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If this doesn’t make your day, nothing will make your day.
Apparently, the woke company called Starbucks is having a
problem with its new open-doors policy. As you know Starbucks, in a paroxysm of
guilt over the fact that a manager in Philadelphia called the police to remove
two non-customers and who refused to leave the café.
The result, a new policy. Starbucks now allows anyone to drop by and to hang out. They can all use the
facilities without buying anything.
It’s a calamity in the making. The Zero Hedge blog has the
details, which, as it happens date to before the new policy:
Starbucks
is having a terrible time adapting to its new "inclusive" public
restroom policy, as employees contend with blood spattered walls, used drug
needles, and face-melting waftings from deuce-dropping vagrants
filling the store.
Oh, and
all that was happening before the new homeless
shelter bathroom policy.
The stores have always had needle removal equipment:
A former Starbucks facilities manager who
oversaw several urban stores on the East Coast said those cafes had special
kits on hand with rubber gloves, tongs and a box that store employees could use
to dispose of needles... –WSJ
Customers are decidedly unhappy…
which eventually will be bad for business. Zero Hedge reports:
As we
reported on Thursday, Starbucks' new "inclusiveness" policy is
sparking outrage in customers who just want to get a $6 latte without running
into the new bathroom inhabitants.
“It sounds like Starbucks is turning their
stores into homeless shelters. Their coffee is strong but their management is
weak,” said Ron Raduechel, a 64-year-old retired supply
chain executive from Waukesha, Wis., who said he would no longer go to
Starbucks. -WSJ
As the
reactions from viewers of CBS
LA's recent story about Starbucks' new policy suggest, customers are
fed up...
“If you go into a business and you just sit
there and you don’t buy anything you are taking up space at the table,”
said Melrose Larry Green.
“You could end up having a squatters problem
where you just have people coming and staying. I mean if they are going to
do that they need to limit how long people can stay in there,” said Joe Selva.
Call it the free market at work. Those who want to impose
their ideology on the rest of us ought at least to pay for it.
9 comments:
Am sure the public libraries are relieved. There is now an alternative location for smelly vagrants to pee, poop, and stay warm in winter, and cool in summer.
Agree with Bizzy Brain re: the public libraries angle.
Also, I know that this thought is not original to me, but I understand that Starbucks sells burnt coffee with an entire serving of dessert's worth of sugar to hide the taste. Plus, they sell actual, non-liquid desserts as well. I wouldn't know, because I've never once darkened the door of the place.
I've always liked Starbucks coffee. I know some people don't but I've been drinking Cafe Verona for years but I have stopped buying it because of the sheer stupidity of their management. It's insupportable
Starbucks CEO Howard Schultz is sometimes mentioned as a possible presidential candidate for the Dems. Outstanding.
Some Christians have a name for this apparent ideology, "Radical hospitality" but it must be voluntary, and every Starbucks ought to decide what hospitality they're willing to give, and how it should work, rather than a top-down directive without knowing how consequences will be different for each store.
The world of commerce says "Everyone pays the same price for the same service", while a pure hospitality model would have everything free and have people who appreciate give back what a service is worth to them within their means.
Whatever level of hospitality offered, it sounds like a recipe for chaos, or bankruptcy, and probably it will be, unless a lot of attention and creativity is applied. I'm certainly a skeptic - will the homeless and drug users exploit the communal space, and scare away everyone else? It seems likely, as the first efforts seem to show, merely giving free access to space.
Myself, I've gone to cafes for meetups over the years, and usually haven't been interested in buying pricey drinks or food, but I have left money in the tip jar for letting me use the space. I've never been asked to leave, although I probably would leave sooner than later if the tables are all nearly full of people, and I'm not buying anything, just common courtesy.
Radical hospitality is an excellent example of why Paul warned of the dangers of women as preachers.
These people always go back to the tale of the Good Samaritan for their guide but the Good Samaritan did not take the beaten man home with him. He cleaned his wounds and paid for a hotel room. Kind action not suicidal action
Oh golly, you're not going to believe this, but Ares Olympus is being a jackass again!
Gotta love it when Ares Olympus uses the words "must" and "ought," as though he is an authority on the subject(s).
Because without "top-down directive," everyone would know how to deliver that Starbucks experience... on their own. In their own way. Miraculously. Subjectively. Individually. They would just... know. Who doesn't believe in stone tablets brought down from Mount Sinai when Ares Olympus imagines each precious soul inventing the inscriptions on their own stone tablets, and bringing them to... US!
It must be the magical incarnation of "craft" coffee! With each barista an "artisan." Just like Howard Schultz romantically remembers it from the good ol' days in Pike Place.
Yet Ares Olympus believes there can be a widespread brand experience without a standard.
Fascinating.
Maybe it will be another opportunity for what Ares Olympus calls attention and creativity. Like pixie dust or magic. Miracles. Sorcery. Witchcraft. Coffee!
And you can appreciate and give back what a service is worth within your means. As though that is somehow different from the way the service economy operates now.
Ostensibly, Ares Olympus believes endless public sector programs are necessary because people cannot voluntarily give back what is within their means. Yep, they have to be coerced. But the homeless can figure it out a Starbucks, if they are allowed to do so). So people like Ares Olympus believe that taxpayer funds must be demanded at the other end of a gun, but it's voluntary for homeless and drug users. And Ares Olympus and his friends don't like guns.
A contradiction. Very strange.
At least Ares Olympus would deliver a voluntary experience and would know just what kind of hospitality to provide. Because... well, he just... knows. Because it's not a top-down directive. It must be organic. Or sustainable. Or inclusive. Or diverse. Or...
Maybe Ares Olympus can also duplicate Starbucks' success. Anyone want to take bets on that one???
After all, Martian Olympian Coffee Shop could also deliver the same thing, couldn't it? With the same quality and consistency, without the top-down directive, with each person paying what it is worth, within their means. Certainly you could build a business on that, right?
Let's try Ares Olumpus' pure "radical hospitality" with a lot of attention and creativity applied. Because the consequences will be different for each store. A store in Seattle will be totally different than a store in Kaiser. Or a store in Rapids City. Or a store in Redoubt. All these stores are different. And their homeless populations have different needs, other than shelter. They could read a book or something. Or suggest an opera. Or deliver a soliloquy. Or some equivalent. Or something.
And of course Ares Olympus shows us the Marxist model, with the Christian equivalent. As if there is a equivalent. Amusing.
Ares Olympus is certainly a skeptic. He say so. He tells us this all the time. So much courage. So much insight. So much pretension of seriousness. He's trying to open our minds. He says "We all see what we want to see." Brilliant.
We all wonder whether the homeless and drug users will explore the communal space, don't we? We also wonder if the homeless and drug users will scare away everyone else, don't we?
Ares Olympus informs us that this is likely.
Profound.
Meanwhile, Ares Olympus has been frequently visiting these commercial locales for years, but hasn't been engaging in commerce. He leaves money for the employees who risk nothing, thinking that this is their space, not the owners.
Again, deliciously Marxist.
No wonder the rest of us can't find a space to sit. I'd love to think I could identify an indigent squatter because of his noxious odor, but that seems to be a non-distinguishing characteristic these days.
Don't kid yourself, Ares... common courtesy isn't your thing. Otherwise, you wouldn't comment on this blog, after being so endlessly ridiculed and asked to leave. And otherwise in the most subtle ways [This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.]. You don't have any common courtesy, as it is clear the space isn't yours, whether physical (Starbucks) or virtual (here).
Common courtesy is that you compensate the property, product or service owner with just compensation requested... should you choose to utilize it through your own free choice. Or you just leave. Your remarks here indicate you don't have the capacity to understand such concepts.
And of course you've postulated all this with no judgment. So impressive.
Whitney, not just women. The church I know that expresses radical hospitality has a male pastor and I agree with a lot as worthy for experimentation. This church for instance took in some college graduates to live in the basement converted into dorm space at minimal rent so they can put all their income into paying off student debt. There's no expectation the students must pay back the church for the hospitality, but rather that they will be financially stronger to express their own hospitality, where ever life leads them.
The clearest risk I see in this modern world is habituating people into budgeting their lives on what level of monthly payments they can afford without ever paying down the principal. People who are in debt might feel an impulse for offering charity, but it's destructive if its just deepening their hole, like tithing 10% while putting living expenses on a credit card hoping for a lottery or prosperity gospel to save them.
Myself, trying to help my drug using brother was sufficient for me to see a limitations of hospitality. In the end I was forced to face he needed to be homeless to break his denial and accept the treatment he needed.
Anon, I'm glad I inspired your own deep thoughts. Actually blogging is a good example of radical hospitality and voluntary donations. And blogger.com itself is free, I have no idea how they make money. Maybe we should worry about that?
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