# Resolved: Starbucks Coffee is Bad **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Tags:** coffee\ **Created:** [January 5, 2017, 12:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-starbucks-coffee-is-bad/776357 "2017-01-05T00:51:20Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![Enright3](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/enright3/32/2897_2.png) [@Enright3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Enright3)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2017, 3:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-starbucks-coffee-is-bad/776357/81 "2017-01-06T15:37:47Z")
To those of you who say Starbucks tastes burnt, I wonder if you’ve ever actually had burnt coffee. Go to a truck stop or convenience store sometime and try it. You’ll see a difference. That being said, I don’t care much for Starbucks coffee as it doesn’t have a good flavor. It’s frequently bitter but has never yet been undrinkable. If given the choice of Dunkin Donuts or McDonalds Café coffee or Starbucks, then Starbucks would be dead last every time. ---
**Author:** ![AncientHumanoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ancienthumanoid/32/278_2.png) [@AncientHumanoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AncientHumanoid)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2017, 3:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-starbucks-coffee-is-bad/776357/82 "2017-01-06T15:44:42Z")
[insert coffee joke set up] COVERED IN BEES!!! [receive criticism from doubling down Dopers on both sides of the issue] ---
**Author:** ![tnetennba](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7993a0/32.png) [@tnetennba](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tnetennba)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2017, 4:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-starbucks-coffee-is-bad/776357/83 "2017-01-06T16:28:41Z")
> [@Czarcasm](#): > > This flies in the face of my personal observations I have observed many times that anecdotal evidence is unreliable. ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2017, 4:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-starbucks-coffee-is-bad/776357/84 "2017-01-06T16:43:11Z")
> [@tnetennba](#): > > I have observed many times that anecdotal evidence is unreliable. If you’ve observed it, it must be true! > [@aceplace57](#): > > The Starbucks beans they sell at the grocery store makes very good coffee. > > But I prefer Dunkin’coffee. I have a bag in the kitchen right now. I think it’s much better than Starbucks. I hear people raving about Dunkin’ Donuts coffee, and I don’t get that. I think it’s AWFUL. Every bit I’ve had, whether from their grocery store stuff brewed at home or in their shop, has tasted almost undrinkably sour and astringent to me. It’s thoroughly unpleasant coffee, much worse than Folger’s and the like. I’ll often buy Pike Place to brew at home if it’s on sale; it’s not great, but on sale it strikes a sweet spot between affordable and tasty. I don’t mind a Starbucks when I’m on the road, or at a schmancy grocery store and I need some caffeine. It’s nowhere near what a good cup of coffee tastes like when brewed by some coffee fiend, but it does the trick. ---
**Author:** ![Pabitel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/bbce88/32.png) [@Pabitel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pabitel)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2017, 5:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-starbucks-coffee-is-bad/776357/85 "2017-01-06T17:20:06Z")
Starbucks is the Godiva Chocolates of coffee. If you don’t know the story of Godiva Chocolates, they were a maker of cheap, crappy chocolates back int he early 90s. They didn’t want to go out of business so someone had the bright idea of turning the company into a “luxury” chocolatier. To do this they didn’t improve their ingredients. They didn’t improve their processing. No, they took the same crappy product and used fancy molds to shape it and put it in a gold box. Now you can go to the mall and pay $15 for 3.4 oz of crappy product. That’s about the same quantity and quality as a king sized candy bar you can grab at the 7/11. Why is this possible? It’s the incredible gullibility of the American public. This is also exactly what skyrocketed Starbucks to its present status. Just like Godiva, Starbucks buys the cheapest, shittiest ingredients, puts it in their own “golden box” and charges an arm and a leg for them. It’s a great business model if you can pull it off. You can get people so intoxicated with the cachet of the brand that they will eat and drink shit and then go out proclaim its virtues to the world. ---
**Author:** ![bump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7c8e57/32.png) [@bump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bump)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2017, 5:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-starbucks-coffee-is-bad/776357/86 "2017-01-06T17:26:37Z")
> [@Qadgop\_the\_Mercotan](#): > > I love my espresso without additives, and I find their product undrinkable. Burnt, bitter, no crema, completely lacking in those elements that make espresso worth drinking in the first place. And knowing they use this basically undrinkable espresso as the basis for many of their other beverages makes me avoid them like the plague. > > I will admit I’ll drink a regular cup of coffee from them (adding a little creamer and maybe some sweetener on my own) and I can’t find anything to really complain about there. But a coffee specialty shop that can’t produce a decent espresso (and so very many chains can’t) is anathema to me. ☹ Their espresso is awful. Full stop. Having had more than my share in Italy and a bunch of better (than Starbucks) restaurants and coffee shops, I feel like I can safely say that. And their blonde roasts are actually decent, but the rest is terrible. All I can say is that if their medium roasts are your idea of “good”, there’s a better than even chance you haven’t really had “good” medium roast coffee. Order a bag of [this coffee](http://noblecoyotecoffee.com/collections/everything/products/cafe-momentum-blend), or coffee [from these guys](http://www.cuveecoffee.com/coffee/), or[from here](https://www.stumptowncoffee.com/) and then drink Starbucks and see what you think. ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2017, 5:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-starbucks-coffee-is-bad/776357/87 "2017-01-06T17:40:56Z")
> [@Quimby](#): > > FWIW I didn’t say it was the worst ever, just consistently bad. How it got to be so popular and successful is a good question since it isn’t the taste of the coffee. Although I suppose it could have been better when it was a smaller chain. Understood, I was responding to the thread in general (others did, I think, describe it as the worst ever). I guess that might have been hyperbole, but I think sometimes it’s just that people take excessive pride in being particular over a thing that really, probably doesn’t deserve that much emotion. ---
**Author:** ![running\_coach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/running_coach/32/15836_2.png) [@running\_coach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/running_coach)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2017, 5:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-starbucks-coffee-is-bad/776357/88 "2017-01-06T17:41:48Z")
> [@Pabitel](#): > > Starbucks is the Godiva Chocolates of coffee. > > If you don’t know the story of Godiva Chocolates, they were a maker of cheap, crappy chocolates back int he early 90s. They didn’t want to go out of business so someone had the bright idea of turning the company into a “luxury” chocolatier. Actually, the company started in the 1920s. More likely, they were at one time a maker of fine chocolate who cheaped it out decades later. ---
**Author:** ![D\_Odds](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/d_odds/32/2882_2.png) [@D\_Odds](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/D_Odds)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2017, 5:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-starbucks-coffee-is-bad/776357/89 "2017-01-06T17:43:44Z")
> [@Enright3](#): > > That being said, I don’t care much for Starbucks coffee as it doesn’t have a good flavor. It’s frequently bitter but has never yet been undrinkable. If given the choice of Dunkin Donuts or McDonalds Café coffee or Starbucks, then Starbucks would be dead last every time. While I appreciate their convenience, I find DD and SB coffee to be drinkable but equally mediocre (at best) in opposite directions. McD is somewhere in-between, better than both. Deli coffee is usually bad to even worse, but sometimes one can be surprised by a decent cup of joe. Street vendor coffee is universally bad. Panera and Au Bon Pain are better coffees, though not always as convenient. Sadly, my best local bagel place has undrinkable coffee. I’d say they shouldn’t waste the water, but it is obvious that they are recycling the dishwater and also the used coffee grounds from the DD across the street, so props for going green. I definitely have noticed the difference in SB beans. It is better now than before, but still has significant room for improvement. ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2017, 5:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-starbucks-coffee-is-bad/776357/90 "2017-01-06T17:50:09Z")
> [@running\_coach](#): > > Actually, the company started in the 1920s. More likely, they were at one time a maker of fine chocolate who cheaped it out decades later. Godiva has always been a quality chocolate product. I doubt it was “cheap, crappy chocolates in the early 90’s” when they opened their first boutique shop on Fifth Avenue back in 1972. What is your source of information, **Pábitel**? ---
**Author:** ![pulykamell](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pulykamell/32/3166_2.png) [@pulykamell](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pulykamell)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2017, 5:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-starbucks-coffee-is-bad/776357/91 "2017-01-06T17:51:25Z")
> [@bump](#): > > T All I can say is that if their medium roasts are your idea of “good”, there’s a better than even chance you haven’t really had “good” medium roast coffee. They’re serviceable. I’m not sure the word “good” was used above (I don’t see it), but it’s fine. And, yes, I’ve had Stumptown coffee, and Intelligentsia, and La Colombe, and from smaller, independent roasters here in the Chicago area (plus I worked for a couple years at an independent coffeehouse, as mentioned above. I liked our medium roast blend the best of all of these but, alas, Casteel Coffee roasters are no more.) ---
**Author:** ![bump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7c8e57/32.png) [@bump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bump)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2017, 7:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-starbucks-coffee-is-bad/776357/92 "2017-01-06T19:35:20Z")
> [@pulykamell](#): > > They’re serviceable. I’m not sure the word “good” was used above (I don’t see it), but it’s fine. And, yes, I’ve had Stumptown coffee, and Intelligentsia, and La Colombe, and from smaller, independent roasters here in the Chicago area (plus I worked for a couple years at an independent coffeehouse, as mentioned above. I liked our medium roast blend the best of all of these but, alas, Casteel Coffee roasters are no more.) Fair enough; Starbucks is definitely a step above gas station coffee, the free stuff at jury duty, most restaurant coffee, etc… And I suppose that’s part of their strategy- they’re a cut above the standard, and well nigh ubiquitous, so that in many places, they ARE the best coffee available. But to some people, that gets conflated into being something truly of premium quality or something like that, which is not at all true. They’re a decidedly middle of the road outfit in terms of the actual coffee that they brew, but because of ignorance or geographic reasons, they’re often perceived as being more premium than they are. I also have a suspicion that their standard coffee is so burnt tasting and funky in order to still provide perceptible coffee flavors above all the milk, cream, syrup and flavorings, while something less acrid and funky would probably be entirely overwhelmed. If that’s the case, it makes sense that a plain cup of the stuff might be less than ideal for outright drinking, and why their light roast is actually pretty decent stuff for plain drinking. ---
**Author:** ![Bijou\_Drains](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bijou_drains/32/2814_2.png) [@Bijou\_Drains](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bijou_Drains)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2017, 8:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-starbucks-coffee-is-bad/776357/93 "2017-01-06T20:26:25Z")
I saw a documentary that said starbucks helped to make 2 big changes to coffee in America: They use Arabica beans rather than robusta They don’t percolate coffee which is burning it I know when I was a kid 40 years ago all coffee was horrible. Now I can drink it from time to time. I still prefer tea. ---
**Author:** ![RickJay](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bb73d2/32.png) [@RickJay](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RickJay)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2017, 8:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-starbucks-coffee-is-bad/776357/94 "2017-01-06T20:36:36Z")
When I had my first Starbucks I just assumed something was wrong with it. ---
**Author:** ![Bijou\_Drains](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bijou_drains/32/2814_2.png) [@Bijou\_Drains](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bijou_Drains)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2017, 8:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-starbucks-coffee-is-bad/776357/95 "2017-01-06T20:40:10Z")
most of the times places with thousands of locations are not considered to be high end places. I don’t see Mercedes or Rolls Royce dealers on every corner for example. ---
**Author:** ![bump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7c8e57/32.png) [@bump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bump)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2017, 9:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-starbucks-coffee-is-bad/776357/96 "2017-01-06T21:19:06Z")
> [@Bijou\_Drains](#): > > most of the times places with thousands of locations are not considered to be high end places. I don’t see Mercedes or Rolls Royce dealers on every corner for example. True, but I think we have a situation where if you’re at the bottom, there’s nowhere to go but up. and unless you’re in a position to actually buy premium craft-roasted coffee, or go to a coffee shop or restaurant where it’s served, you may not even know it exists. To you, Starbucks IS the highest end place you’re realistically aware of. I mean, you may intellectually know that there are high-end coffee shops, but not live near one, or know where one is, or anything like that. Even your post shows some of that- Mercedes Benz and Rolls Royce aren’t even in the same league with each other in terms of exclusiveness, but you’re lumping them together like they are. If all you have is the cheap-ass coffee at the local gas station or at work, then Starbucks is a big improvement, especially if there’s not an even better option conveniently nearby. ---
**Author:** ![running\_coach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/running_coach/32/15836_2.png) [@running\_coach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/running_coach)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2017, 9:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-starbucks-coffee-is-bad/776357/97 "2017-01-06T21:22:20Z")
> [@Bijou\_Drains](#): > > most of the times places with thousands of locations are not considered to be high end places. I don’t see Mercedes or Rolls Royce dealers on every corner for example. That just shows you don’t live in the ( haughty sniff) _right_ places. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![AncientHumanoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ancienthumanoid/32/278_2.png) [@AncientHumanoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AncientHumanoid)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2017, 10:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-starbucks-coffee-is-bad/776357/98 "2017-01-06T22:31:29Z")
It’s not uncommon to see MB work trucks, ferkricesakes! The unpretentiousness of the brand is not unlooked for when seen around nonrich areas in which certain unnamed nonwhite-collar workers may travel… It’s all marketing, man! Buy my book and I’ll explain it to you. Damn, now I want a RR pickup truck! [sips my jamoke…] ---
**Author:** ![DrCube](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/a3d4f5/32.png) [@DrCube](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrCube)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2017, 10:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-starbucks-coffee-is-bad/776357/99 "2017-01-06T22:33:12Z")
> [@Enright3](#): > > To those of you who say Starbucks tastes burnt, I wonder if you’ve ever actually had burnt coffee. Go to a truck stop or convenience store sometime and try it. You’ll see a difference. Of course. I think you’re misunderstanding what people are complaining about here. Starbucks _roasts their beans_ too long, they _don’t_ set their already-brewed coffee on a hotplate for four hours like a truck stop. ---
**Author:** ![pulykamell](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pulykamell/32/3166_2.png) [@pulykamell](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pulykamell)\ **Post date:** [January 6, 2017, 11:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-starbucks-coffee-is-bad/776357/100 "2017-01-06T23:09:39Z")
If they were perceived as a premium product, that perception, in my opinion, is long gone. I mean, they’re in Targets, for Og’s sake. Reasonable middle-of-the-road coffee is about right. I alternate between Starbucks and Dunkin Donuts for that level of coffee, and I can’t quite decide which I prefer. I want to think that I like Dunkin Donuts better, but I think I prefer Starbucks. I need to do them side by side one of these days, as they’re right across the street from each other. The only complaint I really have about either of these is that they’re pretty bland middle-of-the-road coffees. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-starbucks-coffee-is-bad/776357.md?page=4) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/resolved-starbucks-coffee-is-bad/776357.md?page=6)