Starbucks’ low-tech sharpie problem
…and other IRL initiatives that prioritize experience over visible technology. Turns out the biggest variable is humanity.
Starbucks hopes a renewed focus on in-store experiences and hospitality will win back business. Meanwhile, tech-forward Chinese coffeehouse chain Luckin is expanding in the US — “They’ve done an interesting job of turning the app into the only way you can interact with the business,” Starbucks CEO Brian Niccol said last week about his thriving competitor. Niccol is probably hedging against overuse of AI, which is infiltrating the coffee business right now (as reported this week by Paolo Bicchieri on Best Food Blog.)
Just before I planned to hit ‘send’ on this edition of Expedite, Starbucks announced a $1 billion restructuring plan that includes the closure of roughly 500 of its U.S. stores. Per CNBC, Niccol said in a notice to employees that the company ID’d locations where it’s “unable to to create the physical environment our customers and partners expect, or where we don’t see a path to financial performance.”
“We’re tracking down the Sharpies,” the newest CEO of Starbucks told CNBC last October, “and we’re going to get back to writing little notes on the cups.”
Brian Niccol, now a year into his tenure leading the coffee chain, wants to bring back a human touch to Starbucks. Adding handwritten messages to cups, a practice that was discontinued during the height of the pandemic, was an early step toward that goal.
But it’s already causing trouble for the company; recently a worker at a Chicago Starbucks location was accused of writing “Loser” on a customer’s cup. That customer reportedly ordered a Mint Majesty tea with two honeys, the favorite drink of Charlie Kirk, in tribute to the slain political activist. In a separate incident, a Starbucks employee refused to write Kirk’s name on a customer’s order, citing a company policy against writing political names on coffee cups.
After the Starbucks Sharpies turned political, the company issued a press release to clarify its position: Political slogans or “negative messages” aren’t allowed on cups; names including Charlie Kirk are allowed, and as it turns out, that Chicago barista didn’t write “loser” on a customer’s cup after all.
“We also know the markers we use to write on cups are accessible to anyone. And therefore, notes can be easily added to a cup by others after the drink has been handed off by our baristas,” the company said in its release. That’s probably what happened in the case of the widely publicized “loser” — but it took a digital solution (reviewing surveillance footage) to exonerate the Sharpie-wielding employee trying to do their job.
People, it turns out, are complicated. So is real-life hospitality that moves at the speed of coffee. Starbucks is now trying to get it all under control.