The news that the once-beloved, now-beleaguered coffee chain Starbucks is to fire nearly a thousand staff and close dozens of shops in both North America and Britain may not come as a surprise to many. Like many other relics of the Nineties – such as the Friends theme tune, Cool Britannia and vodka Red Bulls – Starbucks tends to be regarded with a mixture of affection and exasperation by its once-faithful patrons.
Now it seems like an anachronism as suited to 2025 as dial-up internet
Certainly, it was once the go-to spot for coffee in any cosmopolitan town or city, and carefully cultivated an air of proto-hipster chic that was at odds with the sugary, overpriced concoctions it served. But that was then, and now it seems like an anachronism as suited to 2025 as dial-up internet.
To their credit, or otherwise, Starbucks have not attempted to sugarcoat the news and pretend that it is somehow in keeping with their grand plans for expansion over the next few years. Their chief executive Brian Niccol put out a statement saying, ‘Each year, we open and close coffee houses for a variety of reasons from financial performance to lease expirations. This is a more significant action that we understand will impact partners and customers Our coffee houses are centres of the community and closing any location is difficult. I know these decisions impact our partners and their families and we did not make them lightly.’
Even allowing for corporate nonsense (‘centres of the community’), this is still a straightforward admission of failure, and Niccol – who, for some reason best known to himself, moves between his California home and the company’s Seattle base via private jet – will undoubtedly be wondering whether his considerable pay packet is likely to be under scrutiny next. Yet Niccol himself, who was poached from a previous job at Mexican fast food chain Chipotle, is neither the problem, nor the cure. Instead, there is very little that can be done to convince anyone, whether they are pretentious coffee aficionados or simply people who fancy a quick morning caffeine fix, that Starbucks really is the best place to go any more.
The days when the group associated itself with once-hip musical luminaries like Bob Dylan and R.E.M. are long gone. Much as they might like to be in bed, figuratively speaking, with the likes of Taylor Swift and Charli xcx, Starbucks are now yesterday’s news, and likely to besmirch any brand associated with them.
The reasons for Starbucks’s downfall are both economic – opening any kind of coffee shop in any urban centre is far more expensive than it was in their heyday – and reputational. Every corporation has a shelf life, and Starbucks reached its peak a considerable time ago. It may once have encouraged the young and trendy to while away their afternoons on their sofas and listen to carefully curated playlists, but those days have long passed.
It was, of course, once a cult concern. In Ben Schott’s excellent new book Schott’s Significa, he lists a selection of terms associated with Starbucks, including ‘the forbidden brownie’ – a selection of used coffee grounds served up to unwitting employees as a quasi-initiation test – and ‘third place feel’. The latter refers to the way that their stores should be a relaxed, welcoming interim space between home and work, with all the friendliness of a pub or bar but without the social expectation that its customers should be drinking copious quantities of alcohol. As with all these things, it was once an attainable goal, but now the group is terminally running out of steam. If ventis and iced matcha lattes were to become a thing of the past, I don’t think many people would mourn especially hard. And if Niccol finds himself swapping a private jet for Amtrak as a result, it would take a heart of stone not to smirk.
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