Travelers to Milan can see Italy's first Starbucks shop in the city that Starbucks' founder Howard Schultz credits with inspiring his decision to open the first Starbucks in Seattle. Will Italians welcome Starbucks? Well if the first day is any harbinger maybe as Italians lined up to get in to see the new competitor to the city's many caffes. The new Starbucks is a fancy 'roastery' a super fancy emporium built with a lavish interior and a labyrinth of different stations - being just one of three such super Starbucks in the world.

A disappointing thing to some young Italians was the lack of frappuccino in the new Starbucks but Starbucks officials say the other 4 Starbucks scheduled to open in Milan would be more normal Starbucks with llavored coffees, which some theorize would be anathema to many Italians. But the chain thinks that young Italians will embrace these type drinks.

Anyway what may sound like bringing coal to Newcastle: https://www.nytimes.com/reuters/2018...customers.html

Interesting is a quote from a Milan university professor saying "now you can get a good cup of coffee in Milan"!

I would like an espresso, per favore. When can I have it? Well, I have to prepare a frappuciono con malto e nougat e miele e ..... Frankly, I have no ides what goes into some of these drinks. But your espresso will be ready in 15 minutes - what's your name? My name is - going around the corner to get an espresso SUBITO!

We'll be in Milan in a couple of weeks. I'm sure my curiosity will take me there once to scope it out, especially since one of the sights we're visiting is a 2-minute walk from Starbucks. Building looks beautiful.

It's a different proposition than what's generally available in italy. It may succeed or fail but I would not expect young people in Milan to be closed to new things from other countries. Perhaps most of the outrage will come from Americans who (wrongly) may see it as some kind of assault on Italian coffee culture.

At the end of the day an espresso in Milan costs €1.00 or €1.10. After the initial experience will Starbucks compete? Even excluding the question of the tostatura?

Isn't that the cost of quickly taking it standing up at the bar? Funny that the article compared the cost of a coffee standing up at the bar to Starbucks when having a coffee sitting down in a cafe table can also cost double or more of one at the bar. Everyone knows that having a coffee at the bar is cheap in Italy but that's a completely different experience from Starbucks. Milan is a prosperous city with loads of creative young people. A bottle of beer costs more than €5 and fizzy drinks are not cheap so I don't think disposable income for this sort of thing is in short supply and I don't think that people in Milan will think that they can just pay €1 for an espresso at the bar when they want to sit down and work on their laptop in the sort of environment that Starbucks provides.

I'm not particularly a fan of Starbucks (although it does have it's place) nor am i defending it but I don't think the fact that a coffee standing up costs €1 will be the problem.

I suspect young Italians will take a liking to frappucino and flavored coffees and the Starbucks experience. MACDonalds was a hard sell at first but now Italian flock to them. Especially younger folk.

It WILL be interesting to see. I remember the hoopla when Starbucks opened in Paris. Promises it would go broke, the Parisians would never give up their leisurely consumed, sit down coffee, and so on. Everyone I went in to last year was packed, and pastries were being ordered also. People chatting, on their phones or computers, just like here.

I think the younger people will like it, agree with Pal.

Sacrilege!
No self respecting Italian will drink there. Only for American tourists.

Mostly Italians who lined up by few hundred to get in and that Milan Prof who said "finally can get a good cup of coffee in Milan" - belies your prediction. If it were for Americano tourists it would have been in Florence or Rome young hip Italians will flock to it from the stale caffes and use it as a study or center or meeting place and for the new for Italy types of coffees and deserts.

I took a walking tour last September in Milano. Our tourguide was a 27-something Italian Millennial who 1) was not happy about the idea of a Starbucks in Italy and 1a) a Starbucks in Milano because, well, "Starbucks is not coffee" and 2) it would just be "another McDonalds for Americans to eat and" drink "bad coffee" at.

My trip last year was my third trip to Italy and my first solo trip ever. Having never been to a McDonalds in Europe, I did listen to the to the clientele as I walked by. FYI: All three cities (Roma, Bologna and Milano) each had at least one McDonalds with an outdoor patio. When walking by, I heard several Asian languages, some German, and (gasp!) some Italian! She was none to happy when I pointed that out. Did (North) Americans ever frequent in all three cities? Sure! Where they there when I was? Maybe.

The point being is that it's not just Americans going to McDonalds (and, presumably, Starbucks) overseas, but it's many people from many cultures stopping at these establishments.

On a separate note, I had not known there was no Starbucks in Italy at the time and I spent many hours for my (American) Starbucks fan looking for a certain cup that referenced Starbucks Italy- until I took that tour. I surprisingly was not "starved" for a Starbucks my entire trip, although I am accustomed from seeing it at every corner in San Francisco and Sacramento.

Do I think Italy will "embrace" Starbucks? I think they will. Will it also cater to tourists of all cultures? Absolutely.

The chic cafes in the Brera district charge more than 1 or 1.5 euro for a shot of espresso and SB in Milan is targeting that customer base more than the nochblads of Milan. For those who haven't seen it, two photos of the new SB. Like SB or hate it, the cafe is stunning and had long lines just to get in the first day (the people waiting were not just foreign tourists in khaki and bumbags, there were many Italians in line as well). One of my team-mates is home in Milan this week-end and will be checking it out if the lines aren't too long. She noted that the pastries/snacks come from Princi, a popular Milan bakery. Looking at the photos, SB has clearly opted for the "go big or go home" approach to entering the Italian market and IMO, they've made the right decision.

Hello! I don't like coffee in Starbucks. I think it expensive and not so tasty. For example, in the Netherlands latte costs near 3 euro. In others cafe it's about 1.5-2 euro.

We were in Milan a few weeks ago...saying those people "won't like something" is insane not to mention foolish.. That McDonalds around the corner from the Galleria is constantly mobbed and not by Americans, either.

Yes the McDonalds example is a good one - 'experts' and food snobs said Italians would never take to it and the 'slow food' movement in France also set up obstacles for McDonalds as did Italian cities - but they finally managed to open a golden arches by the Spanish Steps that became a hit with tourists and local young folk - when I would go there at that time it was mainly a young Italian crowd. But obstacles remained so McDonalds did an end around and bought the Italian Burghy hamburger fast-food chain, which had managed to get permission to open many places, and the rest is history - McDonalds is a huge hit in Italy and France - just recently locals in a part of Marseilles have protested the closing of their golden arches saying it was a community service, employing many ex-cons and drug addicts who never would have had a job, etc.

If allowed Starbucks will prosper too as Italian youths are eager to embrace the idea like any folk their age.

The pics are bueatiful. Ishould go into a SB, I have never done so in my life. Not in the US, not in Europe. Ah, now I remember I went into one in Shanghai with a colleague. But it didn't look like a SB at all, it looked like a cantina... at the groundfloor of our office there.

Shanghai has a Starbucks emporium - like the one in Milan and one of 3 in world so probably not your typical Starbucks.

This is what proper coffee is about - https://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/d...lture-a-guide/

By local children wearing New York and Brooklyn sweatshirts.

People eat or drink at these places because they're there, in prime retail spots, in plain view. Whoever had those sites would be mobbed. It's the location, not the product or brand. Big corporations can afford rent and rates that many smaller companies can't. Yes, some locals use them, but it's usually the case that tourists make up a sizeable percentage of the clientele. The building is beautiful and I commend Starbucks for the effort put into the decor. It doesn't alter the fact that their coffee is bitter and their cakes dry. They are so big that they don't really have to make any effort. People go to them either because they are undiscerning, or discerning, but ignorant of the local area and alternative options.