I'm curious if there have been studies about people not caring about the URL or showing it is a more of a usability hinderance than help. I remember arguments about this back in the late 90s (some suggested VRML navigation as a solution!), and the web has still seemed to take off despite no significant changes to the URL bar before the last few years.

In your example, wouldn't the "BC" be the domain name and not "Starbucks?" I don't know if there's any way to know with certainty in all URLs whether the domain name or the path components are more important to a user.