ITZ STARBUCKS!! - By a coffee Hater

One fine day i read an article saying 'Starbucks to set its foot in India . I don't even remember reading the article except for the title and i hardly knew what Starbucks was. Few weeks later there was someone mentioning about the same and also asked if it would do well in India. I didn't bother to listen to it. Then Starbucks was started in Mumbai.

That green circle and the lady within was identifiable even to a dead coffee hater just as me. And people around me making plans to go in there during their Mumbai trip didn't make me wonder about it much (eating is an excitement to me so going to a new place or talking about the same wasn't anything new) but THEN I saw an interview in YouTube.

Oh my god... Seriously... It is just a coffee. Well maybe not for any other coffee lover i guess. To them  'ITZ STARBUCKS' (ithu ellam vetti sceneu). Whatever the question maybe - 'R u ready to pay so much for it?', 'why are you here?', 'why are you waiting in a queue?' the answer is the same- 'itz Starbucks . And QUEUE??? yes you read it right. close to 2 hours spent waiting for a container ( lets call it so because it is neither a cup nor a bottle) full of coffee with a straw. And when asked what is it you are drinking, you'll definitely get a non-English answer ( romba therinja mathiri- Google la ethayo paathuttu public la peter vida vendithu ).

come on people you travel to a different city wait for 2 hours just to drink a container full of coffee with an epic name for which you pay a premium price? You have CCD next door which at-least lets you have a comfortable seat and spend as long time as you want for the same epic named coffee drink. It is just a choice but to me neither make sense but nobody has said me 'ITZ CCD' so that saves one more post by me with the title 'ITZ CCD!! - By a coffee Hater'.

I agree it is the same coffee which every high class protagonist in every English novel drank and it is the same coffee which was consumed by many Hollywood actors. I also agree it is a world in which we pre-order a communication device 2 months before, stand in long queue for hours to buy a story book which we had pre-ordered a month before and also buy gold on THAT day standing in a biggg queue even after knowing the fact that gold price had peaked that day- and we still buy because if you do so on THAT auspicious day then you get to buy a lot more (but you would have anyway ended up buying lot more for the same money if it was any other day).

I also agree to the fact that 'Starbucks' is not just a coffee and it has built a brand name and it provides an expected product in a comfortable ambiance which sinks with our culture and what these people pay in terms of time and money is an exchange for the value being delivered to them. (unmaiya othukkanum la)

But enough of facts and concepts. We can justify a communication device hype to be for its functionality, story book hype as knowledge (now don't ask me how killing a snake, a half alive human using a wooden stick or drinking blood with a bite [ no I'm not talking about mosquitoes - you need to wait for my next post for that) be knowledgeable] and gold hype as an investment. But COFFEE hype??? Don't people realize it is all lost when the liquid crosses the tongue?

And adding to everything, it is not even good for health ( now i don't want the old man's picture hanging across the wall lecturing me about this... Oh yeah that was for tea - so for now i'm spared).

So you waste a trip, 2 hours in a queue for a un-understandable almost non English named liquid which is not good for health in a container which is not good for mother earth (konjam effectuku add panathu - correct uh therila) for triple the price of what it costs to you if make the same in your own kitchen with your own hands (which you are perfectly capable of making and maybe tastes much better ) because... Just because... 'ITZ STARBUCKS'. Wowwww.

Remember THIS is what branding can do to this world. Welcome to marketing. :) :p :p Eppudi :p