that requires more skill and could actually qualify an employee for a barista competition. Encourage their staff to enter barista championships to elevate their commitment to the craft. Cut off 95% of their coffee suppliers who they buy in great bulk for consistency, focusing on a more select collection of elite bean growers. Give more than lip service to their feel-good green marketing, given that less than 3% of their bean supply is actually certified Fair Trade: enter more Direct Trade relationships with growers. Establish freshness controls that allow them to post roasting dates on their retail packages of beans, and educate the public on how fresh coffee is a lot more like fresh bread than anyone in the lay public has honestly ever considered.
In other words: a snowball’s chance in hell.
@Pop Socket: if it is mandatory training, it is done on the clock. And good training is almost never a waste of resources.
Funny, but to the person talking about dark roast…you all do realize that dark roast coffee actually has less caffeine than regular, mediaum or light roast right?
As a former Starbucks employee, I think the drive thru stores are a bad idea. The store I worked in had enough people working during a shift to cover drinks for either the front counter OR the drive through window, but not both. Drink orders got mixed up sometimes and we usually had one person making all the frozen drinks and another pulling all the shots for both lines at once.
Personally, I only go to the stores that have counter service only…
As a current Starbucks employee I’m excited to have the retraining. I’m in Canada so we won’t get retrained until March. I’m very passionate about my job and it’s such a shame that there’s so much apathy amongst other employees. I think it will be a good thing to reinforce what we’ve learned in our Barista training and to get everyone on the same page. I totally agree with the Drive-Thru comment. I’ve been saying this for a long time that there shouldn’t be Drive-Thru stores. We get so many customers from the DT store asking us to remake they’re beverages. It’s sad. Oh man I’m such a keener
Luckily we have something like 6+ options other than starbucks near campus, so I get to happily ignore them while stopping by Dunn Bros or Caribou.
I actually had a long talk Saturday night with a San Francisco based Starbucks Employee about this. Apparently at his starbucks they already are doing what the training will teach them to do. He thinks his store was part of a test run, since other nearby starbucks weren’t using the system.
Anyway apparently the big changes he mentioned will be using smaller containers to make the drinks, along with a filter designed to make the expresso taste more earthy. It used to be Starbucks employees would make a bunch of drinks at once, but now they are focusing on one drink at a time.
The employee told me the coffee tastes better, but both the filter and smaller containers make it take quite a bit longer to make. This probably won’t be a big deal unless there are a bunch of customers at the same time. If all you care about is getting a caffeine fix quickly on your coffee break, you may be less then happy. On the other hand, he said it does really taste noticeably better.
I just got done with the meeting myself.Utterly pointless the whole idea is make a quality drink which is awesome but sacrifice speed of service. Which means customers wait longer for drinks. That is ridiculous people should not have to wait longer they will only get more pissed off at us. They need to focus on getting better management so people actually get trained right from the begining and want to do things right. But the mediocrity starts at the top and trickles down to the under payed baristas who don’t give a crap and nothing will change. You will still get a mediocre beverage for a ridiculous price.