Friday, August 28, 2009
Starbucks ditches the corporate logo
Posted by Rachael Daigle on Fri, Aug 28, 2009 at 3:47 PM
A rose by any other name still isn't so sweet for some.
Starbucks recently opened a new store in Seattle, and while that alone isn't big news in the city of residence for the coffee giant's corporate seat, what is news is that the new store doesn't bear the Starbucks logo.
Called 15 Ave. Coffee & Tea, it certainly looks (from our Boise standpoint, anyway) that the new store has gone to lengths to prevent being identified with Starbucks.
Have a look at the homepage for 15th Ave. Coffee & Tea. Doesn't look much like a Starbucks, does it?
Well, surely, it must say in the "About" section that it's a Starbucks, right?
Or not. According to a story in the Seattle Times last month, Starbucks employees staked out local coffee shops to take notes and see what worked. The addition of beer and wine, as well as local music are some of the new additions to the Starbucks formula ... well, the new local approach in Starbucks' formula.
The denial goes both ways, however. Not only does 15th Ave. Coffee and Tea not claim to be a Starbucks store on its Web site, but the store locator at starbucks.com doesn't claim it either.
Sure, the argument can be made that there is no truly local coffee—at least not in the United States anyhow—but this kind of "de-branding" of an internationally recognized product sure gets straight to the heart of the ol' local-washing debate, doesn't it?
Comments (6)
Showing 1-6 of 6
You are a little wrong about there being no local coffee in the U.S. We include Hawaii as a state, and they have some delicious berries coming off the island named Kona.
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you are quite right, darrin. and i should know that, having lived in Hawaii. (except to be even more correct, the island isn't named Kona. it's named Hawaii, aka "the big island.")
Thanks for the correction. I've always been under the impression Kona was it's own island.
Here's the store's twitter page for those who are twitterers! http://twitter.com/15thAveCoffee
This story sort of recaps a few things in the past that have said about the story, regardless of their factual accuracy.
The store design follows the natural progression of 'concept' Starbucks in Seattle including U-Village and Heritage Starbucks. Here is a link to the Heritage Starbucks page on V2V:
http://www.v2v.net/starbucks/stores/us_148…
(Click on the multimedia section) for photos.
And here is the link to 15th Coffee and Tea:
http://www.v2v.net/starbucks/stores/us_320…
(Again, click on the multimedia section for pics)
The lights in 15th Avenue Coffee and Tea are the exact same design as what is hanging at 1912 Pike Place - The oldest Starbucks. The chalkboard menus are pretty much the same menus that Starbucks has been testing out at other concept stores.
The coffee selection varies as to what is available since it comes fresh from the roasting plant. I notice the coffee menu board isn't always kept totally uptodate with what is available.
It a store well worth visiting. And there's no intent to try and deny it's run by Starbucks. It fits in the logical sequence of concepts that Starbucks has been toying with for almost a year and a half to 2 years.
My biggest complaint with 15th Ave Coffee & Tea: Not one comfy chair, and no refrigerator so the food offerings tend to be just one pastry after another with little variety for yogurt or something like that.
Melody
http://twitter.com/StarbucksMelody
The sign on the front of the store also says in plain English under the 15th Ave Coffee and Tea "Inspired by Starbucks".
However, "Inspired by Starbucks" does not mean "Owned by Starbucks".
The choice of words was no doubt a subject of debate amongst marketers who wanted people to gain the illusion of choice. Much like how Jacksons Food Stores here in Boise bought Chevrons directly across from their Shell stations and kept the signage the same for years. I miss slurpees, btw, now that they've taken all the 7-11's too.
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