Starbucks Corporation

Does 'Gay Inc.' Believe in Free Speech?

In the battle over gay rights, dissent during wartime isn't always tolerated

McDonald's Shuffles, Sweet Suits

McDonald's CEO Jim Skinner is retiring after 41 years at the fast-food chain. Donald Thompson, the company's current president, will take his spot. [AP via USA Today] What's more natural, sugar or high fructose corn syrup? This old debate was the subject of a lawsuit over false advertising between ... More >>

Starbucks to Boost Booze Sales

Starbucks has decided to add beer and wine to its roster, but it's unclear whether the spirits will be as overpriced and overrated as the chain's coffee. According to Bloomberg (via The Washington Post), at least 25 Starbucks stores will sell booze -- as well as cheese plates and focaccia with oli ... More >>

Starbucks Expanding Into Lighter Roasts With Its New Blonde Brew

Lauren ShockeyStarbucks's Blonde (Ambition)​Starbucks is continuing its coffee domination with a new, lighter brew of coffee called Blonde. The Seattle-based coffee company became known for its dark roasts, and this milder roast is both a departure and an opportunity for the brand to further ... More >>

Person of Interest Questioned in Queens Firebomb Attacks; Surveillance Video Released [Updated]

Surveillance video and a police sketch of the suspect in the Queens firebomb attacks that took place Sunday night have been released, and police are reportedly now questioning a person of interest. The attacks involved Molotov cocktails made from Starbucks bottles; they struck the Imam Al-Khoei Foun ... More >>

Did Starbucks Steal From Artist Ophelia Chong?

​It's not unusual for big companies to be accused of stealing from the little guys. (Remember that whole Urban Outfitters drama earlier this year?) And we're the first to admit that sometimes really good ideas happen to come to different people at the same time. But it's hard to imagine that t ... More >>

Starbucks Sees Liquidity in Juice Market; Papasito Grill Burned by Noise Complaints

​Starbucks, no longer satisfied with being everywhere, has decided to be everywhere even more. The Seattle-based chain bought Evolution, a high-end juice company, Thursday. Execs plan on opening health and wellness-themed stores.[Washington Post]Papasito Grill and Agave Bar's Upper West Side locat ... More >>

The Vagabond Cafe Opened, Sells Chocolate Chip Cookie Lattes

Lauren Shockey​Wong might be the buzzier half of 7 Cornelia Street (212-989-3399), but we've recently become smitten with the Vagabond Cafe, located next door, and which opened a few weeks ago. Amid all the Starbucks and soulless coffee shops, this new cafe offers all that you need in a colle ... More >>

Starbucks Offends Customer By Calling Her 'Phone'

Marguerite McAfee​Starbucks is not only offending Alec Baldwin! It is causing trouble for regular people as well, particularly a woman named Marguerite McAfee, who had an incident this week at the Starbucks on Third Avenue and 23rd Street, her regular spot, where, she says, "The employees have ... More >>

A Fork in the Road Guide to Greenmarket Etiquette

Robert Sietsema​ Farmers markets are a bit like inebriation: they have a way of amplifying the best and worst parts of one's personality, of shaving away pleasantries to reveal a certain hard nut of truth about human nature. And they're also like an open-air subway car, particularly on Saturd ... More >>

New York in the 1960s: Plenty of Hipsters, Fewer Starbucks

Lower East Side from Django's Ghost on VimeoLook at that fucking hipster! Wait...where are we? When are we? As this clip of the East Village in the '60s -- posted on Neighborhoodr via Handsome as Fuck and supplemented with music from the Velvet Underground -- demonstrates, nerdy black glasses, ... More >>

Starbucks in Long Island Accused of Homophobic Incident

​An open letter to Starbucks on the LI Family Blog has sparked a PR nightmare for the coffee giant with a woman named Missy Alison alleging that she witnessed "one of the most brazen and unapologetic displays of homophobia I have ever witnessed in my entire life" at a Centereach, New York bran ... More >>

Shake Shack's Nutritional Information: The Ultimate Buzzkill

Robert SietsemaParadise lost.​We didn't care when Starbucks began posting nutritional information, because caramel latte frappucinos are nasty and embarrassing and no one in their right mind would eat a Starbucks pastry, regardless of caloric content. Likewise, we regard fast-food labeling as ... More >>

Starbucks Finds Ways to Make People Drink Even More Coffee

​Starbucks sure knows how to caffeinate America, having recently introduced its ginormous 31-ounce Trenta size. Now it's come up with a way to get people even more hooked on their java: a mobile application that lets customers pay via their iPhones or BlackBerrys.

There Is Still 75-Cent Coffee in New York!

​I actually found it. And bought it. And drank it. And enjoyed it. And I was so stunned when they handed me a quarter back from my dollar that it's a good thing caffeine was there to delightfully resuscitate my ass. It's at a divey place called 3rd Avenue Food & Deli at 325-Third Avenue (bet ... More >>

Adults Want Kids' Birthday Parties; Restaurants Accept Cash Only

​An English professor from Manhattan was forcibly ejected from an Upper West Side Starbucks after refusing to order her bagel "without butter or cheese," which she claimed was linguistically stupid. [NY Post] Fruits and vegetables are ripening early this year due to warm weather, likely leadi ... More >>

Bay Ridge's Hom Provides Free Brunch for the Unemployed

​Well, this is sweet: The owner of Bay Ridge's Hom is giving out free meals to the unemployed. Per the Daily News, Salvatore Forte has since October been serving free brunch to anyone who calls ahead and asks, despite the fact that his business has been down two-thirds since the recession took ... More >>

Why I Give Starbucks A Fake Name

​Order anything more complicated than a simple cup of coffee at Starbucks, and it happens. They want a name. For some of us, that's when the trouble starts. Recently, I realized that I wasn't the only one who had tired of being asked how to spell a name that people find difficult to handle ... More >>

The Worst Opening Sentence in a Novel Is Pretty Disgusting, But Real Life Is Worse

​Novelist Molly Ringle has been awarded the Bulwer-Lytton prize for the worst opening sentence of the year, and, well, here it is, folks, straight from her book, The Ghost Downstairs: "For the first month of Ricardo and Felicity's affair, they greeted one another at every stolen rendezvous wi ... More >>

Starbucks Continues to Try to Make You Like Them, Offers Free Wifi Starting July 1

​There's yet another reason to continue our conflicted relationship with Starbucks, where on one hand, the coffee generally features an aspect that you might call either "burnt" or "like urine" (and, hey, it's just an opinion, we're sure some love it), but even if you don't, the bathrooms are ... More >>

Reverend Billy & the Life After Shopping Gospel Choir

Bloomberg Approves of Study Saying That Calorie Postings Are Making Us Order Fewer Fatpants Foods at Starbucks

Apparently, people are actually reading those little signs.​ Calorie posting skeptics, be damned: Mayor Bloomberg's office wants us to know that there's a study, from a bunch of people at Stanford, that says that New York calorie postings have indeed made a difference in how many calories peop ... More >>

Starbucks Clashes With Union, Again

​Last night, Starbucks workers held a protest at the company's Manhattan regional headquarters to protest an increase in the amount employees must pay towards their health insurance coverage. As reported on the Times' City Room blog, this is hardly the first time Starbucks has clashed with uni ... More >>

The Blogroll Gazette: Instant Starbucks, Shitshows & a Swedish Meatball Truck

This week in food blogs... Eat Me Daily posted Sandra Lee's response to Anthony Bourdain's calling her "pure evil": "He needs to have a cocktail and lighten up." Serious Eats pitted Starbucks' new line of instant coffee packets against Nescafe. The result? Instant Starbucks "really isn't bad." Mi ... More >>

Starbucks Bomber out on Bail

The AP reports that Kyle Shaw, the 17-year-old arrested and charged with arson, criminal possession of a weapon, and criminal mischief in the Memorial Day weekend bombing of an Upper East Side Starbucks, has been released on $300,000 bail. The recent high school grad and Fight Club fanatic detonated ... More >>

Cops Nab Fight Club-Loving Teen for 5/25 Starbucks Bombing

Tim Hortons will sleep soundly tonight! Cops have caught a suspect in the Memorial Day Starbucks bombing: teenager Kyle Shaw of West 27th Street. Cops say Shaw is into Fight Club, as who isn't, but that he took it further than most of us dweebs and actually started his own Project Mayhem. But he f ... More >>

Healthier Ice Cream; Greener Coffee & A Dog Fight

Mark Bittman points to an article in the SF Chronicle by his friend Marion Nestle about the benefits--or lack thereof--of organic food. Nestle answers such questions as "Aren't organics elitist?" [NY Times] "In the dog-eat-dog restaurant business..." Iconic Chicago hot dog stand SuperDawg is taking ... More >>

Starbucks Explosion: Jihad Against Queen Esther Mermaid?

Baristas never get the day off: The 3 a.m. explosion that rocked an Upper East Side Starbucks yesterday, likely the result of a small bomb, hasn't gotten the Third Avenue store employees out of any of their foaming duties. A Starbucks spokesperson writes via email that "though the store was tempora ... More >>

Giada Speaks About Frenemy Rachael Ray; Ground Beef Recalled

Giada De Laurentiis told Redbook that the rumor about the rivalry between herself and Rachael Ray is not true. "Do we hang out all the time? No. Are we best friends? No," says the Food Network star, but she claims to have no beef with Rach. [People] The latest in food safety scares: beef. A meatpac ... More >>

Armed Robberies At Starbucks Locations in the Village?

Poor Starbucks employees: company stocks are dropping, stores are closing, and now, some mad men are robbing them at gun point and herding them into the freezer at locations around the Village.We learned about these armed robberies this afternoon while buying an iced coffee to celebrate the sunny we ... More >>

What Are The Most Recession-Proof Jobs?

The last thing you would tell a college student today would be "Work for a car company," "Get a job at Starbucks," or "Go into ponzi schemes." Certain lines of work like those are, shall we say, slowing down more than others due to the economic freefall, and it would be rather sadistic to encourag ... More >>

Starbucks Trying to Seem Affordable

In an attempt to seem recession-affordable, Starbucks is rolling out a new breakfast pairing promotion where $3.95 will get you a latte and and an oatmeal or coffee cake.[WSJ]In Indiana, a rising demand for local, organic produce is resulting in a big increase in the number of small farms.[Chicago T ... More >>

Cutbacks Are Swell!

The news that Starbucks won't continually brew decaf after noon to save money is OK with me; I don't go to Starbucks and if I did, I certainly wouldn't drink decaf. The whole point of coffee is the freakin' caffeine! The development that the postal service might not deliver on Saturdays is absolu ... More >>

Starbucks Lays Off 6,700, Killing Our Dream

It was our expectation, not to say our hope, that when we lost our job we could grab an apron and serve coffee at Starbucks. But now even those jobs are more competitive: in the wake of a 69 percent earnings drop, Starbucks announced it would close stores and lay off 6,700 employees. This will resul ... More >>

Are Frogs the Next Fish?

A new study finds that one billion frogs are harvested from the wild for human consumption each year, raising fears about population decline and the possible extinction of some species. [BBC News]Whole Foods and Starbucks make Fortune's 2009 'Best Companies to Work For' list.[Fortune via NY Daily Ne ... More >>

Starbucks Has Ruined Our Economy!

Fuck you, Starbucks! For years you hypnotized Americans with your overpriced lattes, transfixing hordes of people to line up and pay huge wads of money on hot, silty shit with some foam on top and a fucking cinnamon stick in the middle. Their homes were being foreclosed, but these poor, thirsty cr ... More >>

Local Outrages: Ratner's Wake-Up Call, Starbucks Cover-Up, Car Trouble in W'm'sburg

The Day After

No news is bad news in another 9/11 play

Manhattan's Best Iced Coffee

Now Hiring: Cesare Casella, Laurent Tourondel, and some "crazy, sexist crookz"

Starbucks Wants to Dress You!

Grande skim vanilla latte—hold the hormones!

Quitting Time: Call a Meeting With Colleagues at End of Day

Thank You for Sponsoring

Letters

One More Cup of CD for the Road

Starbucks boldly markets its mild music blend

Big Joe Goes Down

Tactical media collective's counter-marketing device fights Starbucks with decent panini

Kids in the Thrall

You make chump change. And Congress likes it that way.

No More Coffee Talk

A California court bans performance activist Reverend Billy from preaching at Starbucks

Rage Against the Caffeine

Reverend Billy Preaches the Anticorporate Gospel to Starbucks