Meridian Coffee House

The other day I stopped at the mind-boggling Starbucks for a cup of coffee.  I asked the barista for a Café Valencia, my all-time favorite Starbucks treat.  I knew full-well the specialty flavor was discontinued sometime in 2006.  Even so, if you are lucky, Starbucks will have left over Valencia syrup in one of their […]

McDonald’s has jumped on the coffee bandwagon with a surprisingly good iced coffee.  The refreshing treat is available in four different varieties (regular, vanilla, hazelnut and caramel) and two sizes (24 oz medium and 32 oz large). At a fraction of the price, McDonald’s iced coffee is comparable to other franchise heavy hitters.  In today’s […]

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There are a lot of opportunities available for coffee lovers these days, including the world of franchises.  Most likely, we know about the Starbucks opportunities to get involved in a franchise.  However, if you want to do something a little different, here are some opportunities of some great franchises for coffee lovers to add into […]

BART (Bay Area Rapid Transit) has partnered with Peet’s Coffee so that morning commuters (and evening commuters and everyone in between) can enjoy java while getting where they need to go.
The partnership will show up at the Embarcadero BART Station around the end of April, and that will be the debut stop for enjoying Peet’s […]

Some people (me included) cannot get enough of the Sumatra coffee from Starbucks. My family goes through a pound a week, and the one time we ran out and had to use the “backup” coffee we made it double strength…and it still tasted like hot flavored water. Ick!
But many people feel that the standard Sumatra […]

Bryant Simon, professor at Philadelphia’s Temple University, is “searching for the meaning of modern life amid the round tables and comfy sofas of Starbucks coffee shops.”
He has observed out 300 Starbucks locations in 6 countries, trying to learn “what it means to live and consume in the age of globalization.” In 2008, expect to […]

I’ve got to say that I’m just beginning to appreciate the wonderful world of coffee. It all started in Europe where my hosts had coffee several times a day; it was a standard part of a good long conversation. I’ve continued my enjoyment of coffee here in the states. I have found a couple of […]

I’m not a big coffee drinker so I might be wrong about the relationship between baristas and customers. I go to both corporate and independent coffee houses and notice that baristas in local cafes are more likely to build a relationship with their customers. This past summer I’ve become sort of a regular at a […]

I only spotted this today on Deadprogrammer’s Cafe, but then I remembered this place and thought it could be worth a lil’ post. Even though it probably focuses more on symbolics than on coffee per se, it’s still an interesting enough tidbit about the evolution of the Starbucks Siren.
Read here, and enjoy.

Lots of people don’t like Starbuck for lots of different reasons. They come in to town and force indpendents out, they contribute to the McDonald’s-ification of the world, so no matter where you are you can be assured you can get a Big Mac and a Mochaccino, they don’t do enough as corporate citizens to […]