starbucks as a brand is so incredibly loaded with cultural-political symbolism in US culture, completely disproportionate to what they actually do and sell as a business (coffee with lots of syrup in).
Not just coffee with lots of syrup, horribly burnt coffee that is less pleasant than just eating whole coffee beans, presumably to encourage people to pay extra for the syrup to hide the taste of them actively making the coffee wrong on purpose.
If starbucks weren’t on the BDS list I’d suggest trying some Starbucks reserve roasts someday. They’re still horribly dark, but at least they have some character.
But instead of that, literally any specialty coffee roaster will outdo them by simply not roasting past second or third crack…
The thing is I’m not even picky about coffee. Like I’ve had gas station boxed coffee that wasn’t good, but it wasn’t Starbucks bad. In college I’d often buy a cup of coffee from an instant vending machine in the student lounge, and that wasn’t good but it wasn’t Starbucks bad. Now I buy the cheapest whole beans I can find on sale in bulk because I can’t afford better and grind it myself, and it’s not great but it’s decent enough. It’s been 20 years since I’ve actually spent money in a Starbucks, and the only time I’ve been since was when I had a Starbucks gift card that someone else won, and their coffee tastes like burnt cardboard or burnt popcorn in a way that’s both horribly bland and actively unpleasant.
When I lived near one, I would get coffee at Winco foods. Very good prices in bulk. They tend to have locations in California, Nevada, Idaho, Texas and a few other places.
like i have to imagine it’s a marketing win for them that a significant portion of the population is under the impression that sbux is a fancy coffee shop for haughty, vaguely effeminate and foreign elites and not just, people who want to get breakfast at a drive thru on their way to their office job.
starbucks as a brand is so incredibly loaded with cultural-political symbolism in US culture, completely disproportionate to what they actually do and sell as a business (coffee with lots of syrup in).
And they say Americans don’t have culture
Not just coffee with lots of syrup, horribly burnt coffee that is less pleasant than just eating whole coffee beans, presumably to encourage people to pay extra for the syrup to hide the taste of them actively making the coffee wrong on purpose.
If starbucks weren’t on the BDS list I’d suggest trying some Starbucks reserve roasts someday. They’re still horribly dark, but at least they have some character.
But instead of that, literally any specialty coffee roaster will outdo them by simply not roasting past second or third crack…
The thing is I’m not even picky about coffee. Like I’ve had gas station boxed coffee that wasn’t good, but it wasn’t Starbucks bad. In college I’d often buy a cup of coffee from an instant vending machine in the student lounge, and that wasn’t good but it wasn’t Starbucks bad. Now I buy the cheapest whole beans I can find on sale in bulk because I can’t afford better and grind it myself, and it’s not great but it’s decent enough. It’s been 20 years since I’ve actually spent money in a Starbucks, and the only time I’ve been since was when I had a Starbucks gift card that someone else won, and their coffee tastes like burnt cardboard or burnt popcorn in a way that’s both horribly bland and actively unpleasant.
When I lived near one, I would get coffee at Winco foods. Very good prices in bulk. They tend to have locations in California, Nevada, Idaho, Texas and a few other places.
It’s also a worker owned co-op 👍👍👍
like i have to imagine it’s a marketing win for them that a significant portion of the population is under the impression that sbux is a fancy coffee shop for haughty, vaguely effeminate and foreign elites and not just, people who want to get breakfast at a drive thru on their way to their office job.