A Starbucks barista says: "Stop suggesting 'unique' drink concoctions to me!"

He writes: "Yes, I know that a vanilla bean frap with a little bit of Strawberry cream and a half pump of mocha tastes like a Neopolitan. I fucking work here. Your discovery is by no means anything new. And even if these mixtures weren't obvious, I still wouldn't want to hear your train of thought." PLUS: More things that irritate this barista. || Read "Why Your Starbucks Barista Hates You" || Jump to the second page of comments.

Comments

[seventysix [76]]

Disclaimer: Not all Starbucks partners are burnt out and sour.

Some of us still love our jobs and still love making our customers happy.

Warmly,
seventysix [76]
Haud ignota loquor

[stan]

not even worth the time to read it.

list should say;

get of your phone and talk to me when your in front.

I don't care what the other store does, your a regular there, they take care of you and make your drink cheaper. I just met you.

no i can't make your drink faster because there is only two of us here. not only that, but the laws of heat absorption don't change when you walk close to the bar.

if your late for work then why did you stop? your already late, whats 2 more minutes going to mean? and if its that important you shouldn't have stopped anyway.

[embean]

my pet peeves used to be a) temperature specifications -- nothing is this important, sorry. and b) frappucino viscosity specifications.

I'm sorry your life sucks so much that these things matter to you.

[LV]

This guy sounds like a complete d-bag, in general. Sounds like he at least has nice, friendly customers who are talking about the products and offering suggestions, and HE'S complaining? I'd be more sympathetic if he complained about the millions of neanderthals who just grunt their order at you without regard to social cues, but he gets no sympathy from me when he complains about the people who are just trying to play along and take interest in his job and his product. I like those customers who ask me about the company (even though I don't often know the answers) and who try to suggest some drink I haven't thought of. Makes things less boring.

However, regarding the specific temperatures: I have one customer, I kid you not, who wants his latte at 173 degrees. Not even 175, 173. What's the point?

[Mocha Gal]

seventysix, out of curiosity, how long have you worked for the company?

[Happy Barista]

working for this company is a pain in the ass and the customers are just as bad...get your drink and get out. If you need more attention go to a brothel...

[Waltie]

This is a pretty dumb, pointless list, made all the worse by not even being clever or funny or well written.

There are so many annoying things that customers do that it's surprising not one legitimate complaint made it onto this list. Customers saying "grande" is really annoying to this person?

[WPGBRSTA]

'Love What You Do'? Anyone remember that? I'm sorry but that 'barista' who was apart of that article is no barista at all. They are nothing but an employee and seems to like it that way. I, on the other hand, am a Partner. I enjoy my customers, even those more of the side of WTF, they give me the best giggles and the ones who I am truly invested in. I'm sorry this guy does have the same thing.

[spence]

I agree with with seventy six. (I've been with the company a few years.) I like it if a customer orders a complicated drink. Then I can make a drink they will love.
My only pet peeve: flirters. I don't want to hear it and have to smile or laugh.

[spence]

Topic Suggestion: Specialty drinks with recipte not on the board. ie, Captain Crunch

[Free Refill]

We have a customer that orders a 182.5 degree latte. Some baristas look at him like he is crazy, stupid, and inconsiderate. But all he wants is for us to remember his drink. And it works, he is known by name and drink at several area starbucks. Its not that difficult folks. Next time someone is rude to you, take it. By responding negatively you are agreeing to play their game. Pull a fast one on them and treat them with respect when they don't deserve it. In the long run it is more likely to pay off, and actually change this person, and help them to treat people with respect.

[Kate]

I agree with LV. I most often enjoy customer interaction, and if a customer is nice enough to actually want to talk with me (as opposed to talking on their cellphone, ignoring me, or berating me), that's cool with me. Complaining about the customers to the customers is not the best way to get them to be nicer to us.

However, that isn't to say that it doesn't get to me when 1) people talk on their cellphone through the transaction 2) don't even say hi before they bark their order, and 3) are either "too important" or "too busy" to wait in line.

[Sheik]

Oh here we go again...

Some barista basically states THE TRUTH about how some/most customers can be and other barista's get HIGH AND MIGHTY about it.

I'm so sick of people who post on here who think they are the perfect person, let alone the perfect barista. Sickening.

[Alex]

@Sheik: And what, you ARE the perfect barista?

Look, I haven't seen anybody claim that. Some people are naturally genuine and kind towards their customers. I'll gladly work a 14 hour shift at my store (not SBUX) as long as I can have awesome conversations with my customers and make them drinks. It's what I like to do. If you absolutely despise baristas like this, maybe you should rethink why you're working with them.

[javagirl666]

You are not supposed to steam the milk past 180* per the beverage resource manual..it is a hazard for the barista if they were to spill the milk on themselves.

[CamSpi]

Ha. I read the article with a grain of salt. Its pretty funny. At the basis, most of us want to do a good job and make you the perfect latte... but sometimes there a handful of people who make it REALLY hard to want to do so. 173 degree people are bananas! And I mean that in the most polite way possible. :)

[milkwhiz]

I hate when customers feel the need to "haze" or "Initiate" partners they think are new by being rude, ignoring them and only taking to "their" barista, or being extra demanding. When in actuality, I am not a new partner and have worked for this company for 6+ years, longer than anyone else at my store (including my manager). This one's for you, you pompous bitch at [store name removed for barista protection]!! You're Venti nonfat 1= no foam latte is NOT THAT COMPLICATED and you are not that important!

[RememberTheGoodOl'Days?]

Hey Javagirl666, double check your manual, it's now 190 degrees. If they want it steamed hotter than that and you won't do it they'll just call and complain and you'll be told to do it. Why make them bother calling? Don't you know the "policy manual" doesn't hold up to a single customer complaint?

[randombarista]

Wow. I've got complaints at times, but they aren't these. I think maybe I want to work at that guy's store because this isn't much to be bugged by.

I LIKE talking to people about their lives and projects, if you really really hate it, well....this is a job where we do that. I must be really odd because I also really enjoy discussing coffee with people, it reminds me that I don't work at the DQ (which, on a heavy frappucino day, I'm not sure about).

That being said, I had a customer get verbally abusive with me today. No, not by ordering a grande bold :). Actually insulting me and wanting to argue no matter how I tried to placate him. I was truly a little astonished and might not have handled it as best as best could be, but I was by no means rude. Some people just feel like beating up on whoever is handy. That's a complaint, btw, "Egon", when someone actually gets personal with you and all your efforts to solve the problem seem to make it worse. If Neapolitan fraps are the worst thing you ever contend with you have it made.

[baroosta]

@seventysix [76] - I'm glad you can ignore the problems that face our company enough to smile and be genuine to your customers everyday. Here's a green apron card for you!

[frappuccinist]

Some of the comments on the site are making me roll my eyes back into my brain.

"Patsy says:

I pay $4.25 for a mocha frappacino that rarely a barrista gets right (never consistent from barrista to barrista) yet, I still drink it. I aways think, "I should just quit going to Starbucks because I'm tired of drinks not done right." Don't the barristas care enough to do a good job? This guy proves they don't! Get a different job, Egon. We're paying too much money to have to deal with attitudes like yours."

Oh, piss off Patsy. "Attitudes like yours"? She strikes me as the type to lean over the handoff plane and have a freaking heart attack over a drink that is not hers. "OMG not so much ice!!!" Chill out, moron! Let the "barrristas" do their jobs.

[milkwhiz]

@ frappuccinist
LOL. :) I know that type!

[CamSpi]

LOL!
-"Why are you pouring 2% milk into my nonfat latte?!"
-"Because that latte belongs to the person who was in front of you in line! LOL"

[Feh]

... to continue that conversation...

"Well, where's mine?!"

"I'm so very sorry, ma'm, but
Baristabot 2000 has not yet come up with a way to circumvent the laws of physics and create your beverage in less time. Be assured that Starbucks is currently working on a 3000 model, which will feature a quantum drive to leap forward in time, make your drink and then leap back to deliver it to you two mere seconds after you appear and peer critically at the barista, and wonder where your decaf, grande, no foam, 200 degree latte might be."

Those. Yes, those cows are really the only things that really make me mad. The folk that don't seem to remember that making things hot and making a machine pull hot water through bean-sand takes just a wee snatch of time. Listen, hosebeast, I guarantee that Nora Roberts' newest novel will still read the same a bare minute from now. Chill.

[ex-sbuxmanager]

-"Why are you pouring 2% milk into my nonfat latte?!"

My response to that was always:

"I make drinks for other people too."

[Shifty Stupovisor]

Once upon a time, that latte was worth $4 because of the superior product that went into making it. We all know this hasn't been the case for quite a while. The product is worth paying for because of what I can do with it, and I take pride in that. No matter what crazy, and, frankly, often disgusting thing you want me to do, I do it perfectly and with a smile. I am required to suggestive sell and upsell, but I do it with a smile and a joke and a full repertoire of taglines so I don't sound like a robot. As a barista on the front line, I am the only position left in this company that gives a damn about service, because it's what I do. Everyone else is in fear of their job if they don't hit numbers, and I understand that, too, but it's created a culture in which managers only care about QASA, DMs only care about sales targets, and upper management only cares about the stock price. Of all the things about my job that I hate right now, the customers are not one of them. And when I do get a doozy, somebody who just can't be human, move 'em out and go on to the next one, and don't let them spread their negativity through me.

[gc]

You're (sic) Venti nonfat 1= no foam latte is NOT THAT COMPLICATED and you are not that important!

And, yet, the customer is still far more important than any help behind a Starbucks counter. Where exactly does that leave you in the pecking order of importance?

It's also not that complicated to understand that any customer paying for any product at a Starbucks location is paying a barista's paycheck. Without those customers, you'd have no job.

I'd suggest you, and many others here, realize that you work a retail foodservice job and offer relatively little in the way of any significance to anyone other than your limited abilities to make beverages and fetch food (and sometimes you can't even do that right.)

Remember, the customer can go anywhere to get coffee. Even places that offer better service and beverages. As a Starbucks employee, you need every single paying customer that walks in the doors.

[(former) FLA SM]

[cut & pasted from the comments posted to the referenced article]

From Family Guy

[cut to Starbucks, where two men are typing on laptops]
Man 1: Hey, gettin' some writing done there, buddy?
Man 2: Yeah, settin' up in public so everybody can watch me type my big screenplay.
Man 1: Me too. All real writers need to be seen writing, otherwise, what's the point, right?
Man 2: You should totally write that down.
Man 1: Okay. Will you watch me?

Laptops in Starbucks would be on my list. Nobody is that important or busy they can't stop to drink a cup of coffee.

[me, myself and I]

I just LOVE those customers that order a tall latte and walk away from the hand off plane with a venti caramel frappuccino with extra whipped cream on top. Dude, didn't you notice you ordered something hot and walk away with something cold????

[Shifted]

@all of the posters who are shocked that a Barista (capital B, as if it was important anymore) could reject the One True Faith that is *$: The company you think you are working for died several years ago. And, the CEO keeps on pounding more silver nails into the mutilated corpse. "Egon" sounds like he is simply dealing with the present reality of working at *$. And the reality of doing it in today's world, where "you should just quit and find another job" is not possible.

[otterinthewater]

@gc

Your spiel is getting boring. It's about the same in every thread. "Customers pay your bills," and/or "get some self-respect," is getting tired. As are your sad attempts at incendiary language.

Time to find another angle, doll.

[spence]

Green Cup, I know you really want Starbucks to be what it used to be. That must be why you keep offering advice. I remember when baristas were animated and amusing to watch.
Reality is: We don't have time. for perfect drinks or conversation.

[Shifty Stupovisor]

Green Cup is a troll. Ignore him and maybe he'll go away.

[milkwhiz]

gc- actually I am working full time and attending graduate school, so I'm not sure what you are getting at with the "pecking order." Also, I think you missed the point of that post. The point is that some customers ARE deliberately rude to baristas to make themselves feel better. Are you one of them? Sure sounds like it!

[justanotherbarista]

@gc,
What you need to understand is that I as a barista get payed to be an actor, act like a give a rats butt about a customer as long as I do that customer will still come and I can cash my check, I don't get payed to care so I can talk mess about them on this site as much as I want and nothing you copy and paste 20 times on here is going to change that by the way I will kill the a holes with kindness and then give them decaf. Also some of us behind the counter are more important than the bitches on welfare that want to feel important by ordering retarted drinks some of us are working and going to school and pumping babies like if there's a population shortage.

[justanotherbarista]

Oos I meant NOT pumping babies like there is a population shortage lol

[intlbarista]

A quick question, I'm now deployed at Starbucks in Switzerland, I wanted to know the recipe for an Iced Espresso Truffle Latte. We have the Premium (what you call "Signature") hot choc. mix in stores, which we mix 1:1 with milk for hot bev's. How does it work for iced drinks? Mix milk and PHC to the first line of the cold cup?

On a side note, the only "unique" drink concoctions or those that I myself suggest coming from the states.. ordering skim milk here is about as much customization that goes on here..

p.s. I don't know about other markets, but here in addition to Soy, there is Lactose Free milk available free of charge.

[Tina]

Barista here in Virginia suck they are rude and don't give a rat's ass. After all it's customer's that pay your wadges.

[dottie]

@gc @tina
Yes and its my taxes and social security that's paying your way, so what's your point?

[James Connolly]

People are rude and don't give a rat's ass probably because they are overworked and underpaid, Tina, and have to worry about hawking garbage products instead of doing the whole customer service thing.

[A Non eMoose]

Ahh, gc has decided to troll...er I mean, grace our presence with another predictable "lol baristas suck and are sucky people" post. How very kind of him to drop in with his valuable input.

[joe]

I LOVE my customers!! The good, bad and ugly!They are what make my day -- everyday. They can be funny, weird, strange, wonderful, friendly, grumpy. They just make the day so fun. And, I truly mean that. I could sit and chat and drink coffee with them all day. But, alas, I have other work to get done.......
between my customers.

[usorthem3]

I love the fact that I can pick out a @green_cup post from the first line before I even scroll down the page. LOL

182.5? This is a person that needs to feel like they are special in Starbucks because in their regular life they are noticed by no one. Sounds like 200 degree Diane, ha ha ha Right @CamSpi ?

[Allen]

Does anyone know if Qasa can visit us on the weekends? Or how late in the evening they can come?

[Longo]

I've been a barista for over a year now and I still don't understand something that goes on all of the time at my store. Partners constantly use short cuts while making the drinks; in other words, putting milk in first, shots in last because it "saves time," not using the tea shaker because it's "not necessary," making two or more of the new Frappucinos in the same blender even though it's not supposed to be done that way. The SM has told everyone repeatedly about these things, yet when the SM isn't looking/there, it's going on constantly. New partners see SS's doing it, etc. Why is this okay?

[AB]

I go to Starbucks on a daily basis. I don't flirt (not single) but I am friendly and ask the baristas how they're doing, how's school, their dog, or whatever other not-too-personal information I know about them. We have a short conversation when there's no one behind me and 9 times out of 10, they don't charge me for my drink. My money just goes into the tip jar anyway, but I'm sure they could get in trouble if the boss is around. They like me because I'm genuinely nice to them.

I'm not going to stop just because one guy wants to be treated like he's working an assembly line and wants to be ignored.

[randombarista]

Alan- QASA can indeed visit on the weekends. They can also come later in the day. I have been present when they came after 5. I don't know what the cutoff is though.

My store got a very high score. We are going to be re-audited BECAUSE we got a high score. You can't win.

[I.Heart.Spirit.]

I think this list is very pretentious. There are far more things that actually slightly bother me, but then I remember... It's just coffee.

And I find it humourous that @gc sees all baristas as peasants that have no aspiration or desire to make their lives better. I don't know how you started your life out, but I've been an independent person all my life. I do apologize to YOU that I need to have a job that is 'beneath you' to make ends me while I attend school to better my life.

[Jo]

@ frappuccinist, Why don't you go to McDonalds? They will get your disgusting dessert disguised as coffee right. Barista's at Starbucks really don't care and most likely despise you and your fatty drink.

[Erik]

Actually, I have been cheered a little by the positive attitude of the baristas at the two Starbucks I frequent on those "I really did not want to get out of bed today" days. Only one or two are annoying (chatting instead of working), but hey, we all have those types at our work, no?

I was surprised that a) Starbuck's workers are Target employees at in store Starbuck's, and b) that I was not allowed to tip. maybe that was a non-sequitor, but I ran into this last week.

And those who want to come down on baristas for complaining: come one now. Kettle, meet pot. You have never complained about your job? I have, and I actually, for the most part, love my job. It is what I wanted to do and what I went to school for. And yet, there are those little things I find annoying. Egon is a bit extreme, but hey, make a barista's job a little more easier and pleasant and maybe someone will make your job a little easier and pleasant. Karma.