Starbucks goes after Big Gulp crowd with new “trenta”

Quoth the Washington Post:

The new, nearly quart-size cups — meant only for iced coffee and tea — are available in 14 states starting today, and everyone, everywhere, should be able to indulge by early May. As the National Journal has pointed out with a handy chart, you will be indulging in a drink larger than most stomachs.

Trenta is Italian for 30 so it only makes sense that *$ new supersized drink contains … 31 ounces. (What’s wrong with Trentuno?)  Is anyone going to say, “Trenta-size me.”

Trenta joins other words repurposed by *$ like

• Venti – “fan” (French),  “wait” (Danish & Norwegian), 20 (Italian)
• Grande – “seniors" (French) or large (Spanish, Catalan, Italian)
• Tall – “I’m broke but want to hang out here anyway.”

Don’t know what they’ll charge for this beast but it shouldn’t be much more than a re-negotiated mortgage payment.

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US interrogators say Starbucks is better than torture

From a Washington Post story:

The Bush administration announced yesterday that it intends to bring capital murder charges against half a dozen men allegedly linked to the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, based partly on information the men disclosed to FBI and military questioners without the use of coercive interrogation tactics.

The admissions made by the men — who were given food whenever they were hungry as well as Starbucks coffee at the U.S. prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba — played a key role in the government’s decision to proceed with the prosecutions, military and law enforcement officials said.

“So which will it be: waterboarding or a venti latte with extra cinnamon on top?”

I want someone to use this in an ad campaign!!!!

You read it here first: Starbucks gets bad press for denying Romenesko a custom card

As loyal readers recall, last month Starbucks turned down a customized card for Jim Romenesko. Romenesko runs two blogs: StarbucksGossip and MediaNews — the online water cooler for journalists. At the time I wrote:

It’s not like Romenesko is Someone Not To Be Messed With. He’s just someone who gets a lot of influential readers. He’s more like Someone I Hope I Didn’t Inadvertently Do Something Stupid To. No doubt some of those MediaNews readers wander over to the Starbucks site. No doubt some of them will love a story about big company being dumb.

The fish. The gun. The smoking barrel, courtesy of the Seattle Times:

Starbucks does not welcome all forms of personalization. The webmaster of StarbucksGossip.com was stopped by company censors when he tried to order a card with his Web site’s name.

“Something like ‘Fluffy is my favorite cat’ might get approved,” Jim Romenesko wrote on his site.

A Starbucks spokeswoman said the company’s policy is to avoid anything that would offend baristas or harm the brand.

“The term ‘gossip’ could be deemed offensive or harmful to our brand,” Lisa Passé explained.

That might explain why CelebrityStarbucks.com got its name on a Starbucks card when StarbucksGossip.com did not.

A correct prediction AND we have a new entrant into the Great Names in Marketing Hall of Fame: Lisa Passé! I LOVE 2008!

Starbucks figures out how to get the most bad publicity for the buck

Yesterday Jim Romenesko was rejected by America’s favorite drug dealer in his attempt to get a Customized Starbucks Card plugging one of his blogs. The card would have said: Check out StarbucksGossip.com. It was nixed because it didn’t conform to the company’s personalization policy, doubtless enforced by a computer program or someone at the bottom of the corporate ladder.

Two things you need to know about the site and Romenesko:

1. The site is pretty damn neutral. StarbucksNews would be a better description. It reports on the latest food items and the latest attitudes from the coffee servers. Romenesko, by all appearances, likes Starbucks. He seems to be at one nearly everyday. (This is what happens when you work by yourself. My local dealer is CafeNation.)
2. He is also proprietor of the MediaNews site at Poynter.org. This site, devoted to news about journalism, is the media’s online watering hole. Everyone reads it. As with any industry-specific news site, it is probably incredibly dull if you aren’t in said industry. (Romenesko’s pay for this site is said to be in the six-figures. It is money well spent.)

It’s not like Romenesko is Someone Not To Be Messed With. He’s just someone who gets a lot of influential readers. He’s more like Someone I Hope I Didn’t Inadvertently Do Something Stupid To. No doubt some of those MediaNews readers wander over to the Starbucks site. No doubt some of them will love a story about big company being dumb.

In case they didn’t think this was a story, the MediaNews types can also read responses from people defending the company’s action.

The policy is reasonable. Don’t take it so personally. Starbucks is trying to protect their brand and that means not allowing any website (whether it’s starbucksgossip.com, poniesandrainbows.com or livehotgirlsxxxxxxxx.com) to use this service to create advertising materials that look as if they were sanctioned and endorsed by Starbucks.

Which would be a feasible defense if a site called CelebrityStarbucks hadn’t got one of the damn cards with its name on it. Personalization, it’s not for the faint-hearted.