Coffee and Booze at Starbucks

This Reuters story about Starbucks' plan to run a pilot of one store, yes JUST one, in Seattle which will sell alcohol with its coffee is a big yawn to someone like me who hails from New Zealand. Almost every coffee shop where I come from sells wine, beer, and real food along with great coffee. And yes they are still called "cafes", not restaurants or bars. Which is why coffee shops in New Zealand buzz from before sun-up to after sun-down.

Is it part of the Puritan American culture that coffee and alcohol are separate in the U.S.?

I also got a laugh from the company spokesperson who said "the cafe and any others that follow, would return to making espresso drinks by hand..." How quaint!

What Starbucks needs to do, if they aren't already, is to do more homework in New Zealand and Australia to try and figure out why coffee shops are so successful there, even during this "great recession".

McDonald's seems to know what a great "social laboratory" New Zealand makes when it comes to the coffee as they trialed their McCafes for several years leading up to their launch in the "Mother Country" in the last year. Not that I'm advocating for McCafes - I have to say I haven't tried one. Perhaps one day...

In my opinion, Starbucks is never going to make it though. As popular as it seems to remain with most Americans, it is after all "corporate coffee", so you will always see the same generic branding of the same product from coast-to-coast, just like we see with food, clothing, housing, and retail throughout the U.S. It's all the same menu, same house, same line-up of stores, same pair of pants from coast to coast. You will never beat the entrepreneurial owner-operator for energy, enthusiasm, and creativity in food and beverage. For corporations operating in food and beverage, after all, it's all about economies of scale and repeatability; not about creativity.

If you get the chance to visit New Zealand you will realize that America has in large part lost its soul in the food and beverage industry. Generic is not creative.

What do you think? Post a comment below.