US coffee chains have a bewildering range of coffee based drinks, almost to the point where ordering a plain black filter coffee will get you weird looks.
Depending on where you are, a "regular" black coffee could also be an espresso. A drink which was made by adding water to it and removing the crema (the horror!) from it is the standard in some places. So, it's best to disambiguate it and I suppose that's why they force you to do that. To be honest, I never go to starbucks. So, I don't know if that is the case - I'm speculating from no real data.
Australia was so annoying on that front. On the whole amazing coffee, but no one served filter or french press coffee, After two weeks I was dying for a nice large cup of black coffee.
The big US chains are very similar to the big European chains. If anything the big US coffee chains, especially Starbucks, arguably originated the model that the big European chains are following almost as a template. The late-20th-century European chains like Baresso, Costa, Nero, etc. do like to play up an "Italian" influence (hence the vaguely Italian names), but in practice their management strategy was pretty much to clone Starbucks. You can see this in part because their menu range and naming tends to follow the US style rather than the Italian style (e.g. Costa's "macchiato" and "iced cappuccino" are American imports).
Flat white is (or at least was) an Australian thing. Never seen it anywhere else (though I suppose it might be spreading). But, Starbucks has everything else (and then some).
I thought Flat White was a London thing. I know it originated from Australia, but its well known as being the overpriced banker/technology worker/lawyer/well paid person drink in London.
I was living in London only 3 or 4 years ago. I never saw it! Weird. But I'm a coffee nerd, so probably I never went to the kinds of cafes that serve it. I actually like a proper flat white -- coffee made with milk instead of water. Just never seen it outside of Australia.
You can't have looked very hard. So called "Third Wave" artisanal coffee shops hit London around 13 years ago, mostly started by Australian immigrants bringing with them the "Flat White". The flat white become such a hipster go to drink that by 2010 they were added to the Starbucks menu in London.
That's a bit harsh. I moved to London in 2013 and I remember I had to order flat white off-menu most of the time back then. Most places knew how to make it but just charged capuchino on the bill. Today it's everywhere.
“Flat White opened its doors in 2005 because it was nigh impossible to get a flat white; the strong, delicious creamy coffee of our namesake.
London lacked a strong independent café/coffee culture so we set out to be beacon & inspiration for other people who loved coffee, independent spirit and good old-fashioned hospitality.
Flash forward and over ten years on London is thriving with many varied and different coffee offerings- a vibrant and exciting scene of excellence and commitment to excellence.”
And to add some more context. A New Zealander I know wrote a London coffee map app around 2010 to teach himself iOS app development. He curated the list of coffee shops he added to the map (they had to serve a proper flat white) and at time of release he’d added over 150 coffee shops.
In 2007 and then again in 2009 the world barista champions hailed from London.
All this should give you an idea of how quickly the London artisan coffee scene exploded in the late “noughties”.
So if you’re claiming to be a coffee nerd who couldn’t find a flat white in London in 2014, I’m going to say you didn’t look very hard.
Note: Not one chain ever featured on that app. I only mentioned Starbucks above to illustrate how ubiquitous the Flat White was at that time (2010) that Starbucks felt they had to add it to their menu to stay relevant/competitive.