Screw 30% of their "stores"; I want it in 100% of my kitchens!

Well boy howdy, that's one fancy bean crushing contraption, and all shiny like too.

And to cover costs, will I now have to pay 8 dollars for my less-than-stellar cup-o-joe?

@bobdobbs: If you have a good one already, just move on. High-end home espresso machines should never need to be replaced - at least without any degree of regularity. In 15 years, I've only ever owned two. The first one lasted 10 years.

@skittlzncombos:
You mean to tell me that your local Starbucks are charging less than $8 for their their mediocre coffee?

You guys are behind the times.

@OMG! Ponies!: yeah, I've got a Livia 90 and matching grinder that work fine. They don't look as cool as that, though.

@Darkest Daze: I try to buy the cheap stuff, so only 5.50.....

in the good ol' days when baristas had the manual espresso machines, where you had to grind the beans, measure, stamp them just perfectly and time them perfectly ... it was tedious. During Christmas rushes, it was HELL. But they were an artform, like bartendering to get the perfect shot and the corporation took that away from us. Yeah, it's easier, but the perfect shot from an experienced barista tastes 100x better than the regular shot from the automated machine. There's no finesse, no perfection, no elitism that us (ex) baristas enjoy so much. Face it, working at Second Cup just doesn't sound as cool as Starbucks.

I hope this will help them, but they'd better combine this with some serious retraining for their baristas, because their coffee and espresso drinks leave a lot to be desired right now. I only go there in a pinch. A much better local chain in California is Pete's, if you can find one. But Starbucks has a LONG way to go to match the lattes I've had in Sydney or Seattle, or here at home on my Gaggia espresso machine.

So im a Starbucks Barista and over the past quarter Howard Schultz has come back in as CEO, as most of you probably know. He is changing a lot with the company. We're getting rid of the breakfast sandwiches by September or so. The new Pike Place Roast is going to be a consistent coffee in all of our stores, brewed all day every day. We're always changing our pastries, but we recently added a few. The next big things will be this new machine, iTunes in the stores which was announced last winter, and more recently they've started putting AT&T wifi in some of the stores on the west coast and from what i here we're all supposed to get it soon.

I don't need you to tell me how fucking good my coffee is, okay? I'm the one who buys it, I know how good it is. When Bonnie goes shopping, she buys shit. Me, I buy the gourmet expensive stuff because when I drink it, I want to taste it. But you know what's on my mind right now? It ain't the coffee in my kitchen, it's the dead n***** in my garage.

Inappropriate Pulp Fiction quote is inappropriate

@redman042: Peet's is great if you like burnt coffee.

@redman042:
I whole heartedly agree with you about Sydney. Every single coffee place I went made lattes that were good as the best you can get here in the states. Come to think of it, the food was too. The average quality of food there is equal to higher end restaurants in the states.

Is this a development resulting from their acquisition of Clover?

@ludwigk: No. Clover machine is for regular coffee, was an independent outfit Starbucks purchased. This is made by the company that makes their current espresso machines. Just a new model.

@Metkis: I love Pulp Fiction!

Petes is ok, it's the place to go if you like dark roasts. When I was over at coffegeek.com they affectionately call Starbucks Charbucks and for good reason, they roast the shit out of their beans for consistency.

They're the coffee of last resort for me. I don't know about any place that uses fixed machines. How do they adjust for the perfect shot? 18-24 seconds depends on each batch, grind, etc.

Only smarmbucks would attempt to bill an automatic espresso machine as a guarantee of quality. The level of corporately honed ignorance and bullshit underlines its unwavering commitment to mediocrity, one cup at a time.

@dangj307: Well, they can't fulfill requests to pull short or long with the current stuff.

Blech. Starbucks is overroasted superautomatic crap.

@skittlzncombos: here in Copenhagen, I ALREADY pay about $8 for a cup of coffee anywhere (except 7-11, thats only about $4.50, lol).... sigh.... at least it's usually damn good coffee, and I dont miss Starbucks.

The only Starbucks we have is at the airport, and If I want to get my old "favorite starbucks" drink, a Quad Grande toffee nut latte, costs me around $13 here! Seriously

@daftrok: doh! NOT one of their best episodes, but watchable, as always :^) and when Butters gets mad at Eric and *pats* him on the chest in anger, it truly puts to rest the age old question 'bout his sexuality. Poor Butters.

I just tried coffee for the first time in my 40+ years. It's amazing that anyone can make money, let alone build stores every ten feet, based on the taste of coffee.

@FThorn: Terrible isn't it?

Now get out of the way, I'm empty. ;)

"Hopefully, this means better coffee" -- not if the stuff going in is Starbx. Ugh. GIGO.

First, find a decent roaster who doesn't burn your beans and knows how to do a proper french or city roast. Then look for a machine. I'll highly recommend my Salvatore semi-auto. Massive brass boiler, full commercial head, an on/off switch and a pump button.

Then you can enjoy coffee that tastes like roasted coffee smells...

WOW is it really that serious? [www.budcase.com]

F Starbucks. The only time I walk into one is to place the Starbuck's gift card I inevitably receive into the employee's tip jar. "Knock yourselves out."

Coffee-philes: almost as funny as audiophiles. Keep it up, guys.

Nice machine. What about getting some NOT over-roasted coffee?

@FThorn: seriously? you only just had coffee for the first time ever?? in 40 years? ummmmm, wow. WHY?

Starbucks sucks... No wonder their stock is cratering - went their two times in past week and thier cappucinos were flavorless and watered down - something hard to do with their burnt-ass beans.

I'm personally going to boycott them.

Here's an idea - Lavazza - open up a competing chain - with taste and quality vs. "starbucks coffee experience" whatever that is.

Drink Intelligentsia coffee

swiss (not swedish) quality machine...

probably won't blend :)

"They'll be in about 30 percent of US stores by the end of this year, and 75 percent by 2010, but I think with a woodier look to them."

Do we really need an espresso machine with a woody?

i hope starbucks stock tanks so i can afford to load up on it for cheap- they have cornered the market on coffee and for good reason-mostly consistant coffee no matter where you are (the same coffee i had in seattle was just as flavorful as the cup i had 10 hours later in frankfurt)and since its highly addictive, it will be around and successful for years to come- that is of course if they don't F-it up by trying to appeal to the masses with this new watered down/weak Pikes Place Roast which is basically a dunkin donuts flavor knock off.

@matt buchanan:
The bummer is for the small local shop near my casa that splurged and got a clover to DIFFERENTIATE themselves from the starbucks only to have the bucks buy the company. The coffee is great however.

@islandhopper: ya laeser okonomi a handelsjoken (sic) a kobenhavn! Hej Hej

@ithcy: As a well-caffeinated guy with a bunch of tube amps in his house, I resemble that remark.

Seriously, its about getting the most for your money. I could frequent Starbucks, drink bad coffee, and pay through the nose for it. Or, I can invest in a well engineered espresso machine and grinder, use my tastebuds to find a good, local roaster, and--on an amortized basis taking into account beans--pay about $0.40 per cuppa joe.

Better coffee, less money. Dismiss me as a coffee-phile, but it doesn't mean the advice is bad.

@FThorn: Oddly enough, I didn't really drink coffee till my kids started working at Starbucks. :)

You can't regain soul or make good espresso with a superauto. At best you can can achieve consistent mediocrity. So much for Starbucks and their efforts "to change".

@Thud: Last I looked, "well-engineered espresso machines" and the attendant equipment cost hundreds or thousands of dollars. It would take the average person years to spend that much on coffee at Starbucks or anywhere else, let alone if they just brewed it at home with a regular old coffee machine. I'm not defending Starbucks here - I can burn my own coffee for much less than they charge for the service.

While I like coffee, I have no need to "quest for the perfect cup" or whatever. Obsessiveness is rarely a desirable character trait. I get along fine with cheap cuban espresso from the grocery store and a $10 stove top espresso maker. (Yes, I have had plenty of coffee from super expensive rigs.)

Instead of spending all that money on an espresso machine for your house, why not give it away to charity and drink crap coffee from the local diner for a year? You think your life will be less rich?

"High-performance Italian sports cars" aren't made in Switzerland, don't have automatic transmissions, and aren't designed for repetetive, push-button use by drivers with only a few hours of experience behind the wheel.

But maybe if Starbucks offered a driving school...

@ithcy: is judgmental! Maybe you should listen to yourself and stop obsessing about how others choose to spend their hard earned money.

I agree that a charitable life is the richest life one can live BUT you are assuming that Thud can't own a reliable and expensive espresso machine AND be charitable at the same time. Not a fair judgment. I know that a person can enjoy both!

@Siouxperman: But YOU'RE assuming that someone's money is hard-earned. How do you know that, exactly?

Not only that, but you're saying that if you have n dollars and give it all to charity, that's morally equal to having 2n dollars, giving n to charity and spending n on things you don't really need for yourself. I don't agree with that at all.

But the charity thing was really an aside - my point was that spending that much money on a coffee machine for yourself is ridiculously wasteful no matter how rich you are or what you do with the rest of your money. It's COFFEE. I can afford a super expensive espresso machine, and tube amps too, but for some reason I don't feel pressed to live like a Roman emperor.

But hey, that's just like, my opinion, man.

@ithcy: Wow, Starbucks coffee isn't the only bitter thing around here... Yes, a good coffee maker costs a fair bit. I'll be honest, and say I spend $1500 on mine, along with another $500 for a decent burr grinder (I would note that I purchased them from a small family-owned business). I spend about $12 per pound on good coffee, roasted by a local, single shop small business. My household consumes about 3 lbs every two weeks, or about 625 lbs over the last 8 years. At 16g of coffee per double, that comes to 28 drinks per pound, say 17,500 drinks over the past 8 years. I've owned my machine for eight years. Total hardware investment = $1500+$500, add in another $12 x 625 = $7500, so the cost per shot is about $0.54. Even at a diner you pay more than that, prolly a saving a buck, and I get better coffee.

So, buying an espresso machine and making my coffee at home seems to have saved me about $17,500 over drinking diner swill, no?

And, I certainly believe my money is hard earned. And, I'm guessing both that as a percentage of annual income and in raw dollars I've contributed more to charity that you have in the past couple years.

Your point seems to be that you are entitled to make judgments about how I spend my money because you don't give a hoot about coffee or because your taste buds suck. The irony is that you're posting in a gadget forum... Can you really claim there is no extravagance in your life?