BBC Article
And for your amusement, here is an Onion article from a while ago about Starbucks (Note: The Onion is a satire website. It's articles are not to be construed as accurate depictions of real events).
Onion Article
Thursday, March 20, 2014
The Economics of Starbucks
I thought this was interesting. Starbucks has announced that they are planning on selling more alcoholic beverages later in the day. This is an effort to increase sales in the afternoon and evening.
In economic terms, what do you think of this decision? Is there enough demand for alcohol to justify Starbucks' sales? Do you think that the sale of alcohol will drive down demand for other products? Starbucks is a common spot for everything from interviews to studying. Would an increased sale of alcohol change the "atmosphere" of Starbucks as a coffee/tea/hot chocolate place? Starbucks probably gets a lot of people who sit there for a couple of hours and only buy one few dollar drink, so it may be to their benefit to sell higher-priced alcohol.
BBC Article
And for your amusement, here is an Onion article from a while ago about Starbucks (Note: The Onion is a satire website. It's articles are not to be construed as accurate depictions of real events).
Onion Article
BBC Article
And for your amusement, here is an Onion article from a while ago about Starbucks (Note: The Onion is a satire website. It's articles are not to be construed as accurate depictions of real events).
Onion Article
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6 comments:
I see both sides to the situation. I agree with Brianne that people do sit in Starbucks for long periods of time and may ultimately buy an alcoholic drink later in the day. However, based on my personal experience at Starbucks, I think that most of Starbucks' customers order their drinks to go, so selling alcoholic drinks may not be the best idea. Also, I think adding alcoholic drinks to the menu would take away from the coffee shop atmosphere.
(I read the Onion article and I must say that I fear that Starbucks and Google and Facebook may be working together in their schemes of world domination. This comment in parenthesis is also satire.)
It does make sense for Starbucks to sell alcoholic beverages as a business model, but frankly I find it a little disappointing. One of the appeals of Starbucks is that parents can bring their kids with them while they get their coffee and they buy their kids hot chocolate. I worry that if Starbucks' atmosphere changes that parents would not want to take their kids there.
Obviously, whatever Starbucks does is their own decision. I just worry that they'd actually lose business. Perhaps if they limited the alcoholic drinks to after a certain time?
Additionally, I don't think that Starbucks is running low on money, so I'm not sure why they would need to do this in the first place.
I thought that this was an interesting concept. I think that by offering alcohol at a mostly coffee/tea-based shop will just get people to spike their hot beverages a bit. I don't really believe that Starbucks, a place where people study, read, and have interviews, will become some sort of night-club by the introduction of alcohol. Adding alcoholic beverages will just be like adding the seasonal beverages to the menu, people may purchase them for a time but then revert back to their usual drinks.
In response to your comment, Amy, for the most part the drinks are only sold in the evening. It seems like, at first, only some stores will have the alcoholic drinks, but then increasingly more stores will sell alcohol.
Definitely a measure purely to generate for revenue. Businesses can and will invest/change in order to make increasingly more money. It's the nature of the market economy.
It certainly may elicit some frowns from patrons but considering that the demand for coffee and alcohol peak at different times of the day, I suspect that Starbucks is calculating that they can retain one consumer base and add another. If it's successful, it would be an unprecedented business model at least at the Starbucks scale.
My greatest worry is that it will crush small businesses. I don't the local bar to close because Starbucks next door can serve the alcoholic beverage faster and cheaper. That would be sad.
I think that Starbucks is trying to appeal more towards the adults who spend a lot of time within the store reading a book or browsing through their laptops. However, I don't think that people will actually go there to buy alcohol. Starbucks= coffee/caffeine. Therefore, I don't think that they will generate much revenue, nor do I think that the atmosphere would change dramatically. Also, Paige makes a very good point- people order their drinks to go, so I think that they'd come up with restrictions on buying alcohol 'to go'.
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