The first Starbucks coffee shop, Seattle - a history of cities in 50 buildings, day 36 | Cities | The Guardian A history of cities in 50 buildings The first Starbucks coffee shop, Seattle - a history of cities in 50 buildings, day 36 When the now-infamous chain first opened its doors in Seattle on 30 March 1971, its sign bore not a green mermaid but a (more anatomically detailed) brown one, and its mission was purely to sell freshly roasted coffee beans Not quite where it all began: No 1912 Pike Place, Seattle, is actually the second location of the ‘original’ Starbucks cafe Cities is supported by Thursday 14 May 2015 05.45 EDT Last modified on Tuesday 26 May 2015 06.52 EDT Share on Messenger Close With more than 21,500 stores in 64 countries and territories, the Starbucks coffee chain has enjoyed the image of omnipresence for so long that jokes about walking across the street from one branch straight into another have themselves become clichéd.

In certain cities, it’s simply the reality: Seattle, for instance, where the now universally recognised green mermaid got her humble start. But when the very first Starbucks opened on 30 March 1971, its sign bore not a green mermaid but a brown one — and a more anatomically detailed one at that. Founders Jerry Baldwin, Zev Siegl and Gordon Bowker (friends from the University of San Francisco, all instructed in the art of roasting by Peet’s Coffee and Tea founder Alfred Peet) drew the theme of their new coffee company from nautical mythology, commissioning that first version of the company’s signature siren and picking a name out of Herman Melville’s Moby-Dick – “Starbucks” having narrowly pipped the second-place contender, “ Pequod ”. You can still see Starbucks’ original mermaid, baring her breasts and spreading her tails, on the window of the “original Starbucks” (actually the second location of the original Starbucks, to which it moved in 1977) at Seattle’s tourist-beloved Pike Place market.

A site of pilgrimage for Starbucks habitués the world over, the store offers not just all the drinks on the company’s modern menu — from normal coffee and espresso to chai tea lattes and caramel Frappuccinos — but a sense of just how much the operation has changed over the decades. You can still see Starbucks’ original mermaid, baring her breasts and spreading her tails, on the window of the store Pinterest The Seattle cafe has become a site of pilgrimage for Starbucks habitués the world over. Photograph: Kevin P Casey/AP Those who visit the original Starbucks will find themselves at the back of a line stretching well past the small building’s door, and once inside will see nowhere to sit and linger — just as Baldwin, Siegl and Bowker intended. They founded Starbucks not as a place to drink freshly brewed coffee, but as a place to buy freshly roasted beans. The home-brewing coffee aficionados of 1970s Seattle loved it, and demand had grown sufficiently by decade’s end that a curious Howard Schultz – then the general manager of their filter supplier, Hammarplast – paid a visit to No.1912 Pike Place to watch this booming small business in action.

Impressed, Schultz joined Starbucks as director of marketing in 1982 and, on a buying trip to Milan, experienced the cultural awakening that would give the company its destiny – in the form of the Piazza del Duomo’s many coffee bars, all of them serving high-grade espresso, all of them providing quasi-public meeting places for Milanese society. There, amid “the light banter of political debate and the chatter of kids in school uniforms”, the question hit Schultz: why couldn’t American cities have the same thing? And if they could, why couldn’t they serve coffee made with Starbucks-roasted beans? Unable to convince Starbucks’ founders of the viability of a concept as novel as coffee bars in Seattle, Schultz left the company in 1985. The next year he opened a coffee bar of his own, named “Il Giornale” after one of Milan’s newspapers. Two years after that, he found enough investors to purchase Starbucks outright, which put him in a position, as CEO, to set about his Milanifying mission in earnest: first Seattle, then the United States, then the world. Pinterest The layout and decor of the Pike Place branch is largely as it was when Starbucks first launched in 1971.

Photograph: Kevin P Casey/Associated Press Starbucks’ greatest period of expansion began in the early 1990s: having already opened money-losing branches in the US-midwest and British Columbia, it then moved profitably into California in 1991, making its initial public offering on the stock market the following year. Starbucks seemed unstoppable throughout that decade and most of the next, opening on average two new stores every day until 2007. But the increasingly globalised company’s fortunes started to mirror those of the global economy, and the following year saw Starbucks shutter hundreds of locations, a grim necessity unthinkable just a decade earlier. The Great Recession played its part, but Starbucks had also lost its own way, a fact nobody admitted more readily than Schultz himself. Having stepped back from his duties as CEO in 2000, he wrote a memo diagnosing the company’s ills – quickly leaked to the media – which cited “a series of decisions that, in retrospect, have led to the watering-down of the Starbucks experience”.

These included the adoption of fast automatic espresso machines bereft of the “romance and theatre” of the old ones, and easily replicable store designs “that no longer have the soul of the past and reflect a chain of stores vs the warm feeling of a neighbourhood store”. Ostensibly, Schultz had addressed the message to then-CEO Jim Donald — tellingly, a former executive at Wal-Mart, the “big box” retail giant which surely exemplifies the very opposite of what Schultz revelled in on the sidewalks of Milan. As the revisions of Starbucks’ mermaid rendered her bland and asexual, so the revisions of Starbucks itself drained it of whatever local charm could have made its stores into social centres. Schultz’s Starbucks has always aspired to create what urban sociologist Ray Oldenburg first termed “third places”: real-life sites that “host the regular, voluntary, informal and happily anticipated gatherings of individuals beyond the realms of home and work” — exactly, in other words, what the life of the suburb-housed, crime-fearing American commuter lost in the 1970s and 80s.

He wrote of the importance of the “‘place on the corner’, real-life alternatives to television, easy escapes from the cabin fever of marriage and family life that do not necessitate getting into an automobile”. Starbucks moved beyond its little original store and wove itself into the fabric of American cities Pinterest Today Starbucks boasts more than 21,500 stores in 64 countries and territories worldwide – but none in Italy. Now that so many street corners seem to have a Starbucks, has the international chain truly become that “place on the corner” where people connect? In fact, Oldenburg dismisses the Starbucks coffee shop as an “imitation”, debilitated by the company’s pursuit of that other quintessentially American obsession, security, and the sterile, predictable environment it produces.

“With its overriding concern for safety,” Oldenburg told Bryant Simon, author of Everything But the Coffee: Learning about America from Starbucks , “it can’t achieve the kind of connections I had in mind.” Walk into a Starbucks today, and you may not notice much connection going on: some customers come in chatty groups, but many others arrive in search of nothing more than a place to open their laptops and get some work done; in effect, using Starbucks not as a third but a second place — their workplace. Most simply grab their coffee and go, never pausing to avail themselves of the chairs and couches provided, while others prefer to keep human interaction to an absolute minimum by using the drive-through window, a resoundingly un-urban feature Starbucks introduced in 1994. Starbucks’ ongoing retooling and experimentation suggests that Schultz, for all he talks about his company’s resurrection of the “third place”, has yet to hear a sufficient amount of political banter and schoolchildren’s chatter in his stores.

Starbucks’ enormous scale and need to service the American demand for frictionless convenience contradicts its mission to replicate the appeal of continental coffee-house culture: how much of a neighbourhood-rooted venue for chance encounter can you provide when you have to run thousands and thousands of them, making sure they all do more-or-less the same thing? Pinterest Starbucks aspired to create what urban sociologist Ray Oldenburg first termed ‘third places’. Photograph: Simon Crumpton/Alamy Still, when Starbucks moved beyond its little original store and wove itself into the fabric of American cities, it primed the public for subsequent waves of more genuinely local coffee shops that really do function as third places. These smaller players may accuse Starbucks of abusing its unfair advantage, ignoring city-planning regulations, saturating the market with loss-making stores in prime real estate, and setting its lawyers upon even the faintest hint of trademark infringement, but the fact remains that Starbucks paved the way by introducing an urban coffee culture into places that had never known it before. Starbucks’ opening in the already coffee-soaked Tokyo in 1996 marked its first step outside North America.

The company’s international president, Howard Behar, spoke at the time of losing sleep over stepping into a city with such entrenched competition, but now Japan has well over a thousand Starbucks stores all over the country. Southdale Center: America's first shopping mall – a history of cities in 50 buildings, day 30 Read more Of the ever-fewer nations in which Starbucks hasn’t yet established itself, one in particular stands out: Italy. Schultz speaks now and again of his intent to bring his coffee bars into the land that gave him the idea in the first place, but also hints that the company doesn’t see that coffee-saturated market as its highest priority. Milan, for its part, now boasts several branches of Arnold Coffee, a homegrown chain that promises “the American Coffee Experience” – one friendlier to students and laptop jockeys than what traditional Italian coffee bars offer. So closely did Arnold’s founders model its branding on Starbucks’ that they had to alter the original circular logo to avoid a lawsuit – opting instead for an inoffensive and decidedly un-mermaidish coffee mug in profile, which seems like a missed opportunity.

If you can get away with a racier logo than the original Starbucks’ anywhere, surely you can do it in Italy. Which other buildings in the world tell stories about urban history?

Share your own pictures and descriptions with GuardianWitness , on Twitter and Instagram using #hoc50 or let us know suggestions in the comments below The First Starbucks Coffee Shop, Seattle - A History of Cities in 50 Buildings - NDTV Food The First Starbucks Coffee Shop, Seattle - A History Of Cities In 50 Buildings The First Starbucks Coffee Shop, Seattle - A History of Cities in 50 Buildings Colin Marshall, guardian.co.uk | Updated: May 15, 2015 15:03 IST Tweeter facebook Google Plus Reddit When the now-infamous chain first opened its doors in Seattle on 30 March 1971, its sign bore not a green mermaid but a (more anatomically detailed) brown one, and its mission was purely to sell freshly roasted coffee beans With more than 21,500 stores in 64 countries and territories, the Starbucks coffee chain has enjoyed the image of omnipresence for so long that jokes about walking across the street from one branch straight into another have themselves become clichéd. In certain cities, it’s simply the reality: Seattle, for instance, where the now universally recognised green mermaid got her humble start.

But when the very first Starbucks opened on 30 March 1971, its sign bore not a green mermaid but a brown one — and a more anatomically detailed one at that. Founders Jerry Baldwin, Zev Siegl and Gordon Bowker (friends from the University of San Francisco, all instructed in the art of roasting by Peet’s Coffee and Tea founder Alfred Peet) drew the theme of their new coffee company from nautical mythology, commissioning that first version of the company’s signature siren and picking a name out of Herman Melville’s Moby-Dick – “Starbucks” having narrowly pipped the second-place contender, “ Pequod ”. You can still see Starbucks’ original mermaid, baring her breasts and spreading her tails, on the window of the “original Starbucks” (actually the second location of the original Starbucks, to which it moved in 1977) at Seattle’s tourist-beloved Pike Place market.

A site of pilgrimage for Starbucks habitués the world over, the store offers not just all the drinks on the company’s modern menu — from normal coffee and espresso to chai tea lattes and caramel Frappuccinos — but a sense of just how much the operation has changed over the decades. You can still see Starbucks’ original mermaid, baring her breasts and spreading her tails, on the window of the store The Seattle cafe has become a site of pilgrimage for Starbucks habitués the world over.Photograph: Kevin P Casey/AP Those who visit the original Starbucks will find themselves at the back of a line stretching well past the small building’s door, and once inside will see nowhere to sit and linger — just as Baldwin, Siegl and Bowker intended. They founded Starbucks not as a place to drink freshly brewed coffee, but as a place to buy freshly roasted beans. The home-brewing coffee aficionados of 1970s Seattle loved it, and demand had grown sufficiently by decade’s end that a curious Howard Schultz – then the general manager of their filter supplier, Hammarplast – paid a visit to No.1912 Pike Place to watch this booming small business in action.

Impressed, Schultz joined Starbucks as director of marketing in 1982 and, on a buying trip to Milan, experienced the cultural awakening that would give the company its destiny – in the form of the Piazza del Duomo’s many coffee bars, all of them serving high-grade espresso, all of them providing quasi-public meeting places for Milanese society. There, amid “the light banter of political debate and the chatter of kids in school uniforms”, the question hit Schultz: why couldn’t American cities have the same thing? And if they could, why couldn’t they serve coffee made with Starbucks-roasted beans? Unable to convince Starbucks’ founders of the viability of a concept as novel as coffee bars in Seattle, Schultz left the company in 1985. The next year he opened a coffee bar of his own, named “Il Giornale” after one of Milan’s newspapers. Two years after that, he found enough investors to purchase Starbucks outright, which put him in a position, as CEO, to set about his Milanifying mission in earnest: first Seattle, then the United States, then the world.

The layout and decor of the Pike Place branch is largely as it was when Starbucks first launched in 1971.Photograph: Kevin P Casey/Associated Press Starbucks’ greatest period of expansion began in the early 1990s: having already opened money-losing branches in the US-midwest and British Columbia, it then moved profitably into California in 1991, making its initial public offering on the stock market the following year. Starbucks seemed unstoppable throughout that decade and most of the next, opening on average two new stores every day until 2007. But the increasingly globalised company’s fortunes started to mirror those of the global economy, and the following year saw Starbucks shutter hundreds of locations, a grim necessity unthinkable just a decade earlier. The Great Recession played its part, but Starbucks had also lost its own way, a fact nobody admitted more readily than Schultz himself. Having stepped back from his duties as CEO in 2000, he wrote a memo diagnosing the company’s ills – quickly leaked to the media – which cited “a series of decisions that, in retrospect, have led to the watering-down of the Starbucks experience”.

These included the adoption of fast automatic espresso machines bereft of the “romance and theatre” of the old ones, and easily replicable store designs “that no longer have the soul of the past and reflect a chain of stores vs the warm feeling of a neighbourhood store”. Ostensibly, Schultz had addressed the message to then-CEO Jim Donald — tellingly, a former executive at Wal-Mart, the “big box” retail giant which surely exemplifies the very opposite of what Schultz revelled in on the sidewalks of Milan. As the revisions of Starbucks’ mermaid rendered her bland and asexual, so the revisions of Starbucks itself drained it of whatever local charm could have made its stores into social centres. Schultz’s Starbucks has always aspired to create what urban sociologist Ray Oldenburg first termed “third places”: real-life sites that “host the regular, voluntary, informal and happily anticipated gatherings of individuals beyond the realms of home and work” — exactly, in other words, what the life of the suburb-housed, crime-fearing American commuter lost in the 1970s and 80s.

He wrote of the importance of the “‘place on the corner’, real-life alternatives to television, easy escapes from the cabin fever of marriage and family life that do not necessitate getting into an automobile”. Starbucks moved beyond its little original store and wove itself into the fabric of American cities Today Starbucks boasts more than 21,500 stores in 64 countries and territories worldwide – but none in Italy. Now that so many street corners seem to have a Starbucks, has the international chain truly become that “place on the corner” where people connect? In fact, Oldenburg dismisses the Starbucks coffee shop as an “imitation”, debilitated by the company’s pursuit of that other quintessentially American obsession, security, and the sterile, predictable environment it produces.

“With its overriding concern for safety,” Oldenburg told Bryant Simon, author of Everything But the Coffee: Learning about America from Starbucks , “it can’t achieve the kind of connections I had in mind.” Walk into a Starbucks today, and you may not notice much connection going on: some customers come in chatty groups, but many others arrive in search of nothing more than a place to open their laptops and get some work done; in effect, using Starbucks not as a third but a second place — their workplace. Most simply grab their coffee and go, never pausing to avail themselves of the chairs and couches provided, while others prefer to keep human interaction to an absolute minimum by using the drive-through window, a resoundingly un-urban feature Starbucks introduced in 1994. Starbucks’ ongoing retooling and experimentation suggests that Schultz, for all he talks about his company’s resurrection of the “third place”, has yet to hear a sufficient amount of political banter and schoolchildren’s chatter in his stores.

Starbucks’ enormous scale and need to service the American demand for frictionless convenience contradicts its mission to replicate the appeal of continental coffee-house culture: how much of a neighbourhood-rooted venue for chance encounter can you provide when you have to run thousands and thousands of them, making sure they all do more-or-less the same thing? Starbucks aspired to create what urban sociologist Ray Oldenburg first termed ‘third places’.Photograph: Simon Crumpton/Alamy Still, when Starbucks moved beyond its little original store and wove itself into the fabric of American cities, it primed the public for subsequent waves of more genuinely local coffee shops that really do function as third places. These smaller players may accuse Starbucks of abusing its unfair advantage, ignoring city-planning regulations, saturating the market with loss-making stores in prime real estate, and setting its lawyers upon even the faintest hint of trademark infringement, but the fact remains that Starbucks paved the way by introducing an urban coffee culture into places that had never known it before. Starbucks’ opening in the already coffee-soaked Tokyo in 1996 marked its first step outside North America.

The company’s international president, Howard Behar, spoke at the time of losing sleep over stepping into a city with such entrenched competition, but now Japan has well over a thousand Starbucks stores all over the country. Related: Southdale Center: America's first shopping mall – a history of cities in 50 buildings, day 30 Of the ever-fewer nations in which Starbucks hasn’t yet established itself, one in particular stands out: Italy. Schultz speaks now and again of his intent to bring his coffee bars into the land that gave him the idea in the first place, but also hints that the company doesn’t see that coffee-saturated market as its highest priority. Milan, for its part, now boasts several branches of Arnold Coffee, a homegrown chain that promises “the American Coffee Experience” – one friendlier to students and laptop jockeys than what traditional Italian coffee bars offer. So closely did Arnold’s founders model its branding on Starbucks’ that they had to alter the original circular logo to avoid a lawsuit – opting instead for an inoffensive and decidedly un-mermaidish coffee mug in profile, which seems like a missed opportunity.

If you can get away with a racier logo than the original Starbucks’ anywhere, surely you can do it in Italy. Which other buildings in the world tell stories about urban history? Share your own pictures and descriptions with GuardianWitness , on Twitter and Instagram using #hoc50 or let us know suggestions in the comments below Not quite where it all began: No 1912 Pike Place, Seattle, is actually the second location of the ‘original’ Starbucks cafe History of Starbucks History of Starbucks SIGN UP FOR OUR EMAIL NEWSLETTER 5705 Steep Hill Road, Building 10712 Fort Smith, AR, 72916 Company Information | Starbucks Coffee Company Starbucks Coffee Company All Starbucks® Coffees Company Information To say Starbucks purchases and roasts high-quality whole bean coffees is very true. That’s the essence of what we do – but it hardly tells the whole story. Our Heritage Every day, we go to work hoping to do two things: share great coffee with our friends and help make the world a little better. It was true when the first Starbucks opened in 1971, and it’s just as true today.

Back then, the company was a single store in Seattle’s historic Pike Place Market. From just a narrow storefront, Starbucks offered some of the world’s finest fresh-roasted whole bean coffees. The name, inspired by Moby Dick, evoked the romance of the high seas and the seafaring tradition of the early coffee traders. In 1981, Howard Schultz (Starbucks chairman and chief executive officer) had first walked into a Starbucks store. From his first cup of Sumatra, Howard was drawn into Starbucks and joined a year later. In 1983, Howard traveled to Italy and became captivated with Italian coffee bars and the romance of the coffee experience. He had a vision to bring the Italian coffeehouse tradition back to the United States. A place for conversation and a sense of community. A third place between work and home. He left Starbucks for a short period of time to start his own Il Giornale coffeehouses and returned in August 1987 to purchase Starbucks with the help of local investors. From the beginning, Starbucks set out to be a different kind of company. One that not only celebrated coffee and the rich tradition, but that also brought a feeling of connection.

Our mission to inspire and nurture the human spirit – one person, one cup, and one neighborhood at a time. Expect More Than Coffee We’re not just passionate purveyors of coffee, but everything else that goes with a full and rewarding coffeehouse experience. We also offer a selection of premium teas, fine pastries and other delectable treats to please the taste buds. And the music you hear in store is chosen for its artistry and appeal. It’s not unusual to see people coming to Starbucks to chat, meet up or even work. We’re a neighborhood gathering place, a part of the daily routine – and we couldn’t be happier about it. Get to know us and you’ll see: we are so much more than what we brew. We make sure everything we do is through the lens of humanity – from our commitment to the highest quality coffee in the world, to the way we engage with our customers and communities to do business responsibly. Learn More About Us Awards and honors we've received.

Our Company India's first Starbucks branches draw long queues | World news | The Guardian India's first Starbucks branches draw long queues Starbucks cafes offering paneer wraps alongside blueberry muffins reflect India's increasingly international high streets India's first branch of Starbucks, which opened this month in Mumbai. Photograph: Punit Paranjpe/AFP/Getty Images Monday 29 October 2012 08.28 EDT First published on Monday 29 October 2012 08.28 EDT Close This article is 4 years old During the past 10 days, sweaty queues of up to 50 people have formed outside an old colonial building in downtown Mumbai, while a security guard operates a one-in-one-out policy. These hopefuls are not trying to get into an edgy new nightclub or shake hands with a visiting politician. They are waiting for up to an hour to go to Starbucks . "There's excitement among everyone," said Akhil Somani, a 27-year-old financial adviser, as he stood in line last weekend. "We have our own coffee brands but this one has had a lot of hype." Starbucks, the world's largest coffee-shop chain, opened its first branch in India on 19 October.

Two more branches – including one in Mumbai's famous Taj Mahal Palace hotel, which has likewise seen dozens of people queuing for a frappuccino – opened last week. With more than 17,600 branches in 61 countries, it is perhaps surprising that the Seattle-based company has only just arrived in India . It entered China in 1999 and has around 600 outlets there. India is the home of chai, sugary and milky tea ladled into tumblers at street stalls for around five rupees. However, as Indians' disposable incomes rise, cafes are cropping up in large cities. The country's cafe sector is worth $230m (£143m), up from $40m five years ago, according to a report by Technopak, an Indian consultancy. Cafe Coffee Day, a no-frills homegrown chain, dominates the market. The UK's Costa Coffee and the US's The Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf also have a small presence. The appearance of Starbucks, whose Mumbai branches offer paneer wraps as well as blueberry muffins, also reflects India's increasingly international malls and high streets.

More western chains are expected to open branches here in the near future, after constraints on foreign investment were loosened this autumn. India's coalition government, led by the Congress party, in September relaxed rules on local sourcing for foreign "single-brand retailers" – shops that sell items belonging to one brand. Last November, it scrapped rules stating that such retailers needed to partner with a local company. Following these reforms, Ikea this month applied to open around 25 outlets. Starbucks has entered India through an $80m joint venture with Tata, one of the country's biggest conglomerates, having worked on this deal before the rules changed. "[The new rules] should be seen as a signal to foreign investors that we are still welcoming them," said Anubhuti Sahay, a senior economist at Standard Chartered. "Two and a half months ago, there was nothing coming from the government but now there's more hope." However, Sahay added that the economy would not benefit for some months, as any new businesses would have to deal with India's vast amounts of red tape before opening outlets. Opposition parties and independent shopkeepers have held protests in response to the retail reforms.

Yet many customers hope foreign brands will result in more choice and better quality, as local businesses will have to fight to retain clients. "More competition is good for the customer," said Somani as he finally managed to enter Starbucks, only to join another queue for the counter. Some punters are also excited about having famous brands in their city. "We've seen [Starbucks] in films and on TV," said Ritika Nurthy, a 23-year-old software engineer on her first trip to the chain. She cited The Devil Wears Prada, a film in which Meryl Streep plays a tyrannical magazine editor whose assistant brings her coffee every morning. "You get curious and wonder 'what is that?'" When did the first Starbucks open? - Quora Quora Written Oct 22, 2011 · Upvoted by Garrick Saito , Starbuck's coffeeholic, fan and shareholder. I spend more at SB's than I do for car insurance.

The first Starbucks was opened on March 30, 1971 and located at 2000 Western Ave in Seattle, WA but was relocated to 1912 Pike Place in 1976 where it still remains today. To honor this location Starbucks' main brew throughout the day is Pike Place Roast. Written Oct 22, 2011 Longer explanation from Wikipedia: The first Starbucks was opened in Seattle, Washington, on March 30, 1971 by three partners: English teacher Jerry Baldwin, history teacher Zev Siegl, and writer Gordon Bowker. The three were inspired by entrepreneur Alfred Peet(whom they knew personally) to sell high-quality coffee beans and equipment. The name is taken from Moby-Dick; after Pequod was rejected by one of the co-founders, the company was named for the first mate on the Pequod, Starbuck. From 1971–1976, the first Starbucks was at 2000 Western Avenue; it then was relocated to 1912 Pike Place, where it remains to this day.

During their first year of operation, they purchased green coffee beans from Peet's, then began buying directly from growers. Starbucks Under Fire in Europe for Greenwashing Starbucks Under Fire in Europe for Greenwashing PR Week, January 21 2005 As Starbucks reviews its UK PR account, Sarah Robertson investigates what the coffee chain is doing to address accusations,led by the anti-globalisation movement, that it is destroying communities and livelihoods. Starbucks is the epitome of the ubiquitous corporation that people love to hate. For this reason its UK PR account, in the process of being reviewed as the firm attempts to improve its ethical credentials (PRWeek, 14 January), is one of the most challenging briefs around. Named after the first mate in Herman Melville's Moby Dick, Starbucks the coffee chain was born in liberal Seattle in 1971. It has since mushroomed to operate 8,000 shops in 34 countries, each week serving 28 million customers. Three new Starbucks branches open every day - its target is 30,000 stores, with sights set firmly on growth markets such as China.

The business has flourished in the UK over the past decade, but success has attracted fierce criticism on issues such as fair-trade coffee, GM milk, chairman Howard Schultz's alleged financial links to the Israeli government, and accusations that the relentless growth is forcing locally run coffee shops out of business. A survey carried out last month by Global Marketing Insite found that even Starbucks customers perceive the company as 'arrogant, intrusive and self-centred'. No surprise then that Starbucks has invested significantly in CSR activity. In the UK it has offered grants to charities, such as the Royal Society of Arts, educational foundations and training courses; it also produces an annual CSR report. Last October Starbucks joined forces with Oxfam, giving £100,000 to a rural region in Ethiopia where farmers suffer from poverty and drought. The money is being invested in seed, improved irrigation systems and local education programmes. And the company is offering advice on improving coffee yields. Starbucks also has a diverse-supplier policy, which it claims increases the amount of business it does with companies that are majority-owned by women, minorities or socially disadvantaged individuals.

Moreover, Starbucks was one of the first major coffee house brands to introduce 'ethical' coffee in 2002 when it offered a 'fair-trade coffee of the week', and shortly afterwards added it to its main menu. But the chain now lags behind competitors such as railway kiosk firm AMT and Marks & Spencer, which has switched to 100 per cent fair-trade coffee in its in-store cafes. Starbucks needs to move quickly to catch up, according to Fairtrade Organisation head of comms Barbara Crowther, who says that introducing 100 per cent fair-trade coffee would boost its image. But criticism of Starbucks extends beyond fair-trade policies. The company's notoriety was cemented in Naomi Klein's seminal anti-globalisation book No Logo. She said Starbucks operates by 'clustering' - saturating areas with branches, forcing local businesses to close down. Ethical Consumer magazine researcher Ruth Rosselson says: 'Starbucks has a number of useful policies in how it sources coffee, and its dialogue with Oxfam is progress. However, we would recommend consumers choose non-chain shops that offer fair-trade coffee.

Starbucks operates like the supermarkets: it puts local companies out of businesses and with this policy can never be 100 per cent ethical.' Corporate Watch researcher Chris Grimshaw dismisses Starbucks' CSR programmes as 'a smokescreen to create the illusion of ethics'. He adds that the company is committed only to making money for its shareholders. Indeed, its critics do not appear to be having much impact on global sales, which grew 30 per cent to £2.9bn in the 12 months to September 2004. Many believe that Starbucks will remain a prime target of criticism by virtue of being a visible American multinational. Dr Stuart Thomson, director at political consultancy Upstream and author of New Activism and the Corporate Response, thinks the best way to address the anti-globalisation movement and other pressure groups is to use their figureheads as advisers. 'It is not enough to have CSR policies if the company is unable to understand the activist group it is facing,' Thomson says. 'Starbucks should liaise with the activist groups that campaign against it so it can anticipate where they will attack.

Consultancies are known to take on people with activist backgrounds to help them.' He adds that protesters are often intelligent, articulate middle-class people who know how to lobby effectively, and have already made Starbucks back down in certain areas. For instance, in 2001 a local community group stopped Starbucks opening a branch in London's Primrose Hill by petitioning the local council. Names on the list included Alan Bennett, Neneh Cherry and Jude Law. Starbucks provided details on CSR activity that it undertakes with organisations such as the National Literacy Trust. 'We do a great deal of community work; we're proud of the grassroots passion of our people,' says Starbucks head of CSR and comms Scott Keiller.

MAKING ENEMIES - 1999 Activists trash Starbucks shops in its home town of Seattle, protesting against the negative impact of globalisation at the World Trade Organisation meeting there - 2001 Starbucks allegedly charges firemen working at Ground Zero after 9/11 for bottled water - 2001/02 Local resident groups stop Starbucks branches opening in the North London districts of Primrose Hill and Camden - 2004 Boycott Israel Campaign criticises Oxfam's deal with Starbucks for the latter's alleged Zionist links and calls on the public to boycott the chain. America's 10 Best Coffee Shops | The Huffington Post America's 10 Best Coffee Shops 04/04/2013 01:05 pm ET | Updated Jun 04, 2013 440 The Daily Meal All things food and drink Coffee culture in America, in the post-World War II era, began with the dark stuff. The "water dressed down in brown," as singer Ani DiFranco once put it -- the nitty, gritty, put-the-hair-on-your-chest stuff that would hardly pass for a decent cup of coffee today.

And forget the billions of combinations of milks, beans, and flavors you'll find today; back then, it was coffee, black, and no questions asked (Photo Credit: Nathan Cyphert). Coffee soon hit a decline through the '60s and '70s, thanks to the rise of America's other favorite caffeinated drink -- soda. But then came the second wave of coffee, when hanging out in coffee shops and drinking espresso became cool (basically, finally following in the footsteps of our European neighbors who had it right all along). But with the boom of coffee once again came the mass market appeal of coffee. Click here to see the Full List of America's Best Coffee Shops Starbucks opened its doors in Pike Place Market in Seattle in 1971, when the coffee industry was still in decline. By 1984, Howard Schultz had tried the café experiment in downtown Seattle, with the first ever Starbucks Caffè Latte. By 1994, Starbucks had 425 stores; by 2004, Starbucks had 8,569 stores. The total number of Starbucks as of July 1, 2012 ( according to the company's timeline )?

17,651. And that doesn't even include the number of coffee chains that took off in the same period: Dunkin' Donuts, Peet's, The Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf, Peaberry, Caribou, Seattle's Best (a subsidiary of Starbucks). But no chain exemplifies the mass market appeal of coffee more than the rise of Starbucks. Check out these 7 Quirky Coffee Shops Now, we're riding out the third wave of coffee that's followed the likes of craft beer and craft cocktails, and entering into the fourth wave. And with it, we find America's best coffee shops -- the places that dedicate themselves to the craft of coffee, from bean to cup. It's the farmers, the roasters, the buyers, and the baristas that have redefined coffee to be more than just a caffeine boost. For the coffee shops we've found, coffee is a way of life. Now more than ever, coffee shops are doing way more than serving better roasts or making your latte into latte art .

They're building relationships with the growers, sourcing beans in ethical and sustainable means, making single-origin roasts to bring out unique flavors, and brewing with innovative techniques never seen before -- so your Mr. Coffee has long been put to bed. Click here to see the Ultimate Guide to Starbucks' Secret Menu We scoured for the best independent coffee shops and chains that have changed the way we drink coffee. Our criteria? The best quality in coffee and food, atmosphere, customer service, and the "unique" factor. (Case in point: a DeLorean car in the back of one shop. You just can't top that.) We then asked our coffee experts -- coffee bloggers, roasters, shop owners, baristas, and educators -- to nominate the shops they loved. Our panel then voted on a list of nearly 150 coffee shops from coast to coast. In the end, we narrowed down our list to the most highly ranked (and most talked about) 33 shops and chains that are riding into the fourth wave of coffee and beyond. Some of the coffee shops you may know well; Stumptown, Intelligentsia, and Blue Bottle all made the cut for an overall quality that's hard to beat.

And many of the shops on our list serve roasts from Stumptown and Intelligentsia, proving that they're the roasts to beat. (Another roaster we saw over and over again on our list? Counter Culture Coffee Co., based in Raleigh, N.C. While Counter Culture doesn't operate any storefronts and instead focuses on supplying shops and educating the public, it too is a winner in our eyes.) Some of the shops have added on roasteries for a true "farm-to-table" approach. And some of our shops operate under a multiroaster model, serving a selection of roasts from the big guys, like Stumptown, and the local providers. Pledging "humility and respect," Starbucks is going to open its first store in Italy — Quartz February 29, 2016 Starbucks is finally heading to the place where it all began. The US coffee chain announced today (Feb. 29) that it is opening a shop in Italy —the birthplace of the espresso. Its first store in the country is slated to open in Milan in early 2017.

“We’re going to try, with great humility and respect, to share what we’ve been doing and what we’ve learned through our first retail presence in Italy,” Schultz said in a statement. “Our first store will be designed with painstaking detail and great respect for the Italian people and coffee culture. And, my hope is that we will create a sense of pride for our partners – so much so that every partner who sees our store or walks through the doors will say: ‘we got it right.'” The vision for Starbucks coffeehouses as we know them today was first conceived of on a trip to Milan in 1983, when CEO Howard Schultz was inspired by the baristas and locals gathered at coffee bars. He hoped to grow the Seattle-based roaster, which was founded in 1971, into an international chain with the coffee and craftsmanship to one day hold its own against any in Italy. Starbucks now has more than 21,000 stores across 65 countries .

To ensure that Starbucks does get it right, the coffee chain is partnering with Percassi, an Italian developer that has helped retail brands like Zara-parent company Inditex, Swatch, Calvin Klein, Guess, Tommy Hilfiger, and Levi’s enter the market. “We know that we are going to face a unique challenge with the opening of the first Starbucks store in Italy, the country of coffee,” said Antonio Percassi, president of Percassi, in a statement. “We are confident that Italian people are ready to live the Starbucks experience, as already occurs in many other markets.” In Italy, where espresso is typically cheaper than it is in the US— around €0.90 to €1.20 ($0.98 to $1.30) compared to more than $2.00 at Starbucks’ New York, New York locations—Starbucks will have to compete on price with other coffee bars, Schultz told the New York Times . Its shops will cater to the region, with bars where customers can stand and enjoy a shot of espresso or cappuccino, as is customary in Italy. Schultz recognizes that the chain will have to prove itself in the country.

“We’re not coming here to teach Italians to make coffee — nothing like that at all,” Schultz told the publication. “We have to earn the respect.” The company has reportedly considered entering the Italian market for awhile , but just now felt it was ready to take that step. Starbucks isn’t the first American chain to co-opt Italian creations and try to sell them back to the country. Domino’s opened its first pizzeria in Italy last October. And ice-cream maker Ben and Jerry’s set up shop there in 2011. Read full story

Question: Which coffee chain opened its first branch in Seattle in 1971 ?
Answer: STARBUCKS