Starbucks

Starbucks

1. What factors accounted for the extraordinary success of Starbucks in the early 1990s?

* Established successful brand image through cultivation of new coffee culture with “experience marketing” (keeping coffee culture alive)

* Established Starbucks as the dominant specialty-coffee brand

* With rapid growth

* Three components to experiential brand strategy

* Coffee itself High-quality coffee : to do that control supply chain

* (i.e.) Directly work with coffee growers to purchase good coffee bean / oversee the roasting process / control distribution channel to the retail stores around world.

* Service referred to as “customer intimacy”

* Atmosphere to relax (inviting environment)

* Obvious Positioning and Targeting Segment

* High-quality & High price (“premium”) on affluent, well-educated, white collar patrons whose age of 24 and 44

* Efficient Marketing

* They did almost nothing on advertising,

* Point-of-sale material materials and local-store marketing

2. Why has Starbucks’ customer satisfaction scores declined? Has the company’s service declined, or is it measuring satisfaction the wrong way?

* New products were launched on a frequent basis through product innovation

* Starbucks introduced at least one new hot beverage every holiday season

* (trade-off) Product innovation is the big driver of company growth

* More coffee-making processing steps are needed to make new, innovative coffee

* The complexity of the barista’s job has increased over time Baristas’ over-workload

* Job complexity created a tension between product quality and customer service

* One solution is to hire more baristas to share over-workload

* Customer base was changing (Exhibit 8)

Affluent, Well-educated,White collar female between 24 and 44 | | Younger, Less-educated, Lower income |

3. How does the Starbucks of 2002 differ from the Starbucks...