Starbucks: Won't You Be My Neighbor?

Who would have guessed that Starbucks would be missed in a place like Southold?

Situated on the picturesque North Fork of Long Island, the 368-year old village harkens back to simpler times. There's Rothman's Department Store, the 90-plus year old family-owned emporium where vintage guitars and banjos hang amidst the jumble of Styrofoam coolers, light bulbs, and other miscellany. There's a luncheonette where high school kids scoop ice cream for locals and tourists. There's Southold Pharmacy where the clerks actually know your name.

Last year, Starbucks decided to open three shops in the area. One of them was in Southold. Some weekenders -- many hale from Starbucks-saturated Manhattan -- grumbled and vowed to boycott the place. The locals said maybe it wasn't such a bad thing. Teenagers need a place to hang out, said one of the owners of a competing coffee and gelato shop in nearby Greenport, where another Starbucks was also taking root.

The mom and pop-ness of this area is profound. Farmstands dot the local byways. Since Colonial times, local families have harvested first potatoes, and now peaches, corn and greens. More recently, vineyards have sprouted on many of the former potato farms.

As both The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal have written recently, a strong sense of community doesn't necessarily breed Starbucks-hatred. The mega-coffee chain has a funny way of insinuating itself into the local zeitgeist

So when Starbucks announced that it was closing our local branch, I wondered what the response would be.

For one, you would think that competing mom and pops would be dancing the jig.

Not so, at least at the Piping Plover Café. It's a small sandwich place on Southold's main road. It also happens to be is situated right next door to the big box coffee purveyor.

Says Jenny Myers, who with her husband, Ken, runs the place: "It was hard at first," when Starbucks flung open its doors about a year ago At this point, though, a bond appears to have formed between giant coffee maker and the modest eatery.

"It was nice having them as a neighbor," says Myers, who expressed concern about the Starbucks employees who might lose their jobs.

Then, of course, with the economy in a tailspin, there's a certain "we're all in it together" mentality.

"If someone like Starbucks isn't going to make it, who will ?" she asks.

"If anybody went out, I think I would be upset." she says. "We became friendly with them."

Comments

[mouselion]

Starbuck's financial dynamics are different than the mom and pop cafe. Starbucks is closing stores because it is a financial colossus -- and this is what they do in the really lean times, they down-size.

This is the problem with the Starbucks model. It is based on getting larger and larger in order to keep its profits performing for its shareholders. The independent coffee house however is not a pawn in the Wall Street game as its next door neighbor happens to be.

[Paul]

Sometimes the best business ideas are the simplist: take 50 cents worth of coffee and charge $5 for it.

[Irene S. Levine - Huffpost Blogger]

Hi Laura:

We had the same reaction in my town when Starbuck's first arrived...and I would have felt terrible if ours had been on "the list."

Too many retail stores, large and small, are going out of business as our economy is tanking. It's very scary because each store has an owner and workers.

Best,
Irene