Eight First Impressions Of Starbucks India

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Starbucks marked its entry into India by opening a few stores in Delhi, Mumbai and Pune over the last few months.

I visited one of these stores recently. Here are my first impressions of Starbucks India based on this visit.

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  1. This store is a lot roomier than the many Starbucks outlets I’ve visited abroad e.g. Central London.
  2. freewifi-sThe “Free WiFi” sign outside the store is misleading since there’s neither free nor paid WiFi inside the store. I think this is a store-specific issue – I was able to find free Wi-Fi in two other stores, one in Pune and another in Delhi.
  3. The menu displays three sizes viz. Short, Tall and Grande. The attendant told me that “Short” – the smallest size – is a new variant created for India. However, there’s no mention of this size on the placard placed on the counter, which only lists Tall, Grande and Venti, the standard sizes across the coffee retailer’s stores worldwide. When I pointed out the disconnect, the attendant told me that it was a “technical error”. To me, it seemed more like a “marketing blunder”. On second thoughts, I couldn’t help wondering if underplaying Short is a subtle way of testing whether the Indian market will be okay with paying more for the standard Tall size or really needs a lower-price Short size. Likewise, there’s no mention of Venti in the menu.
  4. The store uses the “open outcry” method to call out patrons when their orders are ready for pickup. This is strange since, at all Starbucks outlet I’ve visited (outside India), customers place their order, make their payments and collect their drinks in one single pass through the counter. Besides, all the shouting that hapens as a result of this practice causes a lot of disturbance and undermines the coffee retailer’s positioning as the “third place” for getting work done between home and office.
  5. The ordering and payment process are quite time-consuming. As a result, the queue moves more slowly compared to Barista, Cafe Coffee Day, Costa Coffee  and other coffee chains in India. I wonder if the slow checkout – rather than overwhelming popularity – is the real reason for the long queues seen outside many Starbucks shops in India.
  6. placard-sIt’s possible to pay with an American credit card at this outlet – something that’s increasingly becoming difficult at many merchants in India.
  7. None of the staff at this store has heard about Starbucks App, the company’s loyalty-cum-payment mobile app that accounts for over 90% of all mobile wallet spend in the USA and is widely considered the world’s most successful mobile wallet. While the company’s website does feature the Starbucks Card, it’s of the plastic variety and I couldn’t find any mention of the mobile wallet app. I think Starbucks has lost a golden opportunity to go “mobile first” in India, considering that virtually every customer ahead of me in queue had a smartphone and paid by a debit or credit card.
  8. Last but not the least, I found the bill to be very long. Trimming it will save a few trees and serve as a “low hanging fruit” for Starbucks India to reinforce the parent company’s “sustainability” message.

If this blog post is eerily silent on the subject of coffee itself, that’s intentional: Who goes to Starbucks for coffee, eh?