Starbucks Blazes New Trails With Coffee Delivery Service

Starbucks recently announced they will be offering delivery services for their food and beverage items in select locations. To date, details about where products can be delivered, its costs, and how it is going to function have been withheld. Experts are confused as to how any company could offer low cost personalized differences. They do seem to agree that if it works Starbucks will be blazing some new trails in logistics that will be adopted by others.

I congratulate Starbucks on creating buzz in the market because there will be a lot of companies watching how they are effectively going to do this on low value purchases.  The media is ablaze about the development and its implications on e-commerce. Uniquely Starbucks is taking sales and delivery down to a micro level not yet seen on a large scale. 

Starbucks is trend setting by not only offering deliveries, but also providing pre-order cellphone applications that customers can pick up later. No one wants to wait in a long Starbucks line when they know they can grab and go with a pre-order application. Approximately 15% of all their customers’ purchases are being made through mobile devices. 

The great innovations have some theorists wondering. Some have argued that the minimum purchase price needs to be over $20 dollars to make it economically feasible. Certainly this is one possibility. The other possibility is they will require a purchase minimum like $7 and have three deliveries in the same area. Instead of one delivery you are making three within a short distance with each other. 

This would require delivery in high concentrated areas to make a return even possible. There is no doubt technology is lowering costs but to do so on a $2.25 cup of coffee is unprecedented. The only item to effectively beat economy of scale margins would be many small purchases or combining multiple services and benefits together. 

An additional benefit is that more loyalty through habit is being developed with every purchase. The consistent use of technology and applications fits within the tech savvy and trendy markets that create an image that others in society are likely to emulate. Getting customers to make the coffee as part of their working lives certainly makes a difference in longer term sales.

What Starbucks is doing is being a market leader in personalized logistics where members of society can order products and create consumer culture right from their phone. Today you may be limited to a cup of coffee from Starbucks or a bag of groceries from Amazon Fresh but tomorrow you may be having someone deliver your healthy meals three times a day. Wait…you can already sign up for this through a local service. Times have changed and so has the expectation of service.

Starbucks Adjusts Cup Recycling Goals

Americans love their coffee to go and enjoy the convenience of a drive thru or lightening speed service at their local coffee shop. Convenience comes with a cost as those paper cups make their way into a trash can and eventually to a landfill creating mountains of garbage that accumulates over time. Starbucks is attempting to reduce those costs by offering discounts for personal tumblers and selling their own plastic cup for $1.

Even though they had a lofty goal of 25% of all coffee served in plastic reusable containers by 2015 they failed to meet it. Despite missing the mark they did save 2% of all purchases (34 million times) through customers that used reusable containers. This is a total of 1.5 million pounds of waste. 

Their adjusted goal is to have 5% of all coffee served in reusable containers by 2015. Discounts are helpful in bringing this goal to fruition. Starbucks offers a 10 cent discount every time a customer brings in a reusable cup. Purchasing the plastic 1$ cup will allow patrons to start saving in just ten uses without even considering the additional benefits to the environment. 

The technology to recycle paper cups is available but isn’t widespread. In Great Britain a paper cup recovery program has shown that all the fiber in standard polyethylene (PE) coated cups can be recycled into facial and toilet tissues (N.A., 2009). This is great news when we finally make the technology affordable for widespread use.

The problem is that even if the technology is available it isn’t easy for people to find places to pitch recyclable material separate from trash. People on the go that want convenience are also not likely to take the time and effort to separate their items like their more environmentally conscious cousins. At present the reusable containers appear to be the best route. Buy a plastic cup, put it in your car and don’t forget it at home. 

Starbuck's Goals  

N.A. (2009). Trial proves that paper cups are recyclable. Vending International, 43 (1).

Bruegger's Bakery and Starbucks on the Coast in Del Mar

In Del Mar on the main strip of Camino Del Mar are two coffee houses connected together into one convenient location. Bruegger’s Bagels and Starbucks share a store front with an excess of patio space. Of course, each provides Internet access and plenty of indoor seating. The advantage of the two shops working in tandem is that one provides New York Style Bagels and the other some of the most famous coffee in the world. It is a busy place and there is generally a consistent line that may take you a few minutes to get through.  Mornings appear to be the busiest time of the day which tappers off by the afternoon.

Bruegger’s Bakery started as an ethnic and specialty food shop in New York. Through perfecting the bagel, they have now expanded to 300 stores in 26 states. They are a casual bagel shop that allows for sitting, lounging, coffee, lunch, and Internet browsing. Most items on the menu are under $6.00 dollars and one can hope to get a sandwich and coffee for under $10. You can find more information at http://www.brueggers.com/

Del Mar is an interesting town with a short but interesting California history. A contractor on the newly built rail line between San Diego and San Bernardino decided he wanted to build his home on one of the most beautiful coast lines in California. Theodore M. Loop set up his tent city on a mesa and with the partnering of Jacob Taylor began the process of building a town. This was not any ordinary town but one for the rich and famous. Movie stars and Hollywood actors vacationed in the area. The city was designed around the resort Casa del Mar until it burnt down in 1889. You can find more about the history here http://www.delmarmainstreet.com/resources/del-mar-history

From the patio of Starbucks and Brueggers one can still see just a hint of that history still alive. The street is beautifully lined with shops, stores, bars, and restaurants and quaint small town outlets. It is a nice place to walk around and enjoy. From there it only takes a quick turn and one block south to the beach. Bikers zoom up and down the street making their way along the scenic rout of Camino Del Mar to the couple of parks and the Surfside Race Place just a hop, skip, and jump away.

1435 Camino Del Mar  Del Mar, CA 92014
(858) 259-3600

5:30 to 4:00 PM