This is a great example of a HUGE competitive advantage Starbucks has over regular merchants that's very unfair. Smaller merchants don't get the scale advantages here...
Although, having tried Starbucks coffee, I have to say it's terrible!
Maybe it's the way it's made with an automatic machine and a disinterested barista, or perhaps the beans are over-roasted and mass produced in a factory. Just about any small coffee shop makes better espresso based coffee than them, especially in Sydney, Australia, where Starbucks continues to struggle to gain a foothold.
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.
It really depends on the market, I guess.
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.