Stephanie Fierman - Marketing Observations Grown Daily

Starbucks Is Not Listening To Stephanie Fierman

Monday July 28th 2008, 4:05 am
Filed under: stephanie fierman

So this is my fourth post on Starbucks. And now I realize that even my very first post – in which I defended the company for proposing a new line of kids’ products - was about the company losing focus!

Since then, I’ve gone on to write twice more about how badly the company has wandered off course. Howard Schultz issued a big mea-culpa and returned as CEO. In April, he vowed that the company would restore its focus on coffee and jettison distractions like the uber-smelly egg selections at breakfast. In June, he announced that the company was closing down its music business. Good. Coffee and service, coffee and service. Even if you want to bring in some new products, you need to restore our faith in, well, coffee and service.

One month later, the company has reversed its decision on killing the eggy entries (a new recipe will supposedly kill the stink), even though they generate only 3% of sales, and has launched yet another I’m-on-another-planet creation: smoothies* (which are already getting lousy reviews). The company is also closing 600 stores.

So in a recession, when a $4 cup of coffee has to fight extra-hard to survive, Starbucks is keeping an old distraction, starting a new one and putting even more pressure on the employees who remain after the company’s worse blood-letting ever? What’s next?GAH! I’m not saying don’t ever experiment again, but is there anything in the last 18 months that suggests that now is the time?

This is truly a case where I wouldn’t be ranting if I didn’t care. eHarmony is running a TV commercial in which one of its new brides says of her new husband, ”It’s easy to love Lee.”

Well, it’s getting really hard to love Starbucks.

P.S. I need amusement when I’m away from NYC for too long, so I tried a banana chocolate Vivanno last week. No-go. I recall that Schultz provided an oblique reference to the pending launch in the profile Portfolio did in its July issue. He enthused about the incredible-tasting fruit blend from Italy – which makes perfect sense because the nicest thing I would say about the drink is that it has a somewhat sophisticated, unsweet taste that will never make it in the U.S.