Starbucks Gossip

Shape magazine is looking for Starbucks baristas who have served coffee to celebrities

SHAPE magazine writer Kristen Aldridge sends this email:

"I'm working on a story right now called "Celebrities and their Favorite Starbucks Drinks". I'm trying to contact current and former baristas to get information on what celebrities like to order at Starbucks.

"Are you a current or former Barista who has served coffee to the stars? Let us know the details! Article will appear next month on SHAPE.com."

Contact Kristen at [email protected]

* Earlier: Which celebrities have you spotted at Starbucks?

Chicago Tribune columnist wonders why you need a gun while enjoying coffee at Starbucks

* Why do you need a gun to go to Starbucks?

"15 Things You Didn't Know About Starbucks" (Oh yes we did!)

Sorry, BuzzFeed, but we knew about many of these things!

It's no surprise that Chantico is the company's biggest flop; that was well-documented on this website.

Starbucks owns Teavana? Yup.

* 15 Things You Didn't Know About Starbucks

Starbucks is now asking customers to leave their guns at home

"Today we are respectfully requesting that customers no longer bring firearms into our stores or outdoor seating areas—even in states where "open carry" is permitted -- unless they are authorized law enforcement personnel."

Starbucks, which previously allowed open carry of guns in its stores where open carry is permitted, is now asking customers to leave their weapons at home.

"The presence of a weapon in our stores is unsettling and upsetting for many of our customers," says CEO Howard Schultz.

Starbucks won't issue an outright ban on guns, says Schultz, because enforcing that "would potentially require our partners to confront armed customers. ....We're hoping that most people will honor the request."

Even if gun-carrying customers refuse the request, says Schultz, "we'll serve them with a smile and not confront them."

* Starbucks CEO says guns not welcome in stores

* Watch Wall Street Journal's Starbucks reporter discuss the gun issue [VIDEO]

Howard Schultz's second home is on Fifth Avenue in New York (how are your housing arrangements?)

From the New York Times:

* Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz lives at 950 Fifth Avenue in NYC -- a vertical bastion of billionaires with just seven residences
* From 2007: Howard Schultz pays $25 million to $30 million for a Fifth Avenue apartment

The coolest Starbucks on the planet is in New Delhi

Rafat Ali writes after visiting the recently opened (March, 2013) Starbucks store in New Dehli: "For someone used the the skeezy and icky New York Starbucks stores, the cleanliness of this is astounding, to say the least. One of the photos I couldn’t take was of the the restrooms, where there was a male and female attendant each, akin to what you would see in upscale hotels."

Check out his 23 photos here.

Open letter to Howard Schultz about launching a Starbucks Book Club

Click on the letter for a larger view

* Starbucks Book Club pitch

Starbucks barista says he was fired for eating a sandwich that had been thrown away

Coulson Loptmann, 21, says he was fired from Seattle Starbucks for eating an "expired" plastic-wrap sandwich that had been tossed into the dumpster. "I hadn't eaten all day and I was on a seven-hour shift," he says.

Loptmann (on the right) was later told by his boss that what he did was considered stealing, "so I’m sorry, but I have to terminate you." A Starbucks spokesman won't discuss Loptmann's case, but says “it is a violation of our policy to consume marked-out products."

Loptmann, who collected food stamps because he couldn't make ends meet at SBUX, says: "I understand completely they don’t want someone to mark something out just to eat it. I didn’t mark it out, someone else did."

* Starbucks fires a barista for eating a sandwich from the garbage