To get the best mental preparation for this entry of reminiscing, I thought it a wise idea to submerge myself in the atmospheres from which I am now repelled. A large red cup of Colombian coffee and a plain bagel sit beside me, awaiting devouring as I put my thoughts, and the semester, together. Let this be a monument to my fall semester’s free time.
As the semester began, I was somewhat taken aback by the two new Starbucks that had taken ground in Blacksburg soil. I recall when the first one opened after my freshman year and the excitement that it brought. At the time, I was quickly allured by thoughts of caramel macchiatos and plush frappucinos. But then I read Fast Food Nation, watched Super Size Me, and began personal research into large corporate hulks that glean up profits and expand at unbelievable rates. What I discovered about Starbucks appeared uncomfortably similar to that of McDonald’s.
Then, it all began with the Collegiate Times, the non-university funded paper entirely organized and created by students and their efforts. An article was written very early in the year depicting the current state of the coffee market in Blacksburg. For the articles that I will reference, the full text will be copied here in italics, but a link to the article on the CT website will be provided as well.
In Blacksburg, the coffee business is a growth industry. With the opening of the new Starbucks in Kent Square, there are now more than five established coffee houses in the Blacksburg area.
Jaimie Harrison, store manager of the Kent Square Starbucks, said, “We don’t get as much business as the Starbucks on University City Boulevard because a lot of people don’t know that we are even here.”
Since its opening on Aug. 12, the Kent Square Starbucks is “having parking issues,” Harrison said.
Smaller coffee shops are also beginning to prosper in Blacksburg.
“We are part of a franchise out of Winchester, Va. which has been around for 10 years and spreading south down Interstate 81, there are also goals to open shops in Texas and California,” said Jen Christopher, shift manager of the Daily Grind Coffee House.
Christopher said the store originally opened in January 2002, but it closed in October 2004 because of bad management and opened again six weeks ago after a complete renovation.
“We are reaching a point where regular customers are putting the word out, but there hasn’t been much advertising thus far. We’re making plans to begin advertising to increase our customer base,” Christopher said. “We share customers with Mill Mountain, and I hear some of our customers talk about Starbucks, but a lot of customers say that we are better.”
Christopher said that Daily Grind sees between 100 and 150 customers on an average day.
“I’ve had a customer say that he wished we did well enough to see Starbucks pushed out,” Christopher said.
“We have seen fewer faces this year while we continue to see our regulars, we have not increased our clientele because there is stiff competition with all of the new coffee shops opening up,” said Scott Elich, owner of Mill Mountain Coffee and Tea.
Elich said Mill Mountain was the first coffee shop in Blacksburg, opening in 1991.
“We have been roasting our own coffee for 14 years and we try to keep our atmosphere welcoming and comfortable with the hanging of Blacksburg Regional Art Associations’ featured paintings,” Elich said.
“We are privately owned and been here since 1994,” said Miguel Harvey, manager and veteran employee of Bollo’s Coffee Shop.
Harvey said that compared to a couple of years ago, the opening of new coffee shops like Starbucks has affected the “to-go” crowd in the mornings.
“As school opens up every August, business improves, but because Blacksburg is so transient, a lot of clientele will disappear to other shops for unknown reasons,” Harvey said.
Harvey said Bollo’s gets a mix of customers because “we cater and bake our own goods.”
“On average, if I had to guesstimate, we see about 300 to 400 customers daily, on average,” Harvey said.
Harvey said that each coffee shop has their own niche, and Bollo’s is always changing and adapting to fit its customers’ preferences.
“We just started roasting our own coffee and we are pushing our full-time employees to learn as much knowledge about coffee as possible,” said Valerie Sutherland, general manager of the Easy Chair Coffee Shop.
Sutherland said coffee is the focus of the business, not sales.
“We have several full-time employees that are accredited and certified baristas and roasters,” Sutherland said.
Sutherland said Easy Chair Coffee Shop has worked and volunteered at the Specialty Coffee Association of America and the Barista and Roasters Guilds, both of which are chapters of the SCAA.
“Our business has done nothing but steadily increase, even after the opening of the Starbucks of University City Boulevard around a year and a half ago. We weren’t really affected,” Sutherland said.
- Scott Smith, associate news editor, “Coffee a ‘hot’ commodity in Blacksburg – Local coffee shops react to the opening of the new Starbucks in Kent Square”, September 13, 2005
I read this, paused briefly, and felt I would comment with my input about my personal interpretation of the corporation. The following day, my letter to the editor was published in the print edition of the CT.
Within the generic barrage of “Friends don’t let friends … “ bumper stickers, my preference is with the one ending in “ … drink Starbucks.” The New River Valley is only a handful of coffee shops away from arriving on the nation’s top ten list for having the most coffee shops per person. Clearly then, as consumers we have a choice of where we get our coffee, espresso and freshly baked goods. However, I hope we all understand the impact that Starbucks has on a global scale.
When I think of Starbucks, I think of McDonald’s. Why? Starbucks’ mission is to serve the same coffee at every location in every country, continent, hemisphere; this is identical to McDonald’s eternal goal of offering the same hamburger patties, with the precise hints of processed flavors, the world over. When food chains desire to create an ultimate uniformity on this scale, there are several drawbacks, rather severe ramifications. Take a look at McDonald’s: they are now the nation’s largest buyer of meat and notice how their demand has horrifically altered the slaughterhouses and meat-packing plants in this nation. Starbucks is becoming a similar giant in the coffee industry. Buying coffee beans in enormous quantities at minimal prices continually changes the lives of coffee bean growers throughout the world (further, there are great environmental effects to this corporate demand that are difficult to minimize).
Should I even mention Starbucks’ stated business objective of becoming the premier provider of coffee in our world? This sounds strikingly equivalent to McDonald’s ubiquitous yellow arches. There are side effects to being ridiculously successful and gleaning up everyone’s coffee fix. So before you are once again allured by a fertility goddess and crave some frou frou frappuccino, check around for local alternatives and you may find a far better coffee environment and experience.
- Ryan Harne, junior, mechanical engineering, “Local coffee should take precedence over Starbucks”, September 14, 2005
After it was in print, I didn’t think much of it, and I continued my brilliantly busy schedule with courses and the job. It felt good to have some kind of input that was read by others (and the minimal student feedback I got from those who looked my up on facebook).
Out of nowhere, another letter to the editor appeared printed in the CT a few weeks later.
The Collegiate Times has recently published two opinion pieces containing information about Starbucks that misrepresents our corporate social responsibility efforts in local and coffee growing communities.
Contrary to the column “Local coffee should take precedence over Starbucks” (CT, Sept. 14), we pay premium prices to coffee farmers so they can make a profit and support their families. In 2004, this meant that Starbucks paid on average $1.20 per pound for its high-quality coffee beans — approximately double the commodity market’s price during the year.
Beyond paying premium prices, Starbucks also provides coffee farmers access to affordable credit, invests in social projects in coffee communities and provides technical assistance and agricultural expertise through the Starbucks Farmer Support Center in Costa Rica. In addition, Starbucks has developed a set of socially responsible coffee buying guidelines called C.A.F.E. (Coffee and Farmer Equity) Practices, designed to protect the environment, help ensure fair prices, wages and workers’ rights and promote social development in coffee communities.
Locally, we believe that our presence has benefited other coffee retailers by increasing foot traffic and raising consumer awareness of specialty coffee. As Starbucks has opened stores, a growing number of independent coffeehouses have also sprung up across the United States. As a result, consumers benefit as they are offered more choices, new jobs are created and neighborhoods are enriched with the addition of local gathering places.
Starbucks has achieved success one cup at a time, one store at a time. We started as a small business in Seattle’s Pike Place market more than 30 years ago. Since then, each one of our stores has become a unique part of its neighborhood. We firmly believe that there is room for choice in every community and that our customers and partners at each location give the store its own personality and atmosphere.
Starbucks is proud to be a part of the Blacksburg community and we welcome the opportunity to continue to serve the university and its community.
- Sam Rose, District Manager, Starbucks Coffee Company, “Starbucks welcome contribution to locals”, October 6, 2005
The first question I asked myself was, “What’s the second article he is referring to?” The only article that may have “misrepresented Starbuck’s goals would be mine; that initial coffee-related article made no judgment on the company in the least. That insufficiency of example was my first reason for responding.
I’ll forgive him for blatantly reiterating Starbuck’s bland catchphrase (“one cup at a time”), but I couldn’t grant him the satisfaction of taking credit for the increase in the coffee market in Blacksburg. The presence of Starbucks may have contributed to an increase of people drinking coffee, but by no stretch of the imagination could it be a “welcome contribution” to the local coffee shops that it redirects business away from.
I did write up a reply and submit it, but it was only listed in the online section of the CT. I’ll not copy it here because a letter I submitted later was highly repetitive of this attempt I speak of now. So, perhaps, Mr. Rose won that round for his cause of benefiting the local coffee community. But then another article appeared, and this time it wasn’t me or another Starbucks rep. It was one of the editorials for the day, written by a Devin Stone of the CT, and I enjoyed reading his work. Watch the beauty unfold.
Starbucks is one of several popular places for students to get their caffeine fix here in Blacksburg. The coffee shop has also received some coverage here in the Collegiate Times and in national newspapers across the country. A quick Google search for “Starbucks” will provide all sorts of accomplishments that are a step in the right direction to promoting sustainable development and better working conditions. The list of achievements is long: Starbucks is one of the hundred greatest places to work, according to Forbes Magazine. The company is trying to promote its Coffee and Farmer Equity Prices program to raise wages for farmers, and in January of 2006 the eighth-annual “Recycling Works” recognition award will be awarded to Starbucks.
Despite these accomplishments, there is still a strong movement against Starbucks. One of the many examples can be found at American University, where President Benjamin Ladner decided that the coffee shop Pura Vida better represented “American University’s institutional values and another opportunity to translate those values into a demonstrated public responsibility.”
The university allowed Pura Vida (and not Starbucks) to move into the Mary Graydon Student Center due to a strong student-led movement that favored it over Starbucks.
These students had good reason to oppose Starbucks. Starbucks proudly displays its “Corporate Social Responsibility 2004 Annual Report,” which asks an important question on the second page: “Is Starbucks responsible?” Despite the report’s 76 pages of bullet points, graphs and pictures displaying the company’s commitment to diversity, sustainability and a fun workplace, one simple fact cannot be hidden. Only 1.6 percent of Starbucks coffee is fair-trade certified. Despite the opportunities that the C.A.F.E. program can provide, in 2004 only 14.5 percent of Starbucks coffee actually met C.A.F.E. practices. Pura Vida, on the other hand, offers 100 percent fair trade coffee.
According to Starbucks, the lack of Fair Trade Coffee is due to a lack of supply. According to Global Exchange, only 20 percent of fair trade coffee is sold at fair trade prices — the rest is sold at the market price due to a lack of demand. In an open market where huge corporations like Nestle and Kraft have enormous market power as buyers and sellers living on cooperatives have practically no market power, prices are often set below production costs. This makes poverty a sad reality for many coffee farmers who rely on the land for their livelihood.
According to Make Trade Fair, in Vietnam’s Dak Lak Province, coffee is sold at 60 percent of production costs, while a glimpse at Starbucks’ website boasts of “Strong September and Fiscal Year 2005 revenues.” But this end result shouldn’t be surprising, says Make Trade Fair. When you buy a cup of coffee, 2 percent of the earnings go to the farmer, 3 percent to the exporter, while the great majority of the cash — 64 percent — goes to the roaster and 25 percent goes to the retailer.
Much of the products we use every day are built in sweatshops, much of the furniture we use on campus was built in a prison and much of the coffee we drink was grown under conditions that many would consider to be worse than a sweatshop. The stories of these workers are practically absent from advertisements, press releases and corporate social responsibility reports, except for the few workers who can actually provide uplifting stories to comfort consumers and help sell more product. Comments like “tell people in your place that the drink they are enjoying is now the cause of all our problems,” from Lawrence Seguya, a coffee farmer in Uganda, do little to promote a good image for coffee retailers.
Seguya, interviewed by Geoff Sayer from Oxfam International, said “Buyers can just set the price they want. Millers can just set the price they want. Exporters can just set the price they want … We buy the crop with our sweat and sell it for nothing.”
Fair-trade certified coffee, on the other hand, ensures that farmers are paid a living wage for their coffee. Coffee is a very important product in today’s economy, with numerous countries depending heavily on its export. The international economy privileges huge corporations with enormous market power, while small farmers compete for subsistence in a race to the bottom. The best way to help farmers is to pay a living wage, but Starbucks has not shown this necessary commitment. With less then 2 percent of Starbucks coffee being fair-trade certified, Starbucks is far from being socially responsible. The least students can do is to consider finding different coffee shops to spend their money.
- Devin Stone, “Starbucks’ efforts to improve farmers’ wages insufficient”, October 18, 2005
Talk about some research! – I was/am impressed by this article. Somehow I knew that this submission would prompt response. The response was delayed, but it came from the horse’s mouth.
We appreciate the author’s interest in the coffee industry. However, his piece “Starbucks efforts to improve farmers’ wages insufficient” (CT, Oct. 18) is drawing uninformed conclusions.
Starbucks and the Fair Trade movement share common goals: to help ensure that farmers receive a fair price for their coffee so that they can improve their lives and strengthen their farms for the future. Starbucks purchased 4.8 million pounds of Fair Trade Certified coffee in 2004, and those purchases impacted more than 42,000 Fair Trade coffee farmers in nine countries around the world. Our commitment for 2005 is to double our purchases again — to 10 million pounds of Fair Trade Certified coffee. This will make Starbucks the largest purchaser of Fair Trade Certified coffee in North America.
While we support Fair Trade, we think students should understand that purchasing Fair Trade coffee is not the sole measure of social responsibility in coffee buying. The Fair Trade movement was designed to address only one sector of the coffee industry: small-scale farmers organized into cooperatives. The coops that are currently on the Fair Trade registry represent only 3 percent of the world’s coffee farmers. Global Exchange, the human rights organization and Fair Trade advocate, states on its Web site that Fair Trade “cannot address all of the social inequities associated with coffee production around the world,” because it leaves out larger farms and their workers.
In order to address issues of economic transparency, social conditions and environmental protection for coffee purchases from all types of farms, Starbucks developed buying guidelines, Coffee and Farmer Equity Practices (C.A.F.E. Practices), that encourage sustainability at all levels of the coffee supply chain. C.A.F.E. Practices applies to coops (including Fair Trade coops), small and large farms, as well as the mills and exporters who play a critical role in helping small-scale farmers bring their coffee to market. Such holistic guidelines go beyond paying premium prices. This is a new approach for the coffee industry and we are proud to lead it.
As the author pointed out, in 2004, the first year of C.A.F.E. Practices, 14.5 percent of our coffee was purchased under the guidelines established by C.A.F.E. Practices’ pilot program. While this may seem like a small start, it actually represented 43.5 million pounds of coffee and exceeded our target by 45 percent. We committed with publicly stated targets to increasing that percentage each year and our goal is to purchase the majority of our coffee under C.A.F.E. Practices by 2007.
Starbucks agrees with the author about the importance of paying fair prices for coffee—prices that enable farmers to make a profit. Our goal is to pay premium prices for all the coffee we buy, whether or not it is part of C.A.F.E. Practices or our Fair Trade purchases. In fiscal year 2004, as noted in our Corporate Social Responsibility Annual Report, we paid an average of $1.20 per pound for coffee, which was 74 percent higher than the commodity market’s price during the year.
In addition, through 2005, Starbucks has made available more than $8.5 million in funding through nonprofit organizations that provide coffee farmers with access to affordable credit. This credit makes a critical difference to tens of thousands of farmers worldwide each year, allowing them to invest in their farms and hold their crops for sale when the price is best. Much of this credit benefits Fair Trade farmers, whether they are selling coffee to Starbucks or our competitors.
To further strengthen coffee communities, in fiscal year 2004, Starbucks supported 35 social development projects in nine countries, including building and renovating homes for coffee growing families in Columbia, a project that has benefited approximately 2,300 people since 1999.
Starbucks also provides agricultural expertise to farmers through our Farmer Support Center in Costa Rica. Through the Support Center, agronomists collaborate with coffee farmers to improve quality, implement conservation efforts and increase their profitability.
There is no question that there’s more work to be done to bring stability and equity to coffee farmers. We respect and applaud the efforts of Pura Vida and other companies that are working to make a difference in the lives of coffee farmers. But this is a complex issue that requires an integrated response, including, but not limited to, paying prices that allow farmers to make a profit. Fair Trade is one important component of buying coffee in a socially responsible manner, but not the complete solution — for Starbucks or coffee farmers.
- Sue Mecklenburg, Vice President, Corporate Social Responsibility, Starbucks Coffee Company, “Starbucks Protects the interests of its farmers”, November 1, 2005
As the only printed letter to the editor of the day, this submission stood out and encompassed your attention like the costume malfunction at the Super Bowl. I won’t try and blast Mrs. Mecklenburg’s writing on the topic because it was very well represented and thorough. But still, really now, did you think I was going to be silent?
I took a solid two hours out of my important afternoon to write up a reply. I had to skip some homework to take care of the operation as delicately as I wanted, but it was worth it. It required online research, reading through the same annual reports that Mecklenburg mentioned, and a determination to not think about the homework I was skipping out on in the meantime.
The day after Mecklenburg’s printed column, my submission took the opinions spot as the only printed letter of the day. As unmistakably located as her column was, 24 hours later was this reply.
The Coffee and Farmer Equity Practices agreed upon in 2001 were a needed step towards curbing the long-developed ills of the coffee growers worldwide; further, Fair Trade coffee purchases are always another move in the best direction. Yet, while Starbucks is sure to secure their supply for customers (CT Nov. 1, 2005, “Starbucks Protects … “), the situation at home becomes grim. And it’s the problems here that typically get more notice.
On the American front, it is the local coffee shop owners and workers that fall slain against the seemingly unstoppable competition of the coffee giant. In Starbucks’ 2002 Annual Report, the company points out its current stateside situation.
“As a result of its expansion strategy of clustering stores in existing markets, Starbucks has experienced a certain level of cannibalization of sales of existing stores by new stores as store concentration has increased … However, management believes such cannibalization has been justified by incremental sales and return(s),“ it said in the Starbucks.com Annual Reports.
So, not only are they sure to firmly defeat local competition with their clustering, but they also force their own store owners to compete against the other Starbucks around the block and down the street and a few stories above them. This practice is horrendous and with over 4,500 operating locations, the effect shows no sign of diminishing. A corporate practice of pursuing effectual defeat of all competition stymies local diversity and, naturally, relieves us of our choice.
It’s difficult to work against a machine that has but one purpose, but there are ways to curtail the negative effects of this type of consummate dominance. Buy local. There are countless local coffee shops in the Blacksburg area and plenty of opportunities to make a statement against the progressive defeat of local coffee shops. Just 18 months ago, there were no Starbucks in this Virginia Tech community; now there are three, one being in Christiansburg. How many will there be another 18 months from now? Four? Seven? Will you start to notice a Starbucks perched right beside every BT stop? I hope not. Check out your coffee options; Blacksburg is full of them.
- Ryan Harne, junior, mechanical engineering, “Starbucks is ‘a machine’ that stifles competition”, November 2, 2005
The last thing I wanted to do was become aggressive and churn an effectual name-calling battle. I thought my point was made as best as possible, in as few words as was feasible. Nothing more was mentioned in the CT in regards to Starbucks after that article; although, I did receive quite a bit of personal feedback from this submission of mine.
So, in my rush of the fall semester, it was nice to work in a bit of ethical/social stimulus that somewhat pressed me forward in both studies and intellectual debate. It may sound only a minor effort, but compared to my routine of gulping coffee and completing homework, this op-ed spree was wonderful and vibrant.
Only, now, I need something to fill my spring semester with. I am slightly low on course hours and don’t desire to fill extra time with the job, so I have a spot for a “project” that was presented as possibility.
And lastly, I congratulate you for getting the whole way through this behemoth entry. I provided no warning at the beginning in fear of losing your rapt attention. But I am elated you made it the whole way through, and wish you a fantastic day!
Edit: For the benefit of the community, I will have available the reference I made in my final letter to the editor. It is the Starbucks 2002 Fiscal Report and was originally available at the Starbucks website as of last check. To find the excerpt I quoted, just do a search/find for “cannibal”. Ha!
Music: Orbital, "Lush 3.1"