So this isn’t really a post about life in Paris but it’s in response to a discussion that was started in the Current and Former Starbucks employee group on LinkedIn and I felt like I had something to say about it. And the topic is….. what happened? 

I worked as a barista for 2 years and quickly realized that Starbucks wasn’t living up to its award as one of the Fortune 500 Best companies to work for in the U.S., which is what initially motivated me to apply. Now, having been observing the ebbs and flows of the company from the outside for 3 years I see a remarkable decline in the consistency of their brand image. In its beginnings, Starbucks brought the European coffee culture to America, creating a space where people could meet and dialogue over high quality COFFEE beverages. A relaxing environment where friends could chat over coffee, nothing more. The legendary service provided by the barista was meant to be a non-negotiable and yet over time that too has slipped.

Instead of focusing on the legendary service and high quality beverages in an attempt to create a 3rd space, Starbucks has tottered between coffeehouse and fast food establishment as it increased its offerings of pastries, dessert-like beverages and music.

Steadily, Starbucks has moved further and further away from the independent coffee house vibe to a corporate money-hungry let’s-sell-everything kind of attitude to the detriment of their brand image and identity.

Now, living in Paris where Starbucks is frequented by primarily middle to upper class French university students and American and Asian tourists, I have observed a complete lack of consistency in the brand, from its questionable interpretation of legendary service and properly prepared beverages, to smoothie and pie offerings that bring the brand downscale, making it feel like a, as Meg Ryan so cleverly put it, “homogenize-the-world mochaccino land” and little else.

But Starbucks is hitting a new low with news that they will begin selling beer and wine in the hopes of attracting new drinkers while weathering the recession. Although this is more of a test concept for a Seattle based store which will have a different name (15th Ave. Coffee and Tea inspired by Starbucks), the fact remains that the brand is not what it used to be.

I agree with one of the comments above that Starbucks IS a public company and therefore it should be concerned with profit, however they should be MORE concerned with consumer perception of the brand and with how its brand values are not being reflected in its actions. Their brand is eroding and the consumer no longer finds the once-revered “Starbucks Experience” when they enter the store. They badly need to get back to basics:  the coffee.