Gloomy Friday

Fomenting revolution at the B&N Starbucks. They've been trying to supersize me all the time.

Last week when I ordered my usual (Tall Soy Chai Latte), she said with a sense of alarm in her voice, "That's only 12 ounces! Is that going to be enough for you??!!!" I think I laughed in a derisive snort. "Ye-ahh...." Like, "I've been coming here every Friday night for weeks now, chicky, don't you think I'd know if that was going to be enough for me?"

This week it was really busy and the girl with the newly darkened hair was serving everyone on her own so it took a long time. Finally an offsider, a young guy, came in and helped her, and he ended up taking my order. Tall Soy Chai. "The larger size is only fifty cents more, do you want to upgrade?" (He didn't say "upgrade" but it was some word like that.) No thanks. He went off to make my drink, and I asked the girl with the newly darkened hair, "How much larger is the Medium?" "Four ounces," she said. "Fifty cents is a lot, for four ounces!" I said. Created solidarity with the woman standing behind me, a sensible Wisconsin person, but the two employees got very grumpy and stopped making eye contact with me.

Next time I might speak to the girl with the newly darkened hair because she's there every time, should be starting to recognize me, and seems more senior that the other two. I might ask her to please, please not try to supersize her customers, especially by telling lies to us or doing slimy sales-things like adding "only" to "fifty cents" when in fact that's a huge increase, 11 cents per ounce, and a 20% uplift in price from the already overpriced drink that we've ordered. Don't lie to the customers. Should be a big plaque on the Starbucks wall.