Jessica Montgomery
Thomas D’Ambrosio
Luis Salas
Christian Korneev
Clara Canny
Stephanie Caldeira
Consumer Behavior
STARBUCKS
Starbucks was established in 1971 with the mission to inspire and nurture the
human spirit-one person, one cup and neighborhood at a time. They are currently
inspiring 20,519 neighborhoods worldwide in 65 different countries.
Their original store was in Seattle’s Pike Place Market where they began selling
whole bean and ground coffee, tea and spices. They strive to serve the best coffee
possible by making sure that it is grown under the highest standards of quality.
They have employees who travel the world looking for the best coffee beans. As
the Starbucks brand grew they began selling their exceptional products that their
customers enjoyed in stores for their homes and making it very convenient for taking
them on the go. Aside from their tasty coffee and teas they began expanding their brand
to merchandise and fresh food to include many baked goods such as cakes, cookies, and
pastries.
Starbucks, like many companies, have a very iconic brand image; to be specific
they have a two tailed mermaid, also known as a Siren. This Siren, according to
Starbucks.com, “She is a storyteller, carrying the lore of Starbucks ahead, and
remembering our past. In a lot of ways, she’s a muse –always there, inspiring us and
pushing us ahead. And she’s a promise too, inviting all of us to find what we’re looking
for, even if it’s something we haven’t even imagined yet.” This sets a very powerful
brand image and to some people inspires feelings of emotions due to the sentimental
value of Starbucks in their daily lives.
Through this branding Starbucks has created not only a brand but a
culture. Starbucks customers are among the most loyal customers you can find. With the
creation of this culture Starbucks has become a place to chat, meet up for work, a
neighborhood gathering place that is a daily routine. Winning as many 10 different
awards for their success multiple years in a row.
The purpose of this paper is to apply the learnings of our consumer behavior class
to a real retail setting. Applying observation tactics from the book “Why We Buy” by
Paco Underhill. Also we each did a secret shopper forum evaluating the employees on the
service that we received from them. Each of the members of our group observed the
customers in Starbucks for a total of 2 hours at different times and days of the week.
Below is a chart of the different occasions that we observed the customers within
Starbucks. During our observations we watched a customer from the moment that they
entered the store until they received their order and either sat down or left the store, on a
pad of paper wrote down all of our observations of each individual customer. We used a
timer to time the amount of time from start to finish, timing their experience.
Name of
Observer
Date of
Observation
Starting time
Ending Time
Duration
Number of
Customer Observed
Thomas
D’Ambrosio
Tuesday October
21st
10:30 AM
11:25 AM
55 minutes
5
Thomas
D’Ambrosio
Thursday October
23rd
11:50 AM
12:55 PM
65 minutes
7
Clara Canny
Friday October 24 st 10:00 AM
11:00 AM
60 minutes
4
Clara Canny
Thursday October
23rd
08:00 PM
09:00 PM
60 minutes
5
Christian
Korneev
Monday October 20 11:00 AM
12:15 PM
75 minutes
6
Christian
Korneev
Thursday October
23rd
01:00 PM
02:00 PM
60 minutes
5
Jessica
Montgomery
Tuesday October
14th
9:00AM
10:30AM
90 minutes
10
Jessica
Montgomery
Thursday October
23rd
1:00PM
2:00PM
60 Minutes
6
Luis Salas
Friday October 17th 1:00PM
1:30PM
40 minutes
4
Luis Salas
Monday October
21st
2:10PM
40 minutes
5
Luis Salas
Wednesday October 10:25AM
23rd
11:05AM
40 minutes
4
Stephanie
Caldeira
Thursday October
23rd
12:45pm
45 minutes
5
Stephanie
Caldeira
Friday October 24th 2:00pm
3:00pm
60 minutes
7
1:30PM
12:00pm
The experience for the customer begins as soon as you approach the outside area
seating area and get into the line to make your purchase. The outside seating area is when
the experience begins because you can already see people socializing and enjoy their
beverages and baked goods. This sets the mood for whats to come inside, where you will
find more people socializing and studying. As you look to the right side of the store there
are many more people that are alone on their laptops studying individually with
headphones on. And to the left of the store there is more of a line and people in groups
socializing.
This Starbucks location is on the campus of the University of Central Florida
parallel to their famous Memory Mall. This is a high foot-traffic area and the curb appeal
attracts the eyes of many students passing by as they see other students enjoying
themselves outside. Compared to other locations that you can get coffee at on campus
this one is a very central location and close to many of the different colleges. This
location also has much more seating areas and a more social atmosphere than the other
coffee locations.
As you enter the shaded glass doors of Starbucks you enter the transition zone.
They have an stanchion with retractable black tape making a line right as you enter the
door. Further into the line they have small shelving units that contain merchandise such
as travel tumblers, ground coffee, and other branding merchandise. As you approach the
front of the line you are faced with a delicious case of baked goods tempting you as you
look up at the menu of beverages just right above the glass case of goods. Many of the
customers do not look up from their phones or pay much attention to their surroundings
until they are in the last leg of the line near the menu and glass case of baked goods.
From the line the customers approach one of the 4 employees to place their order.
Each cash register where the employees take the orders has to employees one placing the
order into the computer and taking your payment and the other asking your name and
writing the ingredients of your beverage onto a cup and placing it in the line of cups
waiting to be filled and handed to the customers. After their orders are placed the
customer then walks over to left of the registers to wait for their drinks to be prepared.
From there they either leave the store through the door located near the waiting area or go
to take a seat and socialize or study with the meals.
The floor plan of Starbucks is quite large, but due to the scattered seating
arrangement it appears to be sort of cramped. Many people while waiting for drinks all
piled up towards the left side of the store where the baristas would serve the coffee and
announce the customer’s names. I could imagine this arrangement working very well and
being very organized during a slower hour, but during the afternoon rush, around 1 p.m.
to be more specific, this arrangement appeared to be very cluttered, disorganized and
didn’t seem like the most efficient thing. The exit is on the left hand side of the store
though, so the exit zone was at least done correctly due to customers being able to obtain
their drinks and baked goods and follow the path outside and avoid the line that was
extending out past the doors. The butt brush effect appeared to occur often due to some
people waiting closer to the registers which ends up backing up the flow of traffic a bit
more than it should. All observations were made during the weekdays (Monday-Friday)
at fairly scattered timing with as early as 9am and as late as 9pm.
The logos within Starbucks are very prominent. Upon entering Starbucks there is
the logo of the name across the top prior to the entrance, alongside a massive sign of a
well-recognized Starbucks logo of the mermaid placed in a visible location in the
window. Upon entering the store, the front door is placed with many logos. Signs of
future promotions, along with current promotions are placed in the center at eye level,
impossible to miss. Pictures of holiday inspired drinks and holiday designs to promote
the up and coming holiday drinks about to arrive. Arriving inside, into the line, there are
add-on sections for those who wait. The signage on the add-ons, are promotions for the
current coffee beans for sale. Additional signage is for promotional cups and mugs for the
upcoming holiday season. Arriving at the cash register signage for the new holiday drinks
are most eye catching as the new promotion.
The design and placements is very eye catching, well placed and organized. They
make sure all signage is at eye level, making sure the consumer will not be able to not
miss it. The current holiday promotions are added by fall-like and winter-like designs,
making it feel more like a holiday theme. The right message are placed as the consumer
wants to see the current promotions at the front door even before they walk in they have a
sense of what Starbucks has to offer before entering. The store is doing extremely well
with signage, although they can make better improvements with the signage location in
line, while the consumer waits they may not wait a massive sign with the current coffee
to look at, while they are waiting to order their drink, although it is a good placement
idea, not all consumers enjoy it being so prominently in front of them.
Our mystery shopping experience started when we arrived at Starbucks. We made
sure to check how the cashier treated me, and how their energy was that day. We
observed that they were all in uniform and tidy, and whether or not they wore a name tag.
We made note if they tried to upsell or add additional add on items. Also noted if they
said thank you for coming and the way they said goodbye, if they were smiling and
enthusiastic while completing the transaction.
We timed the wait time would be like for my drink and to notice how long people
in front of me had been waiting. The location had appeared extremely clean for such a
busy clientele throughout the day. The grab and go section was fully stocked with waters
and pre made sandwiches, and all the items desired were available. Proper price tags were
placed, and prices were the same at the register. We all had a total percentage of at least
95% satisfaction with our experience.
This Starbucks Coffee location is very customer friendly, providing some of the
best features for persons with disabilities; before walking into the shop, which is ground
level next to Health and Public Affairs; they provide automatic glass doors that make it
easy for people on wheelchairs to enter the store. Braille signage is also properly used at
the entrance making it more accessible for people with other disabilities. Starbucks
strives “to design and operate stores so that they are accessible to all persons with
disabilities,” and are committed to “providing services in a manner that respects the
disability and independence of persons with disability.” When it comes to the floor plan,
this Starbucks location lacks a bit on order structure; it would be difficult for a blind
person (unless being help by a support person) to make his way into line and be able to
follow. It can also be overwhelming for a handicapped person to make his/her way
through line and wait near the waiting area for it can get a bit cluttery when it gets busy.
As previously stated there is a line that starts right upon your arrival. It is set up in
such a way that while you are waiting, you are able to see all the different products they
have to offer either by looking to the menus hanging on top or by checking out the
different samples they have. The waiting time can vary and we would say that it reaches
its peak when there is a UCF football game that day. Excluding that, the lines will
normally be between 2 to 5 minutes with an extra 3 or 4 minutes to serve your order.
The location of the checkout is right at the end of the line where we find all the
employees with their corresponding registers. Normally they have between 2 or 3
registers open at a time, depending on the amount of work they have at that particular
moment.
The employees in our case always greeted us with a warm smile and worried
about how our day was going. This did not delay the process because at the same time
they were registering the pertinent orders we took. By doing so they really made us feel
very comfortable and created a very friendly atmosphere.
In addition to that, after realizing your payment you have very close to the
registers a very nice and comfortable sofa with some extra chairs. This is a great idea so
people can sit down and rest for that short time they have to wait for their order to come.
In conclusion the process that Starbucks employs is very effective and makes it
overall a great experience although you were only planning on buying a coffee. If we
could recommend something to even make this experience better is that, if you are
planning on taking your drink at the store, they could bring it up to the table where you
are sat.
As this Starbucks is located next to the center of the UCF campus we would
expect the main target to be boys and girls between the age of 18 to 25 that are college
students searching for a quick break or a place with free Wi-Fi where they would be able
to do their work. As seen in the chart below, all together we observed a total of 73
people, and 52 were women and 21 were men that came into Starbucks and purchased an
item of some sort.
Gender Observed
Women
Men
The vast majority of people entering Starbucks are buyers. People that come to
Starbucks are searching normally for a coffee and a quick snack. Because their is such a
high number of females that purchase from starbucks, this contributes to why they spend
so little time inside the store. If the women are accompanied by another woman they are
much more likely to spend more time inside the store. Their business is associated with a
bunch of customers making small money purchases, that at the end of the day, add up to a
big quantity. The only shoppers we can think of are all the friends that accompany the
customers in line.
In this case it is pretty clear that there are way more buyers than shoppers, we
could agree that the relation between them would be around 90% buyers, 10% shoppers.
And again, this “shoppers” should have a different name. As they are normally not just
watching what Starbucks has to offer, they are waiting for the person they came with to
get their order. In addition to this, we can say that the interception rate is pretty high with
the buyers and increases with the shoppers when there is a larger queue. This happens
because employees come around the line to take order and interact with them even if they
were not planning on buying anything.
The fact that the Starbucks is located next to the center of the UCF campus makes
it very difficult for them to widen their age target. The only days where we see different
age groups are when there are important events or a football game.
What People Did Post-Transaction
Leave
Stay
0
10
20
Men
30
40
50
Women
As seen in the above graph, our group all tallied whether the people we observed
ended up staying or leaving, a surprising amount did not stay during the hours that we
had observed. 43 out of the 52 women and 18 out of the 21 men we observed all left after
receiving their food and/or beverage. While 9 out of the 52 women and 3 out of the 21
men stayed to all enjoy their food and beverages while they did other things such as
socialize or work on their laptops. These were very interesting findings considering the
amount of people that came in with a friend or group of friends were large, you would
think they would stay and socialize.
Issues that we observed was that the retail space was not very handicap
accessible, the bathrooms and back area where the most accessible for them but very hard
for them to get there. This crowding gets even worse during high traffic and peak hours
of the day, the waiting space is very small and would be hard to maneuver a wheelchair
through. The waiting are being so small may because the condiments table is very close
to the waiting area taking up lots of space that could be used for people standing and
waiting for their items ordered. The outside tables are always full and are also very small
making it hard to fit all our electronics, notebooks, and beverages. Their menu is very
minimal, for new customers this may be confusing. Prices are also printed very small and
hard for people to see.
Recommendations to fix the issues that we noticed. We would suggest to move
the condiment table to towards the front of the store adjacent and left of the fireplace.
This would fix multiple problems, it would make it easier for handicap accessibility, and
the crowding during the peak hours of the day. Adding more tables or getting larger
tables both inside and out would make it easier for people to stay and study, there is a
high volume of people that leave after they reserve their order and this may help to make
people more inclined to stay. Something else they can do to make people want to stay
more is to give people numbers to set on a table and they bring the drink or food out to
you instead of you standing and waiting for it, this would also help greatly with the
clutter that happens with everyone in the same corner waiting for their name to be called.
To help the new customers with understanding the menu, a brief beverage description
with pricing would really help and give customers something to look at while in line.
Looking for prices would be easier if they were a little larger, being college student’s
prices are important to us.
During our observations other things that we noticed:

During the lunch hours people order more iced beverages and are more inclined to
purchase the pre made food items.

Morning hours hot beverages were purchased more frequently than iced
beverages

The left side of the store was much more social

The right side was filled with individuals on their computers studying and
plugged into their technology

We did not observe any groups of people larger than two people

Almost everyone paid with a credit card
From this experience, we learned many things from the observing the customers
at starbucks. As regular customers you dont often pay attention to all the things that are
going on at the same time to make your experience as smooth as possible. There are
many employees working on our order and making it as timely as possible. We saw that
Starbucks is really good at recognizing a problem and solving it before it gets out of
hand; As the line grows long during the lunch hour, they sent an employee out to take
their orders in the line so that when they got to the register all they needed to do was pay
for their items. This process increases the interception rate and makes the customers feel
more relevant. The familiarity that customers have with starbucks, permits that they do
not have to spend any money on advertising. Their culture is very strong and many
customers know what they want before they even walk in. People are very loyal to the
brand and are willing to pay the premium price for it.
Works Cited
"Company
Information."
Starbucks
Coffee
Company.
Web.
05
Nov.
2014.
<http://www.starbucks.com/about-us/company-information>.
"So, Who Is the Siren?" Starbucks Coffee Company. Web. 05 Nov. 2014.
<http://www.starbucks.com/blog/so-who-is-the-siren>.
http://globalassets.starbucks.com/assets/587e5e1925784b708b970c109a0bde92.pdf
http://globalassets.starbucks.com/assets/233b9b746b384f8ca57882614f6cebdb.pdf