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| - Ever since Caribou Coffee closed on East Blvd, getting into Starbucks has been a nightmare. I used to stop there every Saturday for a drink, perhaps lunch, too. Then they stopped carrying their food items when they took on La Boulange items (French for "tastes like cardboard," I think). After that, I took it upon myself to never buy food again at Starbucks until they came to their senses and got rid of La Boulange. So now any time I stop, it's JUST for drinks. Which in itself can be a nightmare.
This past Saturday, I visited Starbucks on East Blvd for an iced coffee. I took the only parking spot that was left in their bumpy, pothole-y, limited-space parking lot. I was happy to see that the line to order was incredibly short and quickly placed my order. What I didn't notice was the throng of people surrounding the other end of the counter, waiting for their drinks. While the SB employees appeared to be working very quickly, the demand was more than they could reasonably handle and produce. (Hey, SB managers -- how about scheduling more employees for one of the busiest times of the day?)
While waiting for almost 10 minutes for my simple, basic iced coffee (pouring it from a pitcher into a cup), I looked around the establishment. They've recently renovated (again) and, if it's possible, there is even less seating to meet the demand of the number of people that frequent this particular restaurant. For one thing, there are fewer individual tables. For another, there aren't enough chairs to even accommodate those tables. There were empty tables with no chairs around them! They've also gone with the space-hogging long community tables, like anyone who goes to SB with a book, laptop, friend, etc. wants to sit closely with another party. One thing that used to make SB great was the intimacy it provided for its patrons. I guess that's out the refurbished window. The drink delay also gave me a chance to get a really good look at the cleanliness of the tables, and especially the common area with the cream, sugar, etc. It was not replenished and filthy. FIL-THY. The garbage was overflowing onto the counter. It looked abandoned. Someone really needed to get out on the floor (hello, manager again!) and CLEAN. THINGS. UP. The outside seating wasn't much cleaner.
Every time I go to this Starbucks, it seems like they've renovated again, but it seems like when they do, they always miss big opportunities: more seating, more staff, cleaner facilities. Starbucks should reasonably be embarrassed by this store.
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