Posted on 03/14/2014 9:58:03 AM PDT by Responsibility2nd
Starbucks has modified its mobile phone app so that US customers can add tips for baristas to their bill. Is it normal to tip in coffee shops in the US - and could it catch on in the UK, asks Tom Geoghegan?
The old distinction between table service that we tip and counter service that we don't disappeared 10-20 years ago, says John McCarty, a business professor at The College of New Jersey, who co-authored a study on tipping for the Association of Consumer Research. Jars for tips appeared in small sandwich shops first, about two decades ago, then spread to chain coffee shops like Starbucks, he says. Nowadays, lots of coffee customers in the US tip although it's not yet as widespread as it is in restaurants.
"Many people tip automatically and don't think through how much it affects the quality of service they get, or the rationality of it," says McCarty. So while a waiter in a top restaurant can greatly improve your dining experience over two hours, or sour it, it's harder to see how someone making your coffee can exercise the same influence. Nonetheless, McCarty himself tips 20% at his local Dunkin' Donuts.
Tipping for coffee is now more the norm than the exception, says Martin O'Neill, head of nutrition and dietetics at Auburn University, Alabama. He believes baristas in his local Mama Mocha's earn their tips due to their talent and exceptional service. "These people work very hard and putting a bit of extra cash into their pockets is not a bad thing," he says.
But unlike many table waiters, baristas at a firm like Starbucks earn above the federal minimum wage. One Starbucks barista in Wisconsin told the Toronto Globe that nearly all customers gave tips, providing an extra $1.50-$2 to her hourly pay of $9.05.
Despite the fact that many British Starbucks counters do have jars for tips, a Starbucks spokeswoman said there were currently no plans to bring digital tipping to the UK because fewer customers leave tips. Tipping is generally viewed with some anxiety and confusion by British visitors to the US - ironic, given that it travelled to the US from Europe in the late 1800s.
British etiquette expert Simon Fanshawe can't see it catching on. "For counter service, I can't quite see the rationale," he says. "I think it would be regarded by the British, in a rather snobby way, as a bit too American."
Amen. My tipping policy exactly.
What’s with all the tip jars at mom & pop convenience stores and pizza shops/delis too? If they want a “tip” for ringing up my order and handing me the goods over the counter here’s a “tip” for ‘em: just tack on what you think you deserve in tips to the price of the food!
Then I’ll decide if I want to buy your goods based on that price, the REAL price, evidently! Don’t try and guilt me into paying more than your advertised price!
I completely agreed with his character in that scene. ;-)
> Tipping for coffee is now more the norm than the exception
Not for me.
I know that it doesn’t take as much time, but it takes time. Maybe a smaller tip. ;-)
With extremely rare exceptions, nowadays operation of an Espresso machine by a “barista” involves turning a selector handle and pushing a button, not much more than complicated than operating a self-serve soda pop dispenser in a fast food restaurant.
It’s a wonder that coffee shops haven’t already turned the machines around on the counter and just let the customers self-serve. Perhaps ubiquitous self-serve Espresso machines just need one more generation of simplification before that ubiquity becomes reality.
LMAO!!!!
You need to learn how to control your mouth.
Ah, mixture of Diet Pepsi and snot on my keyboard - thanks for that!
Oops. :)
At less than 3 seconds a burger I think not being mean to them is tip enough.
Well, yeah, who doesn't.
Cows have become scarce around here, and my back is old and pretty much a mess. But...there are a couple Starbucks nearby and I'd like to think I could still tip a barista or two. Not much of an exercise but could be a hoot.
I see a big difference between factory food (McD) and real made to order. Also keep in mind in the factories there’s a lot more division of labor, the guy at the counter did NOT make your food, a guy in the back did, maybe your guy up front dropped the fries in the vat, but in this self serve drink world they didn’t even get that for you. The barista probably took AND made your order. They devoted significantly more time specifically to you than the entire store does.
Then there’s the real question of if you don’t think this person is worth one extra measly dollar why are you letting them make stuff you’ll put in your body? Be generous, it’s good for the soul. And remember the more you tip the more they work for you instead of the company.
She was right.
Every Starbucks I’ve ever been in (the standalone stores, not the little kiosks inside other stores) has been just as much a factory assembly-line operation as a McD or BK.
There’s a Starbucks my wife goes to a lot; sometimes she will call ahead and her drink is ready when we get there. For that, I’ll tip.
Otherwise, “No”.
Not even close. I don’t think any Starbucks I’ve seen could cycle 600 customers an hour, that was an expected lunch rush at the mid-volume stores I worked in.
Automobile assembly lines build a car a minute.
Airplane assembly lines build an airplane every few days.
Doesn’t mean they’re not both assembly lines.
Well no it hasn't disappeared...I abide by that rule faithfully...
The problem with your comparison is that you have it backwards. And airplane has many many more parts than a car so that scale follows. A cup of coffee, even a cup of Starbucks coffee, doesn’t have as many parts as a hamburger (and fries, drink, maybe desert). Starbucks has built in efficiency, but it’s not like a McDs. McDs is structured to 45 second in house and 60 second drive thru experience, from “hello” to “come back soon”, getting your order, filling your order, getting your money, bang bang bang. Starbucks can’t even get your order that fast. Because they don’t want to, Starbucks wants to be a place where you feel special and wanted and comfortable. They want you to do that as quickly as they can manage it because that’s where the profit is.
When McDs is in full cycle a dozen people could be part of your order process, one person is talking to you, one person is getting the food part of your order, another is getting the drinks, there’s the person keeping the bin full, there’s a person just making fries, 2 people are running the reg grill (where the little burgers and bigmacs are), 2 people are on the 1/4 grill (quarter pounders), another is running the fried food section, still another (or 2) in the “none of the above” area for grilled chicken and other oddities, then there’s a couple of runners bringing supplies from the walk-ins and storage. And that’s a mid-volume store with only one of each prep zone. It’s a machine, an assembly line, a real, actual, stole ideas from Ford assembly line. Starbucks actually goes out of their way to avoid that kind of assembly line, they want to be efficient but they want you to feel like an individual with an individual order. McDs wallows in mass production, Starbucks pretends nobody has ever ordered a coffee quite like this before.
The Starbucks I’ve seen have got someone taking orders and collecting payment, someone else steaming milk by the gallon, someone else cranking out espresso as fast as they can, and someone else putting it all together and adding the carmel/whatever else.
An assembly line.
The only personalization is at the end when they put the drink up on the counter and yell out “Triple venti carmel chai macchiato with a double-shot for Bill” (or whatever). I find the whole operation silly.
And I’ll no more tip them for that than I tip the kid who takes my burger order.
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