Hi Patrick - not sure I agree - most people I talk to complain about the quality. If you look at the comments on the thread on the Australian article, there are a few which talk about the American 'fast food' angle, but a lot more talk about the price or the quality, or both. dR
I have never had Starbucks, so can't comment on the quality, but anecdotelly, I understand the quality is rubbish. However, when you consider the alternatives, of which I have been to a few, the quality is also rubbish - overextracted shots, reheated milk, etc. But people are sucked into the idea that the bloke with the tight black t-shirt or the girl with big boobs pulling very bad shots in a "local" cafe makes great coffee, because the know the customer's name, etc. I would hazard a guess that, to use Ashley's statistics (which I don't disagree with), if you compared 90% of the cafes' products to a Starbucks product, the quality would be comparably bad. However, the fact that one is an American fast-food style franchise possibly sways people to opt for the local rubbish. I have done no research on this, it is just my point of view, which could be wrong.
