Starbucks food is good, but it's expensive. I wonder what their idea of attractive pricing is.

Starbucks coffee tastes burnt. 61% (14 votes)

Everyone says I'm crazy. I love you consumerism!

I'll just keep eating breakfast at home...

Ah, but their frappaccinos (not sure on the spelling of that there invented word) taste like a big pile of sweet sweet heaven-juice. I'm getting fatter just thinking of 'em...

@nataku83: Yep, a couple Disney eggs are all I need in the morning.

Starbucks Coffee tastes burnt, just like every other Fast Food coffee I've had (I'm one of the few Canadians that absolutely cannot STAND Tim Hortons coffee).

Their chai isn't too bad though, but I'm not paying $5 for it every bloody day.

McDonald's customers "are feeling the pinch almost everywhere else."

Especially in the bathroom around 11am.

I think Starbucks should have done this a while back. Lots of people already snack there in the morning and call it breakfast. Might as well add some real nourishment.

I actually ended up picking up breakfast from Starbucks today, because I met a friend there before class and I hadn't had a chance to eat at home. I had a greek yogurt with honey and granola. It was very good, but rather than convince me to eat more often at Starbucks, it just reminded me that I could make the exact same breakfast in 30 seconds at home and toss it into a plastic cup for a quarter of the price. I felt kind of dumb when I realized I paid four dollars for it, and had two of the three ingredients at home already (greek yogurt and honey).

@IT-Chick:
I know. It amazes me how many people think Starbucks is good coffee. I'll drink it because it's convenient. It's drinkable coffee, not good coffee.

@downwithmonstercable:

certainly not that two bites worth of Piadini sandwich thing for almost four bucks

@ScottRose: Starbucks mochia (or java chip if I'm feeling really low) frappacinos are just about the only thing I splurge on these days.

@Ash78:

Ha, you are lucky to make it until 10am, especially if you have the coffee.

There's a value anything at Starbuck? O_o

@ShirtNinja:

I actually don't mind McDonald's coffee, but prefer Dunkin Donuts. Seems a lot of places that sell coffee started going for that "Starbucks Taste" so they're all nasty now.

I actually ended up picking up breakfast from Starbucks today, because I met a friend there before class and I hadn't had a chance to eat at home. ...It was very good, but rather than convince me to eat more often at Starbucks, it just reminded me that I could make the exact same breakfast in 30 seconds at home and toss it into a plastic cup for a quarter of the price.

Um, but you weren't at home. It's the same with a hamburger. Cheap when you make it, more expensive when somebody else makes it, and then serves it in a for-profit business they're paying rent to be in.

Do I really need to be explaining this to you?

I will admit I'm addicted to the breakfast sandwiches. I think they're three bucks and are simple English muffins with egg, cheese, and some meat. My favorite: peppered bacon. Mmmmm...

If freaking Subway can experiment with "breakfast" (mmm, a footlong institutional-grade omelet on last night's surplus sub roll!) then Starbucks can do it.

For years sbux touted its cultural standing. Now it's slowly slipping down a stripper pole to McDonald's level.

I never go to Starbucks so wouldn't go out of my way for breakfast food.

@Hank Scorpio: Yeah, it can't hold a candle to Panera bread. Cheap and unlimited refills.

The really amazing thing was seeing the many Starbucks in England (and the Continent). They generally have more of a culture than eschews "filter coffee" in favor of cappuccinos and espressos. So when you get a regular coffee over there, not only do you pay about $5 for it, but it tastes downright horrible.

Whoo whoo! Polls that look dandy on OS X Safari. Whoo whoo!!

I've never seen "Starbucks" and "value" in the same sentence before, unless "isn't a" was between them.

@Amy Alkon: It all depends on how much you eat, too. If I bought the stuff to make hamburgers at home it would go bad before I got through it all, because I eat maybe one hamburger a week. Buying that hamburger from a restaurant is cheaper than buying ingredients I'm going to end up throwing out.

@Ash78: I can't wait for my 2000 calorie venti mocha bacon biscotti!

@plutonyum: Hah hah. That reminds me, shortly after 9-11 I was on a road trip and I saw a Subway with a sign that said:
WE NOW SERVE BREAKFAST
PRAY FOR AMERICA

Does a Starbuck value meal means a Starbuck's Six Boomer sandwich? If so, I'm in.

/a little seelix on the side please

//I'll run off the calories at a Racetrack

Attractive pricing in the eye of Starbucks Corporate, is likely VERY different from that which is attractive to the public.

McD's/Dunkin you can get "food" and drink for about $3... I'd be willing to guess StarBees is at least $1-3 more, which adds up to a lot of cash if that is a daily pickup

@menty666: A strip club that serves coffee, or a coffee shop that just happens to have strippers in the joint?

Either way: Brilliant! Who wants to be the first lucky investor in my business plan?

@Amy Alkon: "Do I really need to be explaining this to you?"

You don't read the comments every time a story about any restaurant food ever comes up here, do you? If you did, you'd have already gone insane from repeating what you've said about why people eat at restaurants over and over and over and over ...

@Ash78:
I didn't see any Starbucks in France, but I was amused by the fact that there was a McDonald's right next door to the fancy hotel we stayed at in Nice.

Also, best coffee I ever had was a cappuccino at the Illy Cafe down the street from said hotel.

@ShirtNinja: Their chai is fantastic...practically the only thing I get there.

I'm also a fan of the McD's Iced Vanilla Coffee. It's huge, costs less than $3, and I'm pretty sure they use half-and-half as a matter of course, unless you specify otherwise. The fatty mouth feel is divine.

DD's is one of the worst for me. Maybe I've just gotten a bad cup here and there, but it tastes mostly bitter to me...the kind of bitter than gives me the shivers just thinking about it.

@Amy Alkon: I hope I'm missing some kind of sarcasm or inside joke. Otherwise, that seems kind of harsh. Seems like she was just saying that her choice of food made her realize she could have this fairly convenient, easy to prepare, item every day at home with things that she already has.

I don't think anyone here is daft enough to really think that the overhead of running a restaurant doesn't exist, and that everything purchased in a restaurant should be the same price as if you bought it at the store.

@crazyasianman: I was specifically thinking about their butterhorns. So good...but they're like $1.50 or something and are gone in literally like two bites.

Starbucks might taste burnt but I LOVE that burnt taste :)

Their food? Not so much. I do like their sausage egg and cheese breakfast sandwiches, but that's about it.

Besides, there are usually bugs flying around in the pastry cases in then starbucks I've been to in at least 6 cities in the US

Nothing on the menu at Starbucks is attractive, especially when it comes to price.

Starbucks coffee is just horrible. Can't stand it.

@BuddyGuyMontag: BSG FTW!

Funny how a company got Americans to buy into a life style where we are now willing to pay 5 dollars for coffee. We deserve this recession with buying habits like that.

@lonestarbl: Starbucks also gives health benefits and 401K options to employees whereas McD's/Dunkin treats their workers like shit.

I'm willing to pay more to support Starbuck's corporate culture.

@Hank Scorpio:

Google maps found a few.

@Amy Alkon:

So, your point is...wake up 5 minutes earlier and save yourself $3 rather than get reamed by overpriced crap, because you just paid $4 for yogurt due to a logo on the side?

@IT-Chick: i went by the Lexus dealership today to help pick up my mom's car.
inside, they have one of those auto-brew machines, that makes one cup of coffee at a time from fresh beans and some sort of flavor syrup or powder for the cappuccino.
it tasted good, not the best coffee i've ever had, but loads better than starbucks.
(one of my friends works at starbucks, so i get drinks free, so i drink their lattes mostly. won't touch the coffee)

@CaptainSemantics: Yeah - I don't drink coffee and the gift card that my boss gave the underlings went towards creating my addiction to those things. The pepper bacon is the best, but even the low-fat bacon is pretty good.

@Plates: Well, there is that one barista...

@Amy Alkon: I believe Cortina was comparing the cost difference ($3) to the 30 seconds it would take to make it at home. It was a personal cost-benefit analysis, not an evaluation of Starbucks' business plan.

Do I really need to be explaining this to you?

@ALaterDayTD: bacon biscotti! You should patent that idea before I steal it.

First they burn their coffee, now they'll burn their breakfast and still have people lined up waiting for it (in the drive-thru lane with their SUVs running, talking on their cell phones about 90210 last night).

I want an apple fritter with my mocha anyway. If they're going to give me 10% off, I'll take it.

@Ubik2501: Hate to spoil your excitement, but those places already exist. I remember seeing a story on Dateline or something about roadside coffee shops where you were served by women in bikinis. Friggin brilliant!