# Jaded blue-collar coffee anti-elitism rears its ugly head **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [February 1, 2007, 12:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jaded-blue-collar-coffee-anti-elitism-rears-its-ugly-head/390404 "2007-02-01T12:46:56Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![tdn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/94ad74/32.png) [@tdn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tdn)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2007, 4:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jaded-blue-collar-coffee-anti-elitism-rears-its-ugly-head/390404/41 "2007-02-01T16:04:26Z")
[QUOTE=Sublight] Well aren’t you just special. [/QUOTE] Huh? ---
**Author:** ![tdn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/94ad74/32.png) [@tdn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tdn)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2007, 4:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jaded-blue-collar-coffee-anti-elitism-rears-its-ugly-head/390404/42 "2007-02-01T16:19:33Z")
[QUOTE=DiosaBellissima] Isn’t a tall (small) cup of regular coffee like a dollar fifty at Starbucks? If you want some crazy espresso drink the price is going to go up, but not much. I regularly get tall mochas and that runs me a little under $3- like $2.75, I want to say. Hell, a big, huge “vanilla iced tea thing” shouldn’t run you more than $4. Dude, stop going to Starbucks in airports. $5.72? 😃😛 . [/QUOTE] As for the price of a tall small coffee, who the fuck cares? I normally don’t drink coffee, and when I do, I don’t go to Starbucks if I can help it. The vanilla iced tea thing is $2.65, as it turns out. (For a tall. Which I think they don’t have at the place I usually get them.\*) A totally outrageous price for that creamy, dreamy, delicious, _drool_. And I was hyperbolizing with that $5.72. It’s really $5.71. Happy now? 😉 \*I never go into Starbucks, and yet I have a regular place? What’s up with the contradiction? Patience, my sweet. I shall tell you. For several years my GF and I went to a particular beach every week. She would drive. There was a Starbucks drivethrough on the way back. She insisted on going there every time. I could have stuck to my principles and refused to go, asking that she drop me off in at the corner while she drove through. Or I could have stayed in the car, kept my mouth shut, and looked at the menu to see if anything ticked my fancy. Guess which one I did? ---
**Author:** ![TLDRIDKJKLOLFTW](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/51bf81/32.png) [@TLDRIDKJKLOLFTW](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TLDRIDKJKLOLFTW)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2007, 4:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jaded-blue-collar-coffee-anti-elitism-rears-its-ugly-head/390404/43 "2007-02-01T16:20:49Z")
[QUOTE=tdn] The only times I ever go into a Starbucks is when I go with someone else. I’m not exactly dragged in against my will, but I go in because of friendship, not because I want to spend $5.72 on burnt-tasting “tall” smalls. I never make a scene, but I do sort of resent the pretentiousness of it all. [/QUOTE] There is not a single drink on the Starbucks menu that runs $5.72 for a tall. To the OP, I worked in a coffee shop for the past year and I dealt with this sort of irritating shit every day. I posted my own Pit thread once and was banned for a month as a result. One thing I’ve noticed is that there’s a real classism and hostility around the SDMB toward retail workers; any hint of a complaint and you’ll get dogpiled on like in this thread for what an asshole you are for having the gall to complain. :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![Talon\_Karrde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/c5a1d2/32.png) [@Talon\_Karrde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Talon_Karrde)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2007, 4:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jaded-blue-collar-coffee-anti-elitism-rears-its-ugly-head/390404/44 "2007-02-01T16:21:58Z")
[QUOTE=Waverly] American Coffee, or Coffee Americana, is cappuccino only with hot milk replaced with hot water. In other words, watered down, tasteless drek. Anyway, that is how you make American Coffee. The only other thing you need to do is hum the Star Spangled Banner while you make it and put up a picture of Ronald Reagan behind the counter. [/QUOTE] Only traitors who are ashamed of the words hum it, real Americans sing it loud and as clear as the flag shining through the Dawn’s Early Light. ---
**Author:** ![TLDRIDKJKLOLFTW](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/51bf81/32.png) [@TLDRIDKJKLOLFTW](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TLDRIDKJKLOLFTW)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2007, 4:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jaded-blue-collar-coffee-anti-elitism-rears-its-ugly-head/390404/45 "2007-02-01T16:22:03Z")
[QUOTE=Waverly] American Coffee, or Coffee Americana, is cappuccino only with hot milk replaced with hot water. In other words, watered down, tasteless drek. Anyway, that is how you make American Coffee. The only other thing you need to do is hum the Star Spangled Banner while you make it and put up a picture of Ronald Reagan behind the counter. [/QUOTE] This makes no sense; are you perfhaps referring to the **Americano** , a drink made with **espresso** and hot water? Cappuccino is foamed milk. ---
**Author:** ![tdn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/94ad74/32.png) [@tdn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tdn)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2007, 4:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jaded-blue-collar-coffee-anti-elitism-rears-its-ugly-head/390404/46 "2007-02-01T16:22:41Z")
[QUOTE=VCO3] One thing I’ve noticed is that there’s a real classism and hostility around the SDMB toward retail workers; [/QUOTE] Bullshit. There’s real sympathy for retail workers here. There’s only hostility towards stupidity. ---
**Author:** ![Martiju](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e8c25b/32.png) [@Martiju](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martiju)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2007, 4:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jaded-blue-collar-coffee-anti-elitism-rears-its-ugly-head/390404/47 "2007-02-01T16:27:49Z")
[QUOTE=Waverly] American Coffee, or Coffee Americana, is cappuccino only with hot milk replaced with hot water. In other words, watered down, tasteless drek. Anyway, that is how you make American Coffee. The only other thing you need to do is hum the Star Spangled Banner while you make it and put up a picture of Ronald Reagan behind the counter. [/QUOTE] And for added irony, if you want black coffee that isn’t espresso in France, you normally order a cafe Americain… Which is the only way to drink coffee, by the way! (says the anti-elitist, pro-revolutionary front of Judea) ---
**Author:** ![WOOKINPANUB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wookinpanub/32/132_2.png) [@WOOKINPANUB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WOOKINPANUB)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2007, 4:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jaded-blue-collar-coffee-anti-elitism-rears-its-ugly-head/390404/48 "2007-02-01T16:30:40Z")
[QUOTE=Eonwe] Exactly. The stupidity of the guys actions lie in the following. 1: He was aparently ranting against the business because he foud their menu/atmosphere/clientele pretentious 2: He proceded to purchase his coffee there If it truly bugged him, subjecting the employees of the coffee shop to a sanctimonious mini-sermon is not the appropriate way to indicate he doesn’t like the shop’s business practices. Purchasing your coffee somewhere else is. The guy is taking advantage of a captive audience to make himself feel good about his oh-so important position on the fancy-schmancy coffee people get these days. \*\*I, briefly, was against the ‘gentrification’ of the coffee world. I’d walk into Starbucks and order “medium coffee.” And I was corrected more than once (rather, asked for clarification). \*\* Eventually I just kind of realised that, hey, I should order what’s on the menu, and refusing to say the word “venti” when I go into Starbucks did nothing but make it take longer to get what I wanted, and that the only point I was making was that I was either too cool or too stupid to actually order what they offered. It’s just like when folks choose to mispronounce or forget the names of politicians who they don’t like. It’s a little way to get a jab in under the guise of the subject being not worth the consideration of actually having his name remembered. [/QUOTE] I’m with you except for the part I bolded. Are there more than three sizes? Because if not, medium is pretty much universal for the size in between the biggest and the smallest. I’ve been to Starbucks probably three times in my life and don’t know or care to know the vernacular. I wouldn’t dream of being an ass like the Cranky Old Man in the OP, but I don’t think it’s unreasonable to say “I’d like a medium coffee” and expect the server (excuse me, _barista_) to know what size I’m referring to. Perhaps I don’t circulate with the “right crowd”, but I don’t know anyone who doesn’t find Starbuck’s menu / ordering process pretentious and ridiculous. ---
**Author:** ![Uvula\_Donor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/e19adc/32.png) [@Uvula\_Donor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Uvula_Donor)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2007, 4:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jaded-blue-collar-coffee-anti-elitism-rears-its-ugly-head/390404/49 "2007-02-01T16:31:38Z")
[QUOTE=CanvasShoes] Folgers, gag! [/QUOTE] But Folger’s has the best advertising slogan ever: “Mount ‘n’ groan!” ---
**Author:** ![Antigen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/848f3c/32.png) [@Antigen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Antigen)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2007, 4:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jaded-blue-collar-coffee-anti-elitism-rears-its-ugly-head/390404/50 "2007-02-01T16:33:17Z")
[QUOTE=Sean Factotum] I have never had a barista correct me when I ask for “a coffee, black, small/medium/large.” Do you correct those people too, or was it just this guy? [/QUOTE] I’ve had them correct me on occasion. It’s annoying. Large means the cup you have that holds the largest amount of liquid, whatever name you call it. It doesn’t happen very often, but I can’t help but get a little snarky with the girl who corrects me with “you mean venti”, especially the one who gave me the “you’re a moron” look with it. But yeah, the guy in the OP who started ranting about good ol’ American coffee would have had me straining not to roll my eyes at him. Just order a black coffee. The world will keep turning. ---
**Author:** ![Kid\_A\_1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ed8c4c/32.png) [@Kid\_A\_1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kid_A_1)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2007, 4:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jaded-blue-collar-coffee-anti-elitism-rears-its-ugly-head/390404/51 "2007-02-01T16:34:59Z")
[QUOTE=WOOKINPANUB] I’m with you except for the part I bolded. Are there more than three sizes? Because if not, medium is pretty much universal for the size in between the biggest and the smallest. [/QUOTE] There are actually four sizes. The three that you see on the menu and the mysterious “short”, which is the size of a normal “small” coffee. They don’t advertise it but they will sell you a “short” if you ask for it. ---
**Author:** ![Eonwe](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eonwe/32/240_2.png) [@Eonwe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eonwe)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2007, 4:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jaded-blue-collar-coffee-anti-elitism-rears-its-ugly-head/390404/52 "2007-02-01T16:42:21Z")
[QUOTE=WOOKINPANUB] I’m with you except for the part I bolded. Are there more than three sizes? Because if not, medium is pretty much universal for the size in between the biggest and the smallest. I’ve been to Starbucks probably three times in my life and don’t know or care to know the vernacular. I wouldn’t dream of being an ass like the Cranky Old Man in the OP, but I don’t think it’s unreasonable to say “I’d like a medium coffee” and expect the server (excuse me, _barista_) to know what size I’m referring to. Perhaps I don’t circulate with the “right crowd”, but I don’t know anyone who doesn’t find Starbuck’s menu / ordering process pretentious and ridiculous. [/QUOTE] No, I’m with you. But, I’m sure this scenario has played out many times: Customer: “I’d like a small/medium/large coffee” Server: “Here go you,” and hands customer a tall/grande/venti Customer (whose coffee is probably larger than expected, particularly in the early days of Starbucks when people weren’t used to jumbo coffees): “This isn’t what I asked for. I wanted Small!” Server: “Well, um, this is tall, which is the same thing.” Customer: “I asked for small. Not this.” So, I think that clarification is necessary, particularly for new customers. So many people have notions of what a small/medium/large should be, that getting the customer to order specifically the sizes as posted helps to prevent frustration in the long run. ---
**Author:** ![dropzone](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dropzone/32/7515_2.png) [@dropzone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dropzone)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2007, 4:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jaded-blue-collar-coffee-anti-elitism-rears-its-ugly-head/390404/53 "2007-02-01T16:42:53Z")
[QUOTE=VCO3] One thing I’ve noticed is that there’s a real classism and hostility around the SDMB toward retail workers; any hint of a complaint and you’ll get dogpiled on like in this thread for what an asshole you are for having the gall to complain. :rolleyes: [/QUOTE] Not classism, just a memory of when WE worked retail and had to put up with the same or more shit that you younguns bitch about. Sure, we bitched, too, but not on the internet (mostly because it wasn’t around back then) and certainly not publicly. We all thought our customers were jerks, too, but are older with a better understanding of of why they behaved like jerks and sympathy for the ones who were long-suffering, though we know that some of them were just jerks. And in some cases we resent being treated like jerks by some asshole in an apron who thinks he’s oh-so-very-clever, like the OP. If I were his manager and overheard him mouth off to a customer like that he’d be fired on the spot in front of the customer he insulted. And Starbucks is the most stupidly pretentious place this side of a French restaurant. ---
**Author:** ![Waverly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/57b2e6/32.png) [@Waverly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Waverly)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2007, 4:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jaded-blue-collar-coffee-anti-elitism-rears-its-ugly-head/390404/54 "2007-02-01T16:46:38Z")
[QUOTE=VCO3] This makes no sense; are you perfhaps referring to the **Americano** , a drink made with **espresso** and hot water? Cappuccino is foamed milk. [/QUOTE] No, what I’m referring to is the “American Style” coffee you get overseas. Coffee Americana, Coffee Americano… I think I’ve seen it both ways. In all cases, it is the tasty local coffee made undrinkable by cutting it by a third or a half with hot water. Seriously. I plan to market it in the US as Freedom Coffee™. Do not violate my trademark! ---
**Author:** ![saoirse](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/5daacb/32.png) [@saoirse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/saoirse)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2007, 4:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jaded-blue-collar-coffee-anti-elitism-rears-its-ugly-head/390404/55 "2007-02-01T16:47:50Z")
I think **fetus** is right to bitch. He got a guy who acted like an idiot, and didn’t get to unload on him at the time, so he’s following up here. While he should be thankful he’s not getting stabbed by a semen-covered psycho, I think was customer was annoying nough for a pit thread. I also used to do a variation on “coffee-flavored coffee,” which is at least ten, and probably 15 years old now, but I’ve switch to asking the server “Workin’ hard, or hardly workin’.” I don’t like Starbucks coffee that much. I get coffee at Dunkin’ Donuts, usually, or a little cafe near me whoen I feel like splurging. If someone tool me to Starbucks, and it was relly bothering me, I’d rant at the person who brought me. That’s the person who is there by choice. ---
**Author:** ![pizzabrat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/e9c0ed/32.png) [@pizzabrat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pizzabrat)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2007, 4:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jaded-blue-collar-coffee-anti-elitism-rears-its-ugly-head/390404/56 "2007-02-01T16:51:54Z")
[QUOTE=Eonwe] No, I’m with you. But, I’m sure this scenario has played out many times: Customer: “I’d like a small/medium/large coffee” Server: “Here go you,” and hands customer a tall/grande/venti Customer (whose coffee is probably larger than expected, particularly in the early days of Starbucks when people weren’t used to jumbo coffees): “This isn’t what I asked for. I wanted Small!” Server: “Well, um, this is tall, which is the same thing.” Customer: “I asked for small. Not this.” [/QUOTE] Uh, and I’m sure it hasn’t. People don’t think of “small” drinks as being a universal standard size, we know it just means the smallest of three size choices. ---
**Author:** ![dropzone](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dropzone/32/7515_2.png) [@dropzone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dropzone)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2007, 4:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jaded-blue-collar-coffee-anti-elitism-rears-its-ugly-head/390404/57 "2007-02-01T16:54:31Z")
[QUOTE=pizzabrat] Uh, and I’m sure it hasn’t. People don’t think of “small” drinks as being a universal standard size, we know it just means the smallest of three size choices. [/QUOTE] I’m sure it HAS happened, but only up to the point where the customer says, “Really? So THAT’S why a ‘small’ costs so much.” ---
**Author:** ![Uvula\_Donor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/e19adc/32.png) [@Uvula\_Donor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Uvula_Donor)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2007, 4:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jaded-blue-collar-coffee-anti-elitism-rears-its-ugly-head/390404/58 "2007-02-01T16:56:44Z")
> [@VCO3](#): > > To the OP, I worked in a coffee shop for the past year and I dealt with this sort of irritating shit every day. I posted my own Pit thread once and was banned for a month as a result. You mean [in this thread](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=347729) where you started out in your OP telling everyone we’d better be nice to you or you’d fuck with our coffee? > [@VCO3 in the linked thread](#): > > Fortunately, I have absolutely no qualms about exacting swift and immediate revenge when I go to make their drinks. When you treat me (or my coworkers) like garbage at the register, you forget that we have complete control over what does or doesn’t go into your drink. You were \*suspended \*(not banned) for being a troll and a fucking dick in that three-page trainwreck, not for complaining. [QUOTE=VCO3] One thing I’ve noticed is that there’s a real classism and hostility around the SDMB toward retail workers; any hint of a complaint and you’ll get dogpiled on like in this thread for what an asshole you are for having the gall to complain. :rolleyes: [/QUOTE] Oh, like in [this other thread](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=402899) where you call everyone who doesn’t stay at home on holidays an asshole? You pretty much had your ass handed to you by the poor suffering proles you were so gallantly trying to defend. OPs get piled on for being belligerently stupid, not because of any classism or elitism. If you could look past your own elitism, you’d see that. ---
**Author:** ![jacquilynne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/67e7ee/32.png) [@jacquilynne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jacquilynne)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2007, 5:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jaded-blue-collar-coffee-anti-elitism-rears-its-ugly-head/390404/59 "2007-02-01T17:03:24Z")
[QUOTE=Kid\_A] There are actually four sizes. The three that you see on the menu and the mysterious “short”, which is the size of a normal “small” coffee. They don’t advertise it but they will sell you a “short” if you ask for it. [/QUOTE] Not always. I tried to get my Dad ‘a short of whatever your lightest roast brewed coffee is’ at Starbucks in Mandalay Bay on the weekend and they said they didn’t have short. So I got him a ‘small cup of whatever your lightest roast brewed coffee is’ instead. Presumably that was a ‘tall’. But I don’t drink coffee, so I don’t feel compelled to learn Starbucks nomenclature - I’d just read about the ‘short’ as a way to get a smaller than usual cup of coffee somewhere else, and thought I’d try it. ---
**Author:** ![Bibliovore](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7ba0ec/32.png) [@Bibliovore](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bibliovore)\ **Post date:** [February 1, 2007, 5:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jaded-blue-collar-coffee-anti-elitism-rears-its-ugly-head/390404/60 "2007-02-01T17:06:41Z")
The customer was annoying for complaining about something that the OP had no control over. The OP can feel free to vent all he like but should realise that the customer’s behaviour was barely worth of a Pit thread, if that. People who complain about the way Starbucks names it’s sizes should really learn to flex those brain cells a bit harder. I mean come \*on \* - how hard can it be to figure out which is their smallest drink and which is their largest? WTF does it \*matter \* what they call their sizes - they could call them “Flimple”, “Poofly” and "Funbung"and anyone with a pulse should be able to order without any trouble. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jaded-blue-collar-coffee-anti-elitism-rears-its-ugly-head/390404.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/jaded-blue-collar-coffee-anti-elitism-rears-its-ugly-head/390404.md?page=4)