Starbucks Bingo

[Jackalope]

So I came up with a new game while we were in Toronto. Driving up and down...Bloor Street, I think, we noticed a huge number of Starbucks. And from talking to one of the locals we found out it was because the company targeted local coffee chains. So I noticed that if we saw a Starbucks, we'd almost invariably see a Tim Horton's, Second Cup, or Coffee Coffee within a block. And the occasional independant coffee house that had been plagued the same way.

So we started playing Starbucks Bingo. You can either play by spot the local coffee place, then look for Starbucks, or spot the Starbucks, then look for the local coffee place. If you use the second method, you can add bonus points. Hat Trick if you spot both a Second Cup and a Tim Horton's within a block of the Starbucks. Triple Crown if you spot Tim Horton's, Second Cup, and Coffee Coffee within a block of Starbucks (yes, I did spot this combo). There are also extra points for spotting a Starbucks in especially inappropriate places, like in one of the rebuilt historic churches. If I were to make up actual bingo cards, I think that would be the "Startacky" square.

Any of you canucks interested in playing? I hate Starbucks enough to make up bingo cards if anyone wants them. I already host someone else's Passion of the Christ Bingo cards on my site, so this would be just one more offensive game...

[Honor]

Althuogh they do a few cool things, I would hate starbucks for a few of thier more reprehensible business practises... (probably... "Hate" is a word I decided to use very seriously, since I once spent some weeks noticing people using it way too much and too easily.)

but I have this problem. mocha frappucino is just -so- fucking good. It's crack, man... Crack, I tell you.

I'm doomed to hell.

[Moo Cow]

hehe, that's hilarios. Here we have Starbucks and Cosi like that...

Starbucks is an occasional guilty pleasure...

~Sara

[Infinity-Iz-Blue]

I know of three Starbucks here in the UK. But that's probably a small area of the North West. I hope they all go under.

*shouts aside*
Get a polystyrene cup of tea from the market, you jumped-up yuppies!

[Major Maxillary]

Althuogh they do a few cool things, I would hate starbucks for a few of thier more reprehensible business practises... (probably... "Hate" is a word I decided to use very seriously, since I once spent some weeks noticing people using it way too much and too easily.)

but I have this problem. mocha frappucino is just -so- fucking good. It's crack, man... Crack, I tell you.

I'm doomed to hell.

Drink Bawls. it's carbonated, fruity, and has a gazillion times the cafeen.

I hate Starbucks because they're trying to see how close they can come to a monopoly without actually being a monopoly. it's an unethical business practice, like planned obsolesence. i'm not saying they need to be shut down, no company deserves that, but they should be restricted from doing this sort of thing. placing their stores in high traffic areas is one thing, placing them across the street from a "mom and pop" coffee shop just to get their buisiness is something else entirely. it's like that subway that actually drove a local deli out of buisiness, then moved into the location.

the convenience store across the street saw what they did and now sells boars head deli meats, which is the best fucking deli meat ever.

anyway, my point is, yes, i hate Starbucks. run by damn yuppies who have the brains for buisiness, but completely lack any sort of ethics.

I've actually seen a starbucks across the street from another starbucks.

[Infinity-Iz-Blue]

Ok, now that is not right. I didn't realise they were being so... Microsoft about it across the pond.

[Major Maxillary]

Ok, now that is not right. I didn't realise they were being so... Microsoft about it across the pond.

back in the seventies, about a week after the vietman war ended, all the weekend hippies stopped getting high long enough to realise that communism is a red herring. so what did they do? they got jobs. they stopped protesting shit that nobody cares about and actually learned something. since theor morals suffered from retarded development they took capitalism to the logical extreme, and became the ultimate corporate pirates. never since the days of Boss tweed and John Rockafeller has the world seen suck brutal buisiness as the Yuppies. hell, even The old time bastards would be taken aback by the buisiness pracitces of today for a few moments before adopting them.

[Honor]

Random Notes:

Max: Boars Head meats is da bomb... awesome in every respect, from quality and flavor, right down to the political contributions the company makes. (I accidentally found a website once that tells you how companies are contributing to... I stopped shopping several places that day. (..and started feeling a lot better (still not "good" but a lot better) about buying starbucks that day, too, by the way.)

Also: A "red herring" is a false clue. Communism wasn't a red herring, but a flawed utopian social concept - a social plan that could easily withstand any condition except the introduction of humans. And business has always been brutal... What about Howard Hughs? Sam Goldwyn? Louis B. Mayer? David Sarnoff? The list goes on and on and on... Today's Captains of Industry, such as they are, are positively genteel compared to the sharks of even twenty years ago. And those who would become Yuppies (Young Urban Professionals), by pseudo-generational definition, had barely been born before the Viet Nam "war" was over. And, lastly, the "old time bastards" would only be taken aback by how little the new guys can get away with... They would, however, be thrilled at how effeciently computers and technology let you do what has to be done... All it really is is better communications & logistics, and a more aggressive re-investment of income.

It never ceases to amaze me how if someone eschews the ideals of capitalism and free-market economy, we condemn them as comunist and unrealistic... But if they actually do well at it, we villify them as unethical and evil.

Rockefeller, to use a freshly laid out example, engaged in bribery, pandering, gouging, price fixing, transport fraud, and other "business" practices that would fall just short of racketeering today... What did Starbucks do? They created a superior (in obvious terms of customer preference) product, built a superior (in terkms of effeciency) business process to bring that product to market, and displayed a willingness to make less profit per unit in order to gain more market share.

Microsoft came closer, but as much as the competition they are crushing would like to bitch and cry about it, they still didn't do anything "wrong"... Nothing that doesn't happen in the grocery store every day... They developed a product everybody wanted, and they demanded favorable positioning for it - sometimes, by raw default, at the cost of product placement for thier competition. If you think the same thing doesn't happen every day with razors and jeans and toilet paper and raisens, you just don't know as much about business as you may think you do.

I'm also more than a little weary of this characteristic neo-hippy misuse of the word Monopoly. The only way Starbucks could have a "monopoly" is if they controlled the entire coffee bean farming industry. And that's if we consider coffee beans as a commodity. Coffee itself is not a commodity, and being successful isn't illegal, immoral, or unethical.

wow... that -really- wasn't intended to be that... strident.

Yeah... It'd be great if everyone could just play nice and say "It's ok if my business never grows... I won't try to sell to anyone you're already selling to, no matter how badly they want my product." Just like Jr. High School... "You can't date Debbie! I liked her first!"

And mocha frappuchino is -still- crack. way too good. there -has- to be something evil about it.

[Indigo Violent]

I work at Starbucks and you're all hurting my feelings...*sob*
Okay, not really. I served my two weeks' notice yesterday out of need to focus on school, and I fully admit there are a lot of things wrong with Starbucks. But damn it's going to suck coming down off all the free drinks.

[Dragoness]

Honor: I worked at a starbucks too. I think the secret to the mocha frapps is the chocolate syrup. It's made in-house from cocoa and water and a tiny bit of sugar. You can make it yourself with a good-quality dutched cocoa and water, then adding wee amounts of sugar till you can just taste it. It should be only slightly more sweet than unsweetened cooking chocolate. If you've hit the taste of a chocolate chip (semisweet chocolate) there's too much sugar. Anyway, it beats the pants off the crap Hershey's puts out for anything coffee related.

The rest of it is "coffee frap mix" and ice. Coffee frap mix is coffee, 2% milk and sugar... to get the same taste, use about 2 cups of coffee with enough milk to make it the color of a frapp, and enough sugar to make it as sweet as you like. They put thickeners in it, though, to give it a mouth feel closer to cream, so if the frap with milk feels too thin try cream...

So in conclusion: fill the target cup to within 1 1/2 inches of the top with ice. Pour in your sweet, light coffee to the level of the ice. Dump this into a blender. Add two tablespoons of your homemade chocolate syrup. Blend and pour. Homemade frappuccino.

[Sweet or Sour]

Only problem is, just like with crack, think of how many people would just sit around at home OD'ing on frappuccinos if you could make it by-the-vat in your own kitchen. 64 ounce frappuccino anyone?

So if you have restraint, then its probably a lot cheaper and easier to make them at home, but if you would drink your body weight in frapuccino every afternoon if you could, then perhaps the high price and distance is a good deterrent. Personally, I have absolutely no restraint whatsoever, so if I had something I liked right in front of me with near endless supply, I

[Honor]

...Homemade frappuccino.

O.O

I think I love you.

[ps: 50'th post, i'm coming out...]

*listens intently* I love a good coming-out story.

[ManaUser]

I don't know if it's accurate, but I recently came across this site which claims Starbucks coffee has around half again as much caffeine as typical coffee. I wonder if that's the real reason people like it. I have a hard believing it's for the taste. Be sure to check out the "Death by Caffeine" calculator while you're at that site.

[Dragoness]

I don't know if it's accurate, but I recently came across this site which claims Starbucks coffee has around half again as much caffeine as typical coffee. I wonder if that's the real reason people like it. I have a hard believing it's for the taste. Be sure to check out the "Death by Caffeine" calculator while you're at that site.

I can't vouch for Frappuccinos, because the coffee in it is part of the premade coffee mix we're given, but everything else there - anything made with brewed coffee or espresso is made by the baristas and I can tell you they're standard beans.

And believe it or not, I know what almost pure caffiene tastes like, and I used to eat the espresso beans (well, suck on them anyway), and I would know if they did something wierd like spray liquid caffiene on them before they packed it up.

Besides, caffiene isn't exactly a pleasure drug. It gives energy and mental alertness and whatnot, and can addict a person into needing caffiene to be alert, but I can't imagine people getting a pleasure high from it.

[Major Maxillary]

It never ceases to amaze me how if someone eschews the ideals of capitalism and free-market economy, we condemn them as comunist and unrealistic... But if they actually do well at it, we villify them as unethical and evil.

how is that even possible? one cannot have a free market when you have a lack of options. and how did you draw the conclusion that i was saying that yuppies are communists?


Honestly, you should know by now that everything i say is part sarchastic joke.

i don't care who a business contributes to, or what they do with their money. only the quality of their product and the way they treat their workers. also wether they are assholes about business.

Yeah, i know what a red herring is, and it was sort of a bad pun. it's a great idea in small groups that becomes unworkable when scaled up to a national level, and it's often seen as "red." so red herring.


i know all about rockafeller and the old greats of yesteryear. read; joke. joke joke joke joke joke joke joke.


i never said microsoft was evil, did i? microsoft isn't putting stores right across the street or even next door to other stores, also, they have a decent prodoct. i never liked coffee becaus eit cramps up my stomach. but if i only liked coffee from a local shop, and then starbucks came in and wound up putting my favorite shop out of buisiness or even just buying them out, i'd be pretty pissed off. especially if i didn't like anything starbucks sold. and i don't. even if i did drink coffee, i'm not going to pay five to seven dollars for a cup of coffee that i could make for free with hershey's syrup and whipped cream. people have the right to choose what they like, and if you make a product that's better than the other guy's product, then you have the right to enjoy buisiness without getting bitched at for stealing customers. because it's their own fault for not selling something that the customer liked better. that's what a free market is.


I have a little idea for a future business i'm going to do after i get out of the Army; a deli/ice cream shop and gunshop/outdoor firing range. i ran it by alot of other guys, and they liked the idea of not having to go to two seperate places to eat and shoot off their guns on the weekends. one even joked that he'd never have to leave save for work. i could make quite a bit of money off of that, possibly enough to open a franchise. now would it be ethical to take customers from a regular gunshop/shooting range? yes. because i'd give more variety, and have a better atmosphere. however, i'm not going to put one within a short distance of others if i could avoid it. largely due to the fact that open ranges require, well, open ranges.

anyway, my point is that what i was saying was half joke, and i agree with you for the most part.

wow... that -really- wasn't intended to be that... strident.

I know, right?


@ dragoness; Cafeen is classified as a stimulant. which is why it's not a pleasure drug.


i know that stimulants are drugs.

[Sweet or Sour]

The key is to position your shooting range carefully, in close proximity. Let the competing firing range aim their guns toward some hill or something, aim your firing range at their firing range, with some big concrete wall to stop the bullets from causing any damage. Even if its perfectly safe, it would take a deal of courage to be holding a weapon knowing its power, and pointing it at a target, while hearing other people holding the same weapon, tinking bullets against a concrete wall, a wall that if it wasn't there, would leave the original person in question to be the target. A deal of courage that isn't needed, if they choose your firing range. If THATS not unethical business practices, I don't know what is.

not that you should do it, because it is pretty evil, but since ethics have been floating around the forum as of late, figured I'd think of something fitting, as best I could.

[ps: 50'th post, i'm coming out...]

*listens intently* I love a good coming-out story.

its terrifyingly boring and would not be in the least interesting, so I

[Squidflakes]

i never said microsoft was evil, did i? microsoft isn't putting stores right across the street or even next door to other stores, also, they have a decent prodoct.

Sweet tentacles man! Yes, of course Microsoft is evil. Microsoft was built, and continues today on a platform of theft and half-assery. Just because Windows is the de facto for PCs these days doesn't mean the product is good.

As a product, Windows is like a Monte Cristo sandwich stuffed with week old watery shit. The outside looks great, and oh, there is even a little ramekin of raspberry jam for dipping! But take a bite, and suddenly you've got shit all over your face and running down your arms. You want to complain but EVERYONE is eating this same shit sandwich. Hell, you can barely find a resturant that doesn't exclusvly serve the afore mentioned fried feces delight. So everyone eats, and smacks their lips, and tells you how great the shit is, and most of the time, its because they don't even know how a real Monte Cristo is supposed to taste.

Unlike any other shit sandwich, you're still going to suck down the same amount of shit, no matter how much bread you have.

What is a good product? It depends on what you want. Solairs 10 is a fucking awesome product. Mac OSx is a great product too. Both have a sturdy Unix back-end (the only OS over 30 you can trust), but Mac has an EXCEPTIONAL window manager and graphical interface philosophy. Solaris 10 has a window manager that attempts to look as much like Windows as possible. Again, not because its good, but because most administrators are used to it.

As to the theft, MS does NOT innovate. They steal, they modify, and they cover their find in pure MS Brand shit until it stinks like the rest of their products, then they market the hell out of it, and claim it as their own.

[ManaUser]

And believe it or not, I know what almost pure caffiene tastes like, and I used to eat the espresso beans (well, suck on them anyway), and I would know if they did something wierd like spray liquid caffiene on them before they packed it up.

I wasn't really suggesting that their coffee is adulterated; the ammount of caffeine in a cup of coffee can vary quite a bit naturally. But it wouldn't surprise me if the beans, roasting method, etc, were chosen for maxium caffeine content.

[CottonStar]

i never said microsoft was evil, did i? microsoft isn't putting stores right across the street or even next door to other stores, also, they have a decent prodoct.

Sweet tentacles man! Yes, of course Microsoft is evil. Microsoft was built, and continues today on a platform of theft and half-assery. Just because Windows is the de facto for PCs these days doesn't mean the product is good.

As a product, Windows is like a Monte Cristo sandwich stuffed with week old watery shit. The outside looks great, and oh, there is even a little ramekin of raspberry jam for dipping! But take a bite, and suddenly you've got shit all over your face and running down your arms. You want to complain but EVERYONE is eating this same shit sandwich. Hell, you can barely find a resturant that doesn't exclusvly serve the afore mentioned fried feces delight. So everyone eats, and smacks their lips, and tells you how great the shit is, and most of the time, its because they don't even know how a real Monte Cristo is supposed to taste.

Unlike any other shit sandwich, you're still going to suck down the same amount of shit, no matter how much bread you have.

What is a good product? It depends on what you want. Solairs 10 is a fucking awesome product. Mac OSx is a great product too. Both have a sturdy Unix back-end (the only OS over 30 you can trust), but Mac has an EXCEPTIONAL window manager and graphical interface philosophy. Solaris 10 has a window manager that attempts to look as much like Windows as possible. Again, not because its good, but because most administrators are used to it.

As to the theft, MS does NOT innovate. They steal, they modify, and they cover their find in pure MS Brand shit until it stinks like the rest of their products, then they market the hell out of it, and claim it as their own.

And they happen to be sixty million dollars richer for it. So I guess we know who wins THAT arguement.

[Squidflakes]

And they happen to be sixty million dollars richer for it. So I guess we know who wins THAT arguement.

And thus the problem! I wish I could start a company that produces shit and gets paid for it.