I don't particularly care for Starbucks. I also think it tastes like burnt coffee. Dunkin Donuts has a better and much cheaper cup of java. I think it is the cream they use.
I think the frozen frappaccinos are good at Starbucks. That is what my DDs like.

The fact that they are in Europe is fine with me. I also like to visit the local cafes and drink coffee etc... But we did visit a Starbucks in Vienna this past summer. It was 90 degrees F and we were thristy for a frosty frappaccino!

My DH calls Starbucks, 4bucks. He can't believe people here pay 4bucks plus for a cup of coffee. Oh well. He doesn't drink coffee anyway.

Interesting. Of course, taste is highly personal. Each of us has a different set of flavor sensing taste buds; e.g., one person might have more or fewer sweet sensing or sour sensing or heat sensing buds than another. So one person's "burnt' taste is another's "strong" taste. But Starbuck's coffees have done very well in independent, blind taste tests all around the world.

Some diffence would also be just what we are used to from our family upbringing and general "food and drink" environment.

Part of the aversion to Starbucks or Seattles Best might also be psychologically, personality, or world perception based; i.e., just not liking global corporations, or being unhappy about large corporate chains pushing out locals, or being anti-US business, etc.

But I think it is mostly just that we all have a different ratio of flavor receptors in our mouths.

You mean StarBURNT, right?

yes, those taste buds are different alright, thank God.

Dukey--Others are probably thinking exactly the same about your preferences.

In London's case it seems that before the Seattle Coffee Company came in and opened a coffeeshop on every corner London simply did not have what the Continent had had for ages - a coffeeshop in the Viennese model.

Then Seattle sold its stores to Starbucks i believe.

starbucks and places like Costa filled a total void it seems and by their sheer numbers and often crowded status i'd say Londoners welcome the trend, much like Americans did.

I didn't find the Starbucks coffee in Paris to be the same at all as the coffee I get at the U.S. Starbucks. It was pretty much the same as coffee I drank in other places in Europe. I went there because the neighborhood Paris pastry shop didn't have coffee to go with my breakfast and the Starbucks was right down the street.

Connie~ You hit my point from earlier...the "coffee to go" is a draw... Friends that have lived abroad for years say this is a concept that some older Europeans detest while the younger are embracing it. I don't think anyone would deny that Americans like the idea!!

girlonthego, 4Bucks is right! That's $1,460 per year of money that could be spent on travel.

Well the thing is, Starbucks is the closest thing we have to a coffee culture.

That goes for a lot of Asian countries too, as Starbucks is popular there too.

I think the to-go thing appeals to younger Europeans, as well as the non-smoking environment and the more casual decor like couches and such.

Sorry, but I still have issues with Starbucks for charging firefighters on 9/11 for water to wash out their eyes and consequently will not step into one ever again. Unless fair trade cooperatively grown organic coffee is served then Starbucks is part of the problem.

aranda, there's a wrinkle in your foil cap

Sorry, but I still have issues with Starbucks for charging firefighters on 9/11 for water to wash out their eyes>

aranda - any links to support this - sounds terrible and unbelievable - document and i may start to boycott Starbucks as well

thanks

I do not want to see a Starbucks on every street corner like you do in some parts of the UK.>

Hetismij - do you not want to see a Starbucks on every corner

or do you not want to see a Starbucks-like but Dutch owned koffieshop on every corner.

Is it Starbucks or the idea of a coffee shop like the Starbucks model?

Currently i see very few Starbucks type coffee houses in Holland - do you want to deny the Dutch, esp younger Dutch who go there with their laptops, the chance to have coffee shops like in most countries?

You can see i am not sympathetic with your OP attitude.

Cheers

And you do have a McDonalds and or Burger King practically on every main shopping drag and McDrives in the country, etc. Tons of Big Macs - do you want these to go away too?

If not, what's the difference?

I live in NYC. I remember. That's my documentation of Starbucks charging firefighters for water to wash their eyes.

Seamus: I like your humor, really. But it's true. You don't have to believe it, I'm not trying to convince you. I understand how coldhearted that incident sounds, and how unreal. After complaints and local NYC media reporting it, they stopped charging, but only after charging for water was exposed.

Palenque: local NYC newspapers from the time of 9/11 reported on this. Starbucks charging fire fighters for water was not the headline of the news reports at that time, but it was reported.

There still is the issue of fair trade cooperatively grown coffee.

Since Aranda didn't have anything to back her claim up, I googled the incident and found the following link, as usual, there is more to the story.

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/533295/posts

So, Aranda, what do you have to say now?

As for fair trade, what are the policies of Lavazza, Illy, Segafreddo, Tchibo, and every other brand of coffee sold in Europe? The coffee sold at every European cafe?

<b> "Unless fair trade cooperatively grown organic coffee is served then Starbucks is part of the problem."</b>

So-called "fair trade" coffee IS the problem. The European coffee shops around my house (who all boast of selling fairtrade coffee) contribute to exacerbating Third World poverty far more than companies like Wal-Mart or Starbucks.

Coffee is a cyclical commodity, Vietnam (and recent falls in coffee prices are mostly the result of overplanting by Vietnam) plants too many new coffee trees: the world price falls, and other people stop planting.

Modify those price signals by ill thought-out stunts like fairtrade, and all that happens is that growers who've not been adopted by Western do-gooders suffer even more. The world price drops just as much, but growers Oxfam or whoever likes get protected - so the rest get zapped more than they would have been.

<b>"As for fair trade, what are the policies of ...every other brand of coffee sold in Europe"</b>

In Europe, they mostly sell fairtrade. Including - at least in Britain - Starbucks (www.csmonitor.com/2009/0424/p13s04-wmgn.html)

But I suppose a few real facts are a bit beyond Aranda's ability to manage.

<b> "There's more to the water story" </b>
Yes, and most of it makes Starbucks look a lot less public spirited than the Free Republic story implies. www.snopes.com/rumors/starbucks.asp

But as a matter of interest, did Middlewood Ambulance Service provide its services on 11/9 for free? Did all those gallant ambulance workers (and policemen and firemen and TV cameramen and journalists and anchormen and...) get no pay?

Flanneur: You have completely disillusioned me with corporate do gooders - Whole Foods Market has been ballyhooing the Fair Trade Coffee thing as much as anybody

You are telling me their efforts are hurting more coffee farmers than helping?

What a let down.
http://www.globalexchange.org/campai...rtrade/coffee/

The above do-gooders group however seems to have quite another take on Flanner's take (which no doubt is pro big business - his bias IMO)

Here is the script of Jackie Mason's (in)famous routine on Starbucks. I don't agree with his politics, but he can be fun at times.

"Jackie Mason on Starbucks

This is Jackie Mason's bit on Starbucks--the coffee chain. It is funny if you read it with Jackie's voice.

Starbucks is the best example of a phony status symbol that means nothing, but people will still pay 10x as much for because there are French words all over the place. You want coffee in a coffee shop, that's 60 cents. But at Starbucks, Café Latte: $3.50. Cafe Cremier: $4.50. Cafe Suisse: $9.50. For each French word, another four dollars. Why does a little cream in coffee make it worth $3.50? Go into any coffee shop; they'll give you all the cream you want until you're blue in the face. Forty million people are walking around in coffee shops with jars of cream: "Here's all the cream you want!" And it's still 60 cents. You know why? Because it's called "coffee." If it's Cafe Latte - $4.50. You want cinnamon in your coffee? Ask for cinnamon in a coffee shop; they'll give you all the cinnamon you want. Do they ask you for more money because it's cinnamon? It's the same price for cinnamon in your coffee as for coffee without cinnamon - 60 cents, that's it. But not in Starbucks. Over there, it's Cinnamonnier - $9.50. You want a refill in a regular coffee shop, they'll give you all the refills you want until you drop dead. You can come in when you're 27 and keep drinking coffee until you're 98. And they'll start begging you: "Here, you want more coffee, you want more, you want more?" Do you know that you can't get a refill at Starbucks? A refill is a dollar fifty. Two refills, $4.50. Three refills, $19.50. So, for four cups of coffee - $350. And it's burnt coffee. It's burnt coffee at Starbucks, let's be honest about it. If you get burnt coffee in a coffee shop, you call a cop. You say, "It's the bottom of the pot. I don't drink from the bottom of the pot. But when it's burnt at Starbucks, they say, "Oh, it's a blend. It's a blend. It's a special bean from Argentina....." The bean is in your head. And there're no chairs in those Starbucks. Instead, they have these high stools You ever see these stools? You haven't been on a chair that high since you were two. Seventy-three year old Jews are climbing and climbing to get to the top of the chair. And when they get to the top, they can't even drink the coffee because there's 12 people around one little table, and everybody's saying, "Excuse me, excuse me, excuse me, excuse me....." Then they can't get off the chair. Old Jews are begging Gentiles, "Mister, could you get me off this?" Do you remember what a cafeteria was? In poor neighborhoods all over this country, they went to a cafeteria because there were no waiters and no service. And so poor people could save money on a tip. Cafeterias didn't have regular tables or chairs either. They gave coffee to you in a cardboard cup. So because of that you paid less for the coffee. You got less, so you paid less. It's all the same as Starbucks - no chairs, no service, a cardboard cup for you r coffee - except in Starbucks, the less you get, the more it costs. By the time they give you nothing, it's worth four times as much. Am I exaggerating? Did you ever try to buy a cookie in Starbucks? But a cookie in a regular coffee shop. You can tear down a building with that cookie. And the whole cookie is 60 cents. At Starbucks, you're going to have to hire a detective to find that cookie, and it's $9.50. And you can't put butter on it because they want extra. Do you know that if you buy a bagel, you pay extra for cream cheese in Starbucks? Cream cheese, another 60 cents. A knife to put it on, 32 cents. If it reaches the bagel, 48 cents. That bagel costs you $312. And they don't give you the butter or the cream cheese. They don't give it to you. They tell you where it is. "Oh, you want butter? It's over there. Cream cheese? Over here. Sugar? Sugar is here." Now you become your own waiter. You walk around with a tray. "I'll take the cookie. Where's the butter? The butter's here. Where's the cream cheese? The cream cheese is there." You walked around for an hour and a half selecting items, and then the guy at the cash register has a glass in front of him that says "Tips." You're waiting on tables for an hour, and you owe him money. Then there's a sign that says please clean it up when you're finished. They don't give you a waiter or a busboy. Now you've become the janitor. Now you have to start cleaning up the place. Old Jews are walking around cleaning up Starbucks. "Oh, he's got dirt too? Wait, I'll clean this up." They clean up the place for an hour and a half. If I said to you, "I have a great idea for a business. I'll open a whole new type of a coffee shop. A whole new type. Instead of 60 cents for coffee I'll charge 2.50, $3.50, $4.50, and $5.50. Not only that, I'll have no tables, no chairs, no water, no busboy, and you'll clean it up for 20 minutes after you're finished," Would you say to me, "that's the greatest idea for a business I ever heard! We can open a chain of these all over the world!" No, you would put me right into a sanitarium. Starbucks can only get away with it because they have French titles for everything...."