Starbucks – you know it well, especially if you live in the Seattle area. Great overpriced coffee for all the people who are addicted to it in today’s society. Whether you’re looking for that morning jolt or just a refreshing frappucino, Starbucks is right around the corner offering you a $3 cup of whatever you want.

Well, just so happens that Starbucks decided to release a “coupon” to a limited number of Starbucks employees by email with the following text:

Example Email
Hi Everyone,
Starting today until September 30th, please join us in “surprising and delighting” our family and friends, while introducing you to our iced beverages. Attached is an invitation for a complimentary iced Grande beverage. Please forward this invitation to everyone in your email address book.Thanks so much!Kimberly Beasley
*Starbucks Coffee Company*
*Southeast Regional Coordinator*
*(404) 636-5200 ext 2200*Attached Image

“Hey, we can provide coupons to people who never or rarely visit our store to get their hands on addicting stuff that they won’t be able to drop later on – means more $$$ later on in the long run! Let’s do it!”

Well, a few things went wrong with this little “coupon”.
» First of all, the coupon itself – it asks to be printed out on a regular piece of paper. Most coupons are printed on a special…well, coupon paper, making it a coupon.
» The other thing about this coupon design was that it could be used, reused, and reused again – as much as you wanted to use it. One drink per customer per visit – and one visit counts as walking out of the store and walking back in. Print them out for all your friends and come in three times a day if you’d like.
» In addition to that, the Corporate Starbucks office didn’t tell all of the Starbucks locations about this offer. In fact, they thought it wouldn’t spread at all. So there were plenty of people who went to a Starbucks store and were told the coupon wasn’t legit (even though it was).
» Once people figured out that it was legit – well, the stores were packed, especially in areas like New York where people waited in huge lines just to get a $2-3 drink.
» And by people, I mean lots of people. Why? Starbucks initially thought that there would only be a limited number of people using this coupon but…oh wait, look at the email again:

“Please forward this invitation to everyone in your email address book.”

Myspace analogy: the real Tom posts a bulletin telling everyone that you can get a free CD if you message him. The bulletin will be reposted…people will email other people etc. Then it gets posted on a website where 500k people a day visit and…well…chaos ensues.

So what does Starbucks do, since they are losing so much money off of this little money maker? They cancel it and say it’s no longer valid.

Well, there were still people who decided to wait in long lines only to find that the coupon was cancelled on them. What do they do? They sue Starbucks for $114 million dollars.

Quote From BusinessWeek.com
The $114 million the lawsuit asks for approximates the average cost of one cup of Starbucks coffee a day for all of the people turned away* for the 38 days the offer was valid, Sullivan explained. “That’s a very conservative figure,” he said.*note: this lawsuit was filed in the state of New York and only for the residents of New York

Final Statement: Someone at Starbucks is going to get / already got their butt soooo fired.