Happy Thanksgiving! And for the many readers not celebrating Thanksgiving, I’m wishing you happy holidays.
^ A reader sent in this great photo of a sunrise behind a Starbucks. This is actually a photo of the First and Walker Starbucks, which is nearby the Starbucks headquarters in Seattle. The reader said that she is a former SSC partner, and happened to catch this beautiful sunrise on her way into work.
^ From Starbucks in Bulgaria, a couple of photos of a holiday chalkboard. The Orange Mocha is a holiday seasonal drink this year in a number of European countries.
^ This is precious! A cute little girl at Starbucks, who is pretty much making a bit of a mess at their table.
^ I thought this was just a great holiday picture submitted by a partner! Very festive!
^ This is my own photo. I dropped by 1912 Pike Place Starbucks the morning of the 25th, and snapped this picture. It’s impossible to take a bad picture of this store!
This will be the last blog update for about one week. Hope everyone has happy holidays. I’ll be out of town for a few days. I have about a five hour flight ahead of me, and I’d like to download something new on my Kindle. Feel free to leave a book suggestion in the comments – something that could be read in five hours or less, and is a light and fun book.
This is an open thread. Feel free to write anything Starbucks-related in the comments (or your Kindle book suggestion).
Best,
Melody
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Have a wonderful holiday Melody and the same to all of your readers!
Happy Thanksgiving to you & yours Melody! 🙂
I wish you well 🙂 Aymee
I love my my kindle. What do you like? All the bill cordially killing bookstore great. The walk series by Richard Paul Evans are good too.
@Melody (and everyone else!): Happy Thanksgiving! I love this time of year and Thanksgiving. I feel like it’s a more ‘pressure-free’ holiday, and the (ideally, to me) onset of winter in the Chicago area.
I’m very blessed to be going to my 93 y.o Mom’s……we’re all bringing things but she’s cooking the turkey! I should be so lucky to have her strength and energy at 93! (or ever, for that matter)
So, God Bless Us Every One!
@Claire – Thank you!
@Tim Sandor – I’ll probably tonight sit down and Google a bunch of the book suggestions in this thread – Well, assuming there are a few! I am really intrigued by the Walk! I just read an online review of it. That’s a great possibility. Thanks for the suggestion.
@Denise – Happy Thanksgiving to you! That’s incredible to be cooking a turkey at that age! I’m spending Thanksgiving with a sister who is a vegetarian – no turkey for me this year, which is totally fine by me.
To everyone from Melody and all the contributors on this wonderful blog a very beautiful holiday- Thanksgiving and Hanukkah! Denise R that is absolutely great your mom is making the turkey! Enjoy. Have a great trip Melody- hope no delays because of the weather. Yea to an open thread- I tried the peppermint bark this year and it was not as good. Around here partners seem overwhelmed and lines are just so long.
Hi Melody,
I suggest you read The art of Racing in the Rain by Garth Stein. It is a charming book about life from the perspective of a dog. Safe travels!
Kazon
Melody suggested that the 3 for 2 coffee bean promotion would be back this fall. Does anyone know if it is being brought back between now and Christmas? Have a safe and restful Thanksgiving everyone and be kind to the flight crews.
Happy Holidays Melody, enjoy your Starbucks all week.
I hope you enjoy your time with family/friends over the Thanksgiving holiday. Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday of the year !! We will be hosting family members and maybe a few friends for our feast of thanksgiving. I am a corny dad that makes/forces everyone to share their aspects of thanksgiving as we gather around the table.
As far as books go, I am old school and prefer the feel of a book in my hands and the smell of the pages in my nostrils. My current read is “Tailholt Tales”, a non-fiction book (out of print) that documents the childhood years of Thomas Jefferson Mayfield and his days as an adopted member of the Choinumni (Choinumne) branch of the Yokuts tribe in the San Joaquin Valley in Central California, near to current day Porterville. He later rejoined the dominant Anglo-American community throughout his long adulthood, telling his experiences just prior to his death. Fascinating details into a vanished culture that has not been treated kindly others, including our California text book writers.
Safe travels, Melody! Happy holidays to all!
Have a great day everyone!
Hi there FlyGuy – I don’t think that promotion is coming back. Over the summer, there was a coffee card which was a pretty generous, buy 2 pounds, get 1 pound free. I think what was really going on (though this is an educated guess) is that promotion happened right when Starbucks did a major overhaul of their packaging, and really they were hoping to see the old packaging leave the stores, and make room for the new packaging. Now most stores have transitioned to newer packaging. That’s my guess. I don’t think that promotion will return – I suspect that it was more successful than they thought it would be.
What? No “free coupon offer” that drives thousands of gimmie gimmie gimmies to your blog like Starbucks did with MSI? /open grump off
I am thankful that Melody and her blog are a class act in the world of “social media”. Melody, you have attracted a diverse and fun following. All who visit here come away with a little more knowledge and an appreciation for all things coffee.
For Melody and all you fellow Melody fans, safe travels and best wishes. To those who have to work, you have my special appreciation.
I just saw the part about book recommendations. Even though he’s primarily a YA author, I think John Green writes amazing books that speak to all audiences. His most recent book, “The Fault in Our Stars”, has received great acclaim and is in production for a movie release in 2014. HIGHLY recommend!
(Fun fact: He once wrote a joint holiday novel in which one of the other writers features a character that works at Starbucks!! It’s called “Let It Snow”)
Well, here’s a little (possibly) ‘heads up’ re: what partners might know or now know (READ or not read….) re: that little 5-sticker “Earn A Free Drink One Festive Sip At A Time” booklet. This was NOT in my everyday store but one I have written about before. Don’t get me wrong, I have always been compensated for these un-informed, misinterpreted, never-learned etc., events. So, today I order 2 drinks, the same and I hand over the (filled with 5 stamps) little booklet for one of the grande drinks (4shot grande carmel macchiato). It’s a newbie at the POS, I tell her: there’s the code on the back, I show her the code, she enters the code and then somehow needs help from the bar because “it didn’t work”. He comes over (a very nice partner who greeted me very sweetly and asked right away what I was having, said he wanted to make sure this was correct, etc.) He’s fine at bar…altho they may have heard something from their dm from the last time I was there and used the “50% any handcrafted espresso drink” promo code and I noticed the partner only took off ~ $1.00 for my ~ $7.00 drink. I inquired, he said the 50% only comes off the ‘espresso part of the drink’. This seemed impossible (and insane) to me but I accepted that, at the time. Long longer on that: I contacted a dm, I got comped and was assured this store would be made aware etc.
So, back to the cute little booklet which reads: …..’and get one grande beverage of your choice free’. I’d already read all this before I ever attempted to use it. The partner who came over from bar in today’s event says: oh, it’s only for holiday drinks. I proceed to tell him, no, I don’t think so….read it, says any grande drink bla bla bla. Well, they didn’t concede anything but also, I think, just wanted to please me (or maybe not hear anything from their dm?) so they immediately just comped me both my drinks…. well, the one was supposed to be free as it says in the booklet.
So, sorry the rant but it just slays me when it’s really the simple stuff: here, read this! Just something to be aware of, in case this happens as often to anyone else as it seems to to me!
Happy Thanksgiving to ALL of the StarbucksMel crew and followers!!! I love the sunrise pic above the Sbux sign…
@Leslee – Thank you! Hope your Thanksgiving is great too.
@DeniseR – I think it’s always been that way that people don’t read fine print, including partners and promotions. I remember years ago (I think it was 2008), Starbucks experimented with ‘reusable discount cards.’ You held on to a pretty thin, paper promo card and got a discounted item for the time period upon showing the card – there was a Tazo card once and an oatmeal card once.
These cards were a pain. The oatmeal one was 2010 – I have it still! 1-12-10 through 3-8-2010. These cards were annoying. I can’t tell you how many partners thought automatically that you must surrender the card and only use it once. It led to arguments at the register until the partner really read the fine print, and even then the strong presumption was that it must be that you’d have to surrender the card. I get the Starbucks little promo card annoyance. They have a history of that.
@DadCooks – Thank you.
@Claire – Thank you for the book recommendation. I will check it out.
@DadCooks – Happy holidays to you too!
Happy Thanksgiving and safe travels! Hope you take the time to unplug and enjoy the holidays. And grab that $65 tumbler on Black Friday. 🙂
Ditto to all all the warm Thanksgiving wishes to all!
Let us not forget to leave a little something special in the tip jar if we can, as a thank you to all the partners that will be working tomorrow. Let them know we appreciate them.
Thank you for all the terrific photos, posts, suggestions, and ideas this year, Melody — a happy Thanksgiving to you as well! Safe travels!
I’m not sure what sort of books you enjoy, but the last book I read on my Kindle was the fascinating “The Devil in the White City”, a true story about a series of murders that went on during the 1893 Columbian Exposition.
@Gobo: good suggestion about “Devil in the White…..”, altho, fascinating as it is, I found it way too ‘dark’, overall (every other chapter?) for me. And I grew up in the city so, lots of interesting history but maybe just a little ‘dark’. (I think Melody was requesting kind of ‘light.’?) Lots of history tho, for sure.
Happy holidays to you, Melody, and all of your great readers and contributors. I look forward to reading your articles, as well as the comments people leave. I always learn something. Take care!
I am getting a bit frustrated of late with the long lines at the stores because of the new system of training and interacting with customers. I have seen a lot of customers besides me grow inpatient. Has anyone else experienced this at their store? I realize that part of the long lines could be increased customers, but I do not think that is totally it.
@purple1 – I’ll be brief to avoid slipping into a rant.
My daily Starbucks visit is early in the morning so when I first get there business is slow, but very shortly the “shoppers” start coming out (seems that there is a new door buster sale every day) and folks just have to get there red cup of whatever to carry around with them as they shop, as if it is some sign of being special. They are all in a hurry to get their beverage and get out as fast as possible. Too many are self centered and destroy the joy that should be in this season. There is no additional Partner coverage and the unflexible adherence to the new playbook routines so a busy situation is made even worse. The crowds are no more than past years, in fact I would say less, but the new routines are not efficient.
Time for Plan B.
Dad Cooks thanks so much and so well said. This morning I thought I was going to scream waiting on such a long line with the partner at the register being so so slow. It is so ready for Plan B. The morning crowds are impossible but I have to say that I find the same in the evening. Also, there is a fairly new partner that is nice but her interaction with customers leaves something to be desired. I chatted with the SM about that and he acknowledged such but nothing seems to have been acted on. The odd thing of it all is that when you see her interact with other partners she is quite different. Thanks again Dad Cooks for your input.
My district was chosen as the seed district for Playbook, and the store that launched it first has only now really reached it’s stride – 8-10 weeks in. I’ll be launching it in early Jan/Feb, and while I still know very little about it other than what I’ve gleaned by observation/eavesdropping :), it looks to me like a positive change once problems are worked out and partners/customers get used to a new routine. All changes can be frustrating at first (when we rolled the new tills & the new bar routine, speed of service slowed for a time too), but ultimately we go through them because the end result will be of benefit for the partners/customers/business. At least in Canada, we’re rolling playbook a couple of stores in the district at a time, so is it possible you can go to another store for a couple of weeks while this one works out the bugs?
@purple 1 – even if I take immediate action as a result of customer feedback, I do not see instant results. Sometimes, it’s a case of working with the partner as they unlearn bad habits. Sometimes it’s helping them get comfortable with the routines of the store so they can relax and be themselves with the customers as well. And sometimes it’s consistent feedback and corrective action. At almost no time is there instant change. I would encourage you to continue to give feedback to the SM so he can be aware of whether his coaching is making an impact