This is an odd one, in a way. Given that most Fast Food brands are doing everything they can to entice you to use their mobile ordering apps. But Starbucks is lowering the number of items you can order per digital app session…
Starbuck’s new policy: Happy Baristas, happy coffee break!
They want you to sign up for the app and order using it so they can gather incredibly-detailed per-sonal information… On you, your preferences and your life, in general…
Part of a broader strategy
It’s just one of a number of changes to the menu – deemed redundant – that Starbuck’s customers can no longer access. And it’s all part of the recent drive under new CEO Brian Niccol to streamline ordering at the premium coffee retailer.
It used to be, you could order up to 15 regular menu items per session via the digital app. But they’ve lowered that to 12, because so many folks were ‘abusing the privilege’ and driving baristas nuts. Es-pecially during bad weather such we’ve been having lately. We’ve heard that some office cadres are drawing straws to see who’ll make the Starbuck’s run – with the short straw drawing the duty.
The coffee purveyor has also cut a number of ‘customization’ options that were slowing down and confusing servers.
The ‘moment of truth’
“This is the moment of truth,” Niccol told reporters a few weeks ago. “To succeed, we need to address staffing in our stores, remove bottlenecks and simplify things for our baristas. We need to refine mo-bile order and pay so it doesn’t overwhelm the café experience. We know how to make these im-provements, and when we do, we know customers will visit more often.”
Since first announcing menu cuts, the chain has made several changes to operations, including ex-tending free refills to all customers lounging in its cafés, bringing back self-serve condiment bars, and reversing its open-door policy.
Cutting the number of items on its regular menu by as much as 30 percent was, in turn, just one of several measures promised by Niccol to ‘Get back to Starbuck’s’. The idea was to return the brand to it origins as a community hangout – a third place between home and the office – and promote the kind of ‘hangout’ atmosphere that made it famous.
My take
I can see why managers and baristas alike would be frustrated by he minority of folks who might be tempted to abuse their digital ordering app privileges.
“The other day a lady ordered 12 drinks, and then 12 food items, and then another couple food and drink items. this changes nothing,” one frustrated server wrote in an online forum.
“Last week a woman ordered 35 drinks on 5 separate back to back orders,” wrote another.
“I had a customer who would place 2 orders every Tuesday since he hit the cap,” added a third. “That way he can get drinks for the whole office.”
Judging by the extent of the problem, it’s well past time that Starbuck’s did something about it!
~ Maggie J.