[lsc]

>maybe atmosphere (a safe comfortable place to hang for awhile),

So I mean, coffee shops in general, yes. But at least in urban areas? Starbucks seems to be really well-designed to maximize throughput and profit; they have fewer seats, usually per cup of coffee sold than the smaller coffee places, and generally seem to be set up for 'to go'.

It's one of those things where if I look at it as an investor, I really like it, but if I look at it as a consumer, the opposite.

[seanmcdirmid]

What urban areas? Seattle? No, downtown stores have seats, there are very few togo stores, heck the one near the library is pure plush seat forest (the one in Paris near the grand opera is like that also). You can’t operate togo stores at all in China, where your sales volume is strictly limited by the amount of seating you have (unlike the USA). Tokyo has the best seating I’ve ever seen in a Starbucks, maybe NYC?

It really depends on the market, I guess.

[lsc]

mm. in santa clara, redwood city, san francisco and Los Angeles, Starbucks usually have few places to sit (compared to local coffee shops) - and are usually way busier (compared to local coffee shops) and usually don't offer mugs; they just have to-go cups (or bring your own mug) - while most of the nicer local places give you a mug by default if you say it's 'for here'

I mean, sure, they aren't 'to go only' - but they are impractical places to meet or hang out compared to most smaller coffee shops, just because they seem to have a much worse (or, I guess as an investor, better) ratio of customers to seats; a lot of time there are more people in line for coffee than there are tables.

I'm not saying they don't have seating at all, just that they seem to be optimized in a thoughtful way to sell as much coffee as possible, making them superior (if you are an investor) but inferior if you want a place to meet up with other people or hang out, when compared to the locally run and less-optimized coffee shops.