I just read that Starbucks plans to close almost 10% of their stores due to the economy.
I spent years satirizing Starbucks back before I could make any sense of Flash. (1998-2000) When I think back on it, the Starbucks I was making fun of were so different from what they're like now.
The secret menus used to drive me nuts, and the arrogant stylin barristas... Don't know if you've been in a Starbucks lately, but my last trip or two to Starbucks I saw the same stylin employees you'd see at Burger King. I was saying to Jon, "Next thing you know even flight attendants will be temp workers." Remember when they used to go to special schools in Texas to learn flight attendant grooming?
In Ridgway, a nearby town, there are only two businesses where you see people spending money: the True Grit Cafe and Second Chance, the thrift store on Main Street that benefits a no-kill animal shelter. The parking lot in front of Second Chance is almost always full. True Grit has been around a long time, with pictures of John Wayne and Dennis Weaver covering the walls, and they have a liquor license.
4 comments:
Driving to East Tennessee last week, which I associate with Appalachia, I stopped at a Starbucks in Cookeville on the way. And I thought: I don't know if I like that there is Starbucks in Cookeville; something just seems wrong about that! Of course I enjoyed the coffee, but does everybody really need to be all cosmopolitan and sophisticated?
Glad to see they're closing. The coffee is styled watery and the pastries are styled soggy. Yes to your observation about Burger King 'Bucks.
This post and the one before it bring back memories. I saw my first Starbucks in 1994 in Altadena. I drove by it on my way to a hike up Echo Mountian(?) on Mt. Lowe.
It (Echo Mountian, not Starbucks) had an echo horn and ruins of a resort and a furnacular system at tbe top.
Now there's probably a Starbucks up there.
oh those soggy pastries-- a favorite thing to toss in the trash can at airports. I wonder if the closures include all those ubiquitous supermarket/Target kiosks as well.
stray g, that seems so depressing.
namowal, there used to be some amazing things atop Mt. Lowe. At the turn of the 20th century hiking was very popular, and there were hotels up there which could only be reached by hiking in. Also that cool railway
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