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As a subscriber you can listen to articles at work, in the car, or while you work out. Subscribe NowIf you want to hang out or use the restroom at Starbucks, you’re going to have to buy something.
Starbucks on Monday said it was reversing a policy that invited everyone into its stores. A new code of conduct–which will be posted in all company-owned North American stores–also bans discrimination or harassment, consumption of outside alcohol, smoking, vaping, drug use and panhandling.
Starbucks spokesperson Jaci Anderson said the new rules are designed to help prioritize paying customers. Anderson said most other retailers already have similar rules.
“We want everyone to feel welcome and comfortable in our stores,” Anderson said. “By setting clear expectations for behavior and use of our spaces, we can create a better environment for everyone.”
The code of conduct warns that violators will be asked to leave, and says the store may call law enforcement, if necessary. Starbucks said employees would receive training on enforcing the new policy.
The new rules reverse an open-door policy put in place in 2018, after two Black men were arrested at a Philadelphia Starbucks where they had gone for a business meeting. The individual store had a policy of asking non-paying customers to leave, and the men hadn’t bought anything. But the arrest, which was caught on video, was a major embarrassment for the company.
At the time, Starbucks Chairman Howard Schultz said he didn’t want people to feel “less than” if they were refused access.
“We don’t want to become a public bathroom, but we’re going to make the right decision a hundred percent of the time and give people the key,” Schultz said.
Since then, though, employees and customers have struggled with unruly and even dangerous behavior in stores. In 2022, Starbucks closed 16 stores around the country—including six in Los Angeles and six in its hometown of Seattle—for repeated safety issues, including drug use and other disruptive behaviors that threatened staff.
The new rule comes as part of a push by Starbucks’ new chairman and CEO, Brian Niccol, to reinvigorate the chain’s sagging sales. Niccol has said that he wants Starbucks to recapture the community coffeehouse feeling it used to have, before long drive-thru lines, mobile order backups and other issues made visits more of a chore.
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Wow! I agree. Imagine the cultural shift this will generate. Where will all the hangouts and remote studyers go now. Stay home? Public libraries? Smaller coffee shop chains? Inovative Membership hangouts? What about the inner city homeless? Will they be Urinating in alleys?
Inorder to really accomplish this goal, my opinion is SB may have to add security, (called servers), to police the tables. Then post table top menus to encourage food sales. Hugh!!!!! All very interesting.
Great idea. I do not suggest table top service for an industry already stressed. Starbucks staff already are tasked with tidying up table after use.
Menus are [already] readily available with the app.
It certainly is not unreasonable to expect one to buy something upon entering a business. Certainly, if one needs to (as opposed to chooses to) use the restroom, one should pay. In many Starbucks one must get a code to use the restroom.
Sarcasm and snarky remarks aside, many of those who study in Starbucks and other coffee shops do purchase items during as part of their visit.
Impulse response;
This is going to be a tough one for a cultural shift. Social media will bash starbucks. Business owners will understand. Libraries will eventually be flooded.
Maybe AI holograms will pop down from the ceiling reminding folks to go. In any case, guests will push the limits. A cup of coffee does not pay for the chair for 2 hours. Maybe coffee for dine in will cost $10. Sarcasm notes on a cup to stay in will encourage a time limit. Hanging out is a tough culture that is beholding around the world.
Studying or working at home can create anxiety. What will tempers grow to while the nervous kind are being pushed back while in a general store.
The entire world is in for a shift. This is only the public front runners.
Best of luck to humanity.
Seems quite simple and logical, never understood where and why people thought they had the right to camp out at Starbucks for hours on end to chill, read, study, conduct business if only to buy one cup of overpriced coffee — or buy nothing at all. That was an insane business model, and a very unsuccessful social experiment. I’d like to think I have a social conscience, but not at the cost of ruining a good business model. I do tire of rantings and ravings of both the “woke” and the “anti-woke” crowds, but this was one social experiment, much like decriminalizing some crimes, and scaling back on policing powers, that have proven to be a failure. Well-meaning is one thing, until people stomp all over and take advantage of it.
I can understand why they want someone to buy something if they’re sitting in a chair for hours but I don’t understand why retailers have such a problem with people using the restroom. Especially as I get older and find myself having to go more often, I really appreciate having a place to relieve myself without having to buy a cup of coffee. The proliferation of “no public restrooms” and “restrooms for customers only” signs really annoys me. Even our local post office now has such a sign (if there’s that big a demand at the PO perhaps they ought to consider adding a public restroom). Seems to me that offering a restroom is just basic hospitality.
Mike, I’m older also and understand. There are several Urban locations that suffer from homeless or low influenced folks that make a mess, sleep, and steal the supplies.