Generalism

I’m not into product placement in a big way. Heck, it’s not as if this is prime time or anything. But I do want to mention Starbucks. For some reason, when I have a Starbucks coffee, the taste and the feeling I get is just plain better than other coffees. So why mention them? Well, because I want things to change. Y’see something is happening to their stores. We have at least four in our city that I know of, and they’ve all been around a couple of years. When they were fresh and new, they were a pleasure to visit, grab a comfy chair, chill out, and just drink coffee to the tune of the world going by.

BUT

Now that they’re a couple of years old, they’re not so fresh any more. Stock seating has been added to up capacity and get a better ROI (I suppose), to the detriment of large comfy, inviting chairs and airy open spaces. The comfy chairs that still exist are turning tatty and tarnished with spillage, and the mood is starting to become more dull, dreary and closed-in than comfortable, airy and inviting. And things are starting to break and wobble. For the first time in my Starbucks life, when I’m out, and coffee calls, I’m thinking two things:

1. Should I drink outside? (I still love the coffee after all)
2. Should I try someplace new?

But of course if I’m thinking this, then someone else is. And if I start influencing my friends to go elsewhere, and they start influencing their friends, pretty soon those shops are gonna be empty. And close. And not sell me coffee any more.

So please Mr Starbuck, keep as close an eye on your perfect coffee-drinking environments as you do on your coffee; after all, you wouldn’t let the taste slip, would you…?