limmy, I quoted one sentence, and then dedicated one brief paragraph in response. The remaining paragraphs in my post above are addressed to the entire board.

<i><font color=#555555>"Never worked on a feature film location shoot? What a very odd, very specific thing to point out."</font></i>

Experience with Starbucks is relative. What may be odd to you is very ordinary to me. I do work on film shoots, and very often, no matter where I am in the world, I witness hundreds of people eschewing the caterer's brew for a cup of regular black coffee from Starbuck's. (I know a few celebrities who love their tea.)

When you're in the middle of nowhere, or at a truck stop in Kansas, a Starbucks can be a life saver. I rarely drink the brand in NYC, but outside the city when I'm working, it often does the trick with plenty of satisfaction.

Nyc- thanks for the clarification. After I hit submit I thought maybe he/she wasn't talking to me with that part. Would have liked to add a note but no edit option!

Anyhow, it seems like we're both describing circumstance more or less. Which is why I think it will do just fine in Italy and I think the dessert drinks will be as popular with young people as it is here. And by young I mean 35ish and under.

As far as I know, we don't have a single Starbucks around here anywhere, andno one's going through withdrawal. I actually had one of the tastiest cups of coffee of my life this afternoon at my hairdresser's, out on the patio. I'm no coffee freak, but it was delicious, and it didn't trail a kerosene smell across the landscape the way Starbucks did. And it was free.

Starbucks will find a niche in Italy, no doubt, the same way all those fake virgin olive oils have in the USA.

StCirq- the lure of Starbucks is much more than coffee like mentioned above - many folks there never drink coffee but the array of more exotic drinks or snacks.

I travel a lot in the U.S. and the UK, and the first choice is to Yelp a boutique espresso place, but some places there aren't any, so Starbucks will do in a pinch. It's more reliable espresso than Caribou - - that is after they closed every store in the country for a day and retrained everybody on how to make espresso a couple years back. Since then, it has been fairly reliable, but not wonderful by any means.

Best recent indy espresso was at a place on Princeton St. in Orlando two weeks back - - beautiful choice of bean, perfectly prepared. (Score: 8.5)

Worst recent indy espresso lately was in Eldorado, New Mexico and Rushden, UK where the baristas were unaware that you do not just let the espresso run till it half fills up a cup! What you get if you let espresso run too long is hideously bitter, evil, and undrinkable (I've also had coffee that bad at the Caribou in the F concourse at the MSP airport). (Score for them: negative twelve)

Starbucks always scores between a 3.0 and a 5.5. for me, and the "charbucks" flavor profile is always the same.

But even in Italy, the espresso is generally not wonderful - - it gets up to a 7.0 or so for me - - but boutique U.S. shops sometimes use really remarkable beans - - including "3rd wave" high-altitude arabica from specific individual farmers (Italian espressos are usually a mass-produced blend of arabica and pedestrian, low-altitude robusta).

Kerosene smell from Starbucks? That's news to me, lol. Their roasters burn the coffee, which I don't like, but kerosene...

As long as we're talking, my biggest problem with Starbucks is the absence of shade grown coffee options there. But of course, shade grown coffee is difficult to find everywhere, because consumer awareness is so low. People like coffee to be a cheap luxury, but it costs the planet in the end.

Please consider buying shade grown the next time you buy coffee.