From Starbucks to Dunkin Donuts

By Tommy Leung on 07/07/2008 in Marketing

A few months ago I stopped buying my coffee from Starbucks and started going to Dunkin Donuts. I don’t know what exactly prompted me to do that. I had been buying Starbucks coffee for years and would specifically look for Starbucks when I wanted coffee. It might have had something to do with the economy going south–do I pay for gas and food or expensive coffee? Starbucks was also going through–and still is–a rough patch. Their stock price was down and the company had plans to close a great number of stores.

Then came their new marketing campaign. I’m not sure about Starbucks stores outside of New York City, but they started putting up little signs on every Starbucks that said something to the effect of having the best neighborhood coffee. Starbucks was trying to go back to their original image of small and local. I find that rather difficult in NYC when there is a Starbucks on every other street corner.

Discounting their hard to swallow new image, I noticed that a lot of Starbucks stores were losing quality. The staff or associates did not seem as well trained as I remember them being. I had read The Starbucks Experience and could relate to some of those stories in the book so I had a rather high image of Starbucks as a business. There was a quality to Starbucks that you came to expect and remembered but, it was no longer there.

At Dunkin Donuts, I don’t expect the kind of quality service that Starbucks had built their business on. The coffee at Dunkin Donuts is not as good but it is cheaper. I’m also not a big fan of the white cups that Starbucks have been using–I know it’s temporary but, it is still ugly. So, for the foreseeable future, I will likely continue my patronage at Dunkin Donuts over Starbucks. Of course, Starbucks can’t reach everyone with their marketing campaigns and I have not looked into how well their new campaign is performing. I did see in the news that Starbucks had closed hundreds of stores recently.

I still believe Starbucks is a good company and with Howard Schultz at the helm again, perhaps Starbucks can reinvent themselves and at least be a good stock to buy regardless of whether I ever choose to exclusively go there for my coffee again.

By Tommy Leung

  • aleung

    Starbucks is involved with the whole greening the cup program so the cups they use are suppose to be environmentally friendly.
    I also use to drink Starbucks everyday and almost couldn’t go a day without it. That craze died off. So did my addiction for coffee.
    I actually prefer McDonalds coffee now. Not bad.

  • Nik Mikros

    I recall this switch to Dunkin Donuts. It made me think of my switch.

    A few years ago I drank a lot of Dunkin Donuts. Not because it was particularly good, or because the service was good (it was terrible), but simply because there was one right next to my office. Everyday the same people would try to “deal” me to death, oh you want a cofee? well for 25 cents more you can have a donut and you can have a larger size, on and on like this. Now I drink Starbucks because A) its right next to my office and B) its not great coffee but its good enough.

    P.S.
    If you want to have some pretty good coffee try Grumpy Cafe on 20th Street in Manhattan or Gorilla Coffee on 5th Ave in Brooklyn. Much much better than the chain swill.

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