Posted By LambChop
"Starbucks represents something beyond a cup of coffee." - Howard Schultz, Starbucks CEO who began as Director of Marketing.
Howard Schultz at Starbucks is at it again. In an open letter to his "Fellow Americans” on the Starbucks website, Schultz weighs in on the media-generated attack on guns, issuing a fiat that guns are no longer permitted in Starbucks stores because guns are “unsettling and upsetting for many of our customers.” Schultz took out full-page newspaper ads announcing his new “policy” in USA TODAY, the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal and the Washington Post.
This is hardly Schultz’s first foray into politics.
Even Bono recognizes Schultz for what he is – a P.T. Barnum without the panache or wisdom. Schultz is merely a monument to self-absorption and greed, steeped in the cynicism of a polled marketing strategist following a deft formula proving that there is, indeed, a sucker born every minute (who will pay THAT much for average coffee). Bono said of the coffee corporation: "We think of Starbucks not as a coffee company but a media company.”
Schultz and Starbucks waded into the promotion of “same-sex” marriage and not just with public comments. Schultz actually put the money and might of the corporation to wage war against traditional marriage. In 2011, the company sued in federal court in opposition to the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA) and again in 2012, Starbucks joined another legal action against DOMA in Washington State.
At the annual Starbucks shareholder’s meeting Schultz made sure that those who support a traditional Biblical marriage were threatened. Marriage supporters were told that they “can sell [their] shares in Starbucks and buy shares in another company.”
Interesting that Schultz picked two issues that are the building blocks of our nation. Gun ownership is a second amendment right afforded in the United States Constitution. Traditional marriage is the foundation on which our entire society is built.
While Schultz attacks our nation, amazingly he escapes scrutiny both personally and professionally. Forget that fact that he is personally worth $2 billion according to Forbes. Forget the fact that Obama has him on speed dial. And that he scurries around in custom tailored suits, hobnobbing with Madonna. He owns a beach mansion in the Hamptons and his own Colorado ski retreat. His latest “celebrated” act of charity - he bought 55 cows for Rwandan farmers. Yep net worth of $2 billion and all they got was a lousy cow.
Meanwhile his fortune is based on business model of selling average coffee at a ridiculously high price served in a in a paper cup, with meaningless and unpronounceable Italian names. The average price a consumer spends on a cup of something at Starbucks? $4.30.The average number of times a month a person spends this much money on coffee from Starbucks? 18. (This comes to a monthly total of $77.40 per month – on coffee).
Schultz got the idea to dupe the American consumer on a trip to Italy when he observed the fruits of socialism firsthand – group of people with long vacations, shortened work hours (or no jobs at all) with personally subsidized welfare households hanging out in coffee serving “cafes” all day. Interestingly, Starbucks was created at a time when Americans were simultaneously being cautioned about obesity and the dangers of caffeine consumption. A Starbucks “Grande” coffee has 320 milligrams of caffeine - four times the amount of caffeine in a Red Bull. The Starbucks cinnamon chip scone has more calories than a McDonald's quarter pounder hamburger with 480 calories. To add to the mixed messages of Starbucks (do as I say but please don’t look at what we do too closely), Starbucks statistics of consumers show that adults from 17-40 make up 89% of their sales. What is not disclosed is their secret target market where they can increase their sales and create caffeine addicted consumers for life – the 13-17 year olds.
It gets better. Starbucks is not a franchise company – it is not made of a group of autonomous local owners who employ and give back to their local communities. Nope – it’s a corporate tyrant made up of a labor force that is 65% part-time. Schultz somehow turned this pathetic fact into a positive – by providing insurance benefits to those who work 20 hours per week or more. In response to the news that Obamacare was causing companies to drop insurance benefits for employees because of the skyrocketing costs of premiums, Schultz capitalized on the PR opportunity vowing in a most dramatic fashion that Starbucks would keep benefits for its part-timers and that Obamacare is “a good thing for the country.” That same month Starbucks raised prices a jaw-dropping 1% across the board.
Next time you find yourself jonesing for a cup of hot fresh Starbucks coffee – perhaps just drive by. Maybe find a local vendor – instead of the one who uses its corporate might to attack the very foundations on which our country was built. Use your brain – not your emotions – you have been duped, America. Duped by a marketing plan.
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