starbucks, personalization, and brand as signal.

Starbucks is, to put it lightly, in a wee bit of trouble.

What they have on their side, is a rabid customer base, who sees the brand as a reflection of their own taste and sophistication.  Lots of people who love starbucks would argue with me about this, but I’d bet the majority of them take some form of pride in being able to order their quad long non-fat venti no-foam caramel macchiato.

Starbucks should draw attention to this type of customer, and this specific skill, in it’s promotions.

A simple idea:

Run a contest inviting customers to submit their own drink modifications, combinations, etc.  The things you can do when you actually know the Starbucks menu and ordering process are pretty interesting.  Let people enter a drink of choice, or if you really want to go overboard, create a Facebook application that makes the ‘signature drink’ a badge on their profile.

Get some big wigs at Starbucks headquarters, or some high profile Starbucks fanatics (there are a lot of them out there) to test out 10 selections, and pick a winner.  Prizes are fairly easy, maybe a trip for 2 to Seattle, your signature drink added to the menu at the Pike Place location for the duration of your trip, and your chosen ‘home’ Starbucks location for a year.

This wouldn’t cost much, but considering the amount of press it could generate based on 1) the number of people addicted to Starbucks in some capacity or another, and 2) the celebrity connection Starbucks has developed, it seems like a solid investment with a probable high return.

The key points here are recognizing the potential for personalization in the brand, and recognizing the need for each location to serve as an anchor point for its customers.  I fully admit that’s why I was at Starbucks last night, and will probably be there tonight.

liveblogging the inconsequential (1)

9.32pm experiment starts. A line has developed at starbucks, and the cute manager girl is herding people in an attempt to make it faster. I’m drinking a caffe vanilla frapp. I’m also reading LVHRD magazine (pdf).

9.35pm I take a sip.

9.35pm there’s an irritating mass of high school aged girls sitting in the corner behind me. The phrase ‘ohmygod’ is being tossed around like al gore’s name at a hipster dinner party. Or, I guess, like the word ‘like’. If it was socially acceptable, I would argue that these are the girls who should be sold into slavery in eastern bloc nations. But I doubt it is socially acceptable.

9.36pm ‘do you really need another dress’ – justification for selling them into slavery?

9.37pm I remember that, as a black man, I should probably not be so free and easy with the slavery jokes. I go back to my magazine.

9.39pm LVHRD magazine is now my go-to example for design ‘style’ being more important than readability, or functionality, or anything that actually matters. Pretty is good. Pretty and works is infinitely superior.

9.40pm I’ve learned to tune out the prostitots in the corner. Am I the only person in the world for whom working in PR is actually mellowing?

9.41pm the phrase ‘on crack’ is the new black.

9.43pm paul pope is my hero. I need more THB.

9.44pm my parents call. I inform them I have taken out the garbage. Rejoicing follows.

9.46pm deep notes that ‘it’s pretty loud for a Monday’ I respond with ‘it’s pretty fucking loud, yeah’. I hate everyone in the room excepting deep, cute starbucks girl, and my mac. We will move outside when the situation permits.

9.48pm I am running out of frappaccino. Alert the authorities.

9.48pm I am nearly certain that this is more interesting than the last liveblog I read, which was basically ‘crapcrapcrapcrap what, no love for children of men? Crapcrapcrap’.

9.51pm I am currently eavesdropping on another example of one minority group attempting to corner the market on being discriminated against. No, not black. Guess again.

9.53pm I really should be spending this time working on my press release writing skills. Trust me, it’s harder than it looks.

9.54pm I have finished reading LVHRD, I am again an advocate, that shit was beautiful.

9.55pm when the hell is PULPHOPE coming out already? The wait is killing me. Screw harry potter, this shit is important. There is currently 3.50 left on my macbook battery. I am seriously impressed, considering I’m refusing to turn down the brightness for no good reason.

9.57pm I’ve begun to read coroflot number 2, because it distracts me from the frat-boy-esque tards that keep talking about trashing hotels with their hockey teams.

10.00pm I just wasted two minutes reformatting the word doc of this ‘liveblog’. Two. Minutes. And still, the tedium.

10.01pm so is this more stream of consciousness, or just idiocy? Is this any more or less relevant than most liveblogging? Experiment ended.

I once wrote that the revolution wouldn’t be televised, it would be liveblogged and photocasted, it would be available from the citizenry and for the citizens of the world. I’m wondering if that’s the case, or if the revolution will be lost in the twitter storm of ‘I just had a sandwich’ that you can currently watch on a google maps mashup (insert link).

This was a proof-of-concept episode of LTI. Next time, it’s going to be a more focused event, although meaningless. The real dream is to pull off an LTI that is completely within the topic.

Meta. Meta. Meta.

10.05pm Okay, I just had to add this. One emo, pete wentz looking guy, and an army of not-quite-aware-they-are-chubby emo girls just walked out of the starbucks, talking about how they are going to some place on Richmond, and it’s amateur night. Teen whores heading to a strip joint. Like, 15. There is no god.

Not that I thought one was coming.

oh thank god.

As expected, there was no truth whatsoever to the Radiohead / Starbucks rumour.

Please go about your day, no longer worried about the impending apocalypse.

starbucks and lifestyle.

Starbucks sells a lifestyle. This should be fairly clear, because they have to be selling something other than coffee, considering what they charge. They sell a lifestyle of complex names, many options, euro-flavoured sizes, and extravagance. In less words, this is called exclusivity, or class. Taste, even. Which is ironic, because the few insanely dedicated coffee drinkers I associate with find the stuff middle of the road, whereas I love it.

Having taste is a big arrow pointing to your head that says you are better than other people. Music is a great aspect of your life in which to have 'good taste' because it's something that people can experience passively. If you have great taste in literature, that only helps you win people over if they ask what you are reading, or if you pretentiously drop it into the conversation (I know, because I do this all the time.) Music is overheard, it provides social outings (concerts) that have more cachet than a book reading (at least among youth) and it is often seen as a big indicator of personality. I cannot count the number of times a friend has found attraction or distaste based on the musical affinities of a potential love interest.

After that massive aside, the point. Starbucks, through Hear Music, has a music label. This isn't surprising, considering they have been selling CDs and exclusive versions for a while now, in the middle of the store. The issue at the moment is, they have managed to get one of the major cultural icons of our time to sign on. Paul McCartney is, as they say, kind of a big deal. This is something of a coup, considering he's the first signing for Hear Music. Considering these are the people who convinced Alanis Morissette to release an acoustic version of her good album, it makes sense to pick someone who, however talented, skews to the adult contemporary crowd.

What's more surprising is rumours that Radiohead might be up next. I really want to discount this, and am reiterating it is a rumour. But still, scary thing to see pop up in the RSS reader.

I guess the point of this post is that the need to sell a lifestyle is managing to turn the arts into a marketing approach for coffee. Because, at core, that is what signing to Hear Music would make someone, and unofficial promotion for Starbucks. This isn't necessarily a bad thing, and might even be one of those solutions to the 'failing' music industry's woes. Culture as a means of generating interest in material goods, rather than cultural content in object form.

I can't think about this without mentioning that Alexandra Patsavas, the person behind loading music into the OC and Grey's, is launching a record label. I will admit that I was swayed by her choices repeatedly, although I did lament the fact that bands I love would show up, poppiest song in tow, in shows that quickly lost my interest. (I was in the weird contingent that would turn on the OC more to see Dirty Pretty Things songs than for the adventures of Ryan Atwood.) Don't these things seem eerily connected to you? (Hilariously, I just noticed while writing this that the connection was also made in the comments thread to the linked post.)

Paul McCartney is making music, and indirectly it is about selling you coffee. Welcome to the future. Try not to vomit on anything nice.