Starbucked: A Double Tall Tale of Caffeine, Commerce, and Culture | 
 enlarge | Author: Taylor Clark
Publisher: Little, Brown and Company
Category: Book
List Price: $25.99
Buy New: $9.90
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Avg. Customer Rating:  21 reviews
Sales Rank: 72457
Media: Hardcover
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 304
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.9
Dimensions (in): 9.3 x 6.2 x 1.2
ISBN: 031601348X
Dewey Decimal Number: 338.17373
EAN: 9780316013482
ASIN: 031601348X
Publication Date: November 5, 2007
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Condition: Brand new! Ships out next day with FREE delivery confirmation number.
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Product Description
STARBUCKED will be the first book to explore the incredible rise of the Starbucks Corporation and the caffeine-crazy culture that fueled its success. Part Fast Food Nation, part Bobos in Paradise, STARBUCKED combines investigative heft with witty cultural observation in telling the story of how the coffeehouse movement changed our everyday lives, from our evolving neighborhoods and workplaces to the ways we shop, socialize, and self-medicate.
In STARBUCKED, Taylor Clark provides an objective, meticulously reported look at the volatile issues like gentrification and fair trade that distress activists and coffee zealots alike. Through a cast of characters that includes coffee-wild hippies, business sharks, slackers, Hollywood trendsetters and more, STARBUCKED explores how America transformed into a nation of coffee gourmets in only a few years, how Starbucks manipulates psyches and social habits to snare loyal customers, and why many of the things we think we know about the coffee commodity chain are false.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 16 more reviews...
 Highly Recommended! July 3, 2008
This is a very thought-provoking, informative, and enjoyable book: full of information, witty, packed with ideas and beautifully written. It touches on a lot of very important topics in a not-too-heavy way. Well worth reading, and I look forward to more books by this young author!
 Even-handed, well-researched, a great read! April 24, 2008
Easy and fun, this book asks all the questions, then arrives at the answers with research, not hyperbole. Neither love nor hate shows through, and the author uses humor in perfect amounts to illustrate points and clear up the clouds surrounding the coffee Goliath. A must-read for every reason.
Is Starbucks really the bad guy? April 21, 2008
New York salesman Howard Schultz turned an anti-capitalist enterprise into the ever-expanding corporate behemoth that it is today. Where is there not a Starbucks today? The challenge to find out where you can get the farthest from the nearest Starbucks was the impetus for this book by author Taylor Clark.
In Starbucked, Clark explores the history of coffee and its culture. Before specialty coffee came along, American coffee consumption had been declining. This caused the Big Four coffee conglomerates to cut costs by buying the cheapest beans possible. Bad beans being bitter, the Big Four sucked that nastiness right out of them and injected the beans with synthetic flavorings. Supermarket brands like MJB, Hills Brothers, and Folgers used a large amount of low-quality "filler" beans called robusta (as opposed to arabica), rendering themselves completely indistinguishable from each other. It was coffee-flavored water. They continued to increase the robusta to arabica ratio because it's cheaper and consumers never seemed to protest - until they had a really good cup of coffee at their local gourmet coffeehouse. Add to that a time when the disposable income of America was on the rise, along with a general addiction to caffeine, and you've got demand for higher quality coffee.
Howard Schultz's hunger to create the utopian Coffee Experience led to an unparalleled growth of a company whose annual stockholders' meetings are Standing Room Only, resembling a rock concert more than a droll PowerPoint presentation of facts and figures.
The coffee company with the mermaid siren logo has a real estate department who are experts at pinpointing the best locations, when they aren't opening up next door to competitors, or to each other. They analyze cities and neighborhoods, going as far as studying oil spots in parking lots to determine where people shop and how often. Their aggressive growth tactics concern their opponents who question the company's ethical behavior and accuse them of squeezing out mom-and-pop stores, not realizing that, in fact, the mom-and-pop stores have thrived and ridden the wave of the gourmet bean's popularity precisely because of Starbucks.
Clark's thorough investigative research and witty but objective prose not only questions the validity of critics and accusers, but armed with statistics, he debunks many myths surrounding the mega coffee chain. Like Oprah, perhaps some people, or companies, can only be praised up to a certain level of success, at which point they are deemed too successful and must therefore be lambasted at every opportunity.
After Clark investigates the ethics of Starbucks compared with those of the big coffee conglomerates, it becomes apparent that we may be blaming the wrong corporation for the plight of coffee growers in Latin America (and the rise of the drug trade in Colombia). This book raises questions like: Does Fair Trade mean higher quality coffee?
It's hard to imagine that 271 pages about coffee, commerce and culture could be engaging, but Clark's Starbucked is entertaining, compelling, and educational. He delivers a wealth of information without overwhelming the reader. While it's a little confusing to understand whether Peet's or Starbucks came first, and who bought whom, and how they switched names, and which one is the original, that's probably not the point. Clark set out to discover the relevancy of what good coffee means to Americans and how much we're willing to pay for the forced utopian Coffee Experience. And what will the rest of the world think of it? And with many thousands of coffeehouses around the globe, when will Starbucks open one in Italy, the country where Howard Schultz had his first euphoric latte, spawning a revolution?
This book is best read with a Grande No-Whip Caramel Frappucino.
Reviewed by Margaret Andrews for Curled Up With A Good Book
Over caffeinated April 18, 2008
An illuminating and well-researched piece that not only chronicles the rise of a corporate behemoth but also discusses how we became obsessed with all things coffee. Fun and light read.
Well Balanced and Fascinating Read April 18, 2008
I recently became friends with an independent coffee shop owner, ([...]) The Bean Cup, and the owner worked at Starbucks for many of the early years out in California. I noticed immediately that the expresso was much richer and smoother and was amazed at the difference in flavor and even the smell of the brew.
Chris started teaching me how to pour shots properly and the science behind the beans, the grind, the packing of the shot, the temperature of the water (and the steamed milk) - and how long the shots took to pour. I was amazed that I could see and taste such a difference. Truth be told, I still like 'Charbucks' and love the hustle and bustle of the stores as well as the blast of caffeine in a morning mocha that I can get. I simply enjoy The Bean Cup's brew rather much more.
With all of that, this book was an amazing read from front to back and Taylor Clark is a great writer (I especially appreciated many of the insights and off remarks he put as footnotes throughout the book). At times I thought he took it easy on Starbucks. They have enough pull that they COULD change the industry, the pay of coffee farmers, etc. They simply choose not to because it's convenient to the bottom line.
This is a great story any way you slice it, though. Howard sounds like someone I'd love to meet. No doubt that his passion and enthusiasm have driven Starbucks to where they are today. I am anxious to see where they go from here - with such an expensive product, it seems like the McCafe will be a shoe-in to dethrone a lot of Starbuck's sales.
Great book. I consumed it a lot faster than my most recent reads!
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