Starbucks Baristas: The daily grind
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Question from non barista: why are Starbucks employees so goddamn rude online? (self.starbucksbaristas)
submitted by violet331
[removed]
lelaluv 4 points 2y ago
can we have a place to vent? is that allowed? you’re upset over being downvoted in a subreddit that’s designed for baristas to vent or ask questions to other baristas. we vent on here because we’re allowed to. we can’t roll our eyes in a customers face when they order 5 customized 6+ modification having drinks, press us for how long it takes, then don’t tip us either. we are treated like coffee robots. it throws off our routine and sequencing when somebody orders something weird. am i going to be mean about it? no. but may i come to the starbucks/ starbucksbaristas subreddit to express how annoying it was in that moment? probably, because it’s a community of people who understand. also, tik tok drinks have only made our lives more complicated so yeah, finding out there’s a new ‘tik tok drink’ does annoy me. but when you order it i’m going to happily make it for you because it is my job, and honestly that’s all that matters. who cares if i go and vent later online to other baristas? i would also like to add that if we didn’t have times shoved down our throats by our managers 24/7, making custom drinks would be a lot less annoying. but when you have a customer ordering a 6+ modification drink with all types of random shit in it and your manager is poking you about times and being faster..... it becomes overwhelming.
violet331 [OP] -2 points 2y ago
If you read my post, I said I understand drinks with a bunch of modifications. The drink I mentioned was not one of those drinks. Which is the problem. Complaining about a drink with one modification makes baristas look whiny. That’s like complaining that someone asked to add avocado on their burger. One modification.
lelaluv 2 points 2y ago
like i said, it comes down to us being pushed to be fast and adding a tea bag is an extra step that messes with our sequencing. i personally wouldn’t sit and tell people not to order it, i also work nights so it’s slower, therefore making custom drinks isn’t a big deal. but that is why i can imagine other baristas complaining. and also, the way we hand craft drinks is not the equivalent to adding something onto a burger.
violet331 [OP] -1 points 2y ago
But is cussing at people on tik tok the way to make them care? No. It has the opposite effect
lelaluv 1 points 2y ago
nobody defended those people. i just explained why it’s frustrating. also, you clearly aren’t aware how entitled, rude, demanding, and borderline abusive our customers can be. i’m not sure why this is pressing you so much, or why you expected us to all applaud your post or for everyone to agree with you. this subreddit is for starbucks baristas which you are not.
clay_face1 4 points 2y ago
I agree with you for the most part, the baristas can get really rude about customers online sometimes, I would be lying if I didn't vent about customers myself.
I think the issue with TikTok drinks for some people is they get into the routine of making drinks in a specific way, and when theirs a lot of modifications or unorthodox ones, like the peach tea bag, (unorthodox as in a unique not bad) it throws off barista's routine of what they know regarding how to make, say, the white hot chocolate. I haven't run across that drink yet, but I agree that's really an easy addition, just not the norm.
However if you have a lot of modifications in your drinks it can slow down the barista affect how long everyone else has to wait behind those complicated ones, ( the sunset refresher was probably the most tedious imo ) and now that everyone is getting complicated tiktok drinks it means the wait time overall has increased for everyone. Hope this helped a bit!
I think the issue with TikTok drinks for some people is they get into the routine of making drinks in a specific way, and when theirs a lot of modifications or unorthodox ones, like the peach tea bag, (unorthodox as in a unique not bad) it throws off barista's routine of what they know regarding how to make, say, the white hot chocolate. I haven't run across that drink yet, but I agree that's really an easy addition, just not the norm.
However if you have a lot of modifications in your drinks it can slow down the barista affect how long everyone else has to wait behind those complicated ones, ( the sunset refresher was probably the most tedious imo ) and now that everyone is getting complicated tiktok drinks it means the wait time overall has increased for everyone. Hope this helped a bit!
violet331 [OP] -2 points 2y ago
Yeah, I said I understand when people add a bunch of things, or if you saw my other comment people being cheap and trying to get an espresso shot add milk instead of paying for a latte. Stuff like that. But this subreddit is kind of proving my point. Besides you 3 kind people who answered I went from 4 upvotes to one on my original post. Lol venting about your job is fine, everyone does it. & it sucks when work gets busy. But it seems like wether someone orders a white hot chocolate add peach tea bag or a iced latte with 10 pumps caramel 10 pumps vanilla 10 pumps raspberry grande no ice with a venti cup of ice on the side the reaction is always the same. No matter how simple or complicated baristas are in the comments acting like someone shot their mom. Probably because they’re mostly teenagers but it’s annoying lol
Savmac1020 2 points 2y ago
All I can say is you try working here, then you’ll get it :)
violet331 [OP] -3 points 2y ago
I have been a server in multiple restaurants. I understand someone asking for a complicated order. Which I said in the post and I have to keep repeating. Adding one thing to a drink or changing one thing in an order is not the end of the world.
KL258 2 points 2y ago
This just shows you have never worked at Starbucks. People are answering your question, but you just aren’t really listening to what they say. Also, any tea actually takes you majorly out of your routine and is an incredible pain in the ass to make at Starbucks. That is why usually the front register person makes teas so the bar person doesn’t get way out of routine. We have to constantly be making 2 drinks at once and to run to grab a tea bag, put on a glove, use tongs to get the bag out of the packet and pull the stupid string and not break the bag and get back to the bar in the few seconds your shot for your previous drink was pulling is pretty impossible. Plus you would have needed to prep your milk for this drink before even doing that in those same few seconds. Also, technically milk is not steamed to a hot enough temp to truly brew tea btw. So this “simple request” in your opinion is not actually that simple in the eyes of a barista. Just don’t add packets of honey to the drink, then you would really see the eyes roll lol.
darthtinmay 1 points 2y ago
Hello! I completely understand where you’re coming from. And to be completely honest, the drink you described is simple to make, even with the modifications. You literally just add the tea bags.
If I can speak from my personal experience (I understand everyone has their own unique one, so this one is just mine) it’s truly brutal being a barista, especially at Starbucks. I can say with 100% confidence that my coworkers and I try to be as kind to customers as possible. Now do we get it right all the time? Of course not. We’re human so their may be times when we’re short with some customers? However, again from my personal experience, 9 times out of 10 customers are so rude to us. Honestly don’t even treat us like we’re human. Swear at us. Call us horrible names. Quite honestly speak to us like we’re incompetent animals. It can be pretty brutal. (We have a running joke at my store that we’re not people when we clock-in but coffee slaves to the customers).
I think this subReddit is helpful(?) in a strange way I guess. For me at least. It’s nice to know that you’re not alone in your suffering as sad as that may sound.
However, with all that being said, our regular customers are what keeps me going. They’re always so kind and understanding. Being a barista is tough, but their are great moments as well.
Sorry for the long speech lol. I’ll get off my soap box now. I hope this helps a little bit in understanding baristas!
But I totally agree with you, some drinks are not bad, or hard at all. It’s really not a hill worth dying on lol.
Anyways! Have a good day!
If I can speak from my personal experience (I understand everyone has their own unique one, so this one is just mine) it’s truly brutal being a barista, especially at Starbucks. I can say with 100% confidence that my coworkers and I try to be as kind to customers as possible. Now do we get it right all the time? Of course not. We’re human so their may be times when we’re short with some customers? However, again from my personal experience, 9 times out of 10 customers are so rude to us. Honestly don’t even treat us like we’re human. Swear at us. Call us horrible names. Quite honestly speak to us like we’re incompetent animals. It can be pretty brutal. (We have a running joke at my store that we’re not people when we clock-in but coffee slaves to the customers).
I think this subReddit is helpful(?) in a strange way I guess. For me at least. It’s nice to know that you’re not alone in your suffering as sad as that may sound.
However, with all that being said, our regular customers are what keeps me going. They’re always so kind and understanding. Being a barista is tough, but their are great moments as well.
Sorry for the long speech lol. I’ll get off my soap box now. I hope this helps a little bit in understanding baristas!
But I totally agree with you, some drinks are not bad, or hard at all. It’s really not a hill worth dying on lol.
Anyways! Have a good day!
violet331 [OP] 1 points 2y ago
Yeah. I’ve worked in the service industry for about 3 years. I understand rude customers and I understand when someone makes a complicated order. My issue with the baristas I’ve seen online is the hateful comments people get from an order with one modification. I know how hard customers can make your job when they don’t know what they want or how to order. For example, I say I can get a grande iced caramel macchiato with almond milk. Try to say the things in order so you know exactly what I want. Especially since I worked in subway for a minute and people say “footlong ham” and expect me to know what bread. I understand dealing with rude customers. But as I said, ANY deviation from a standard drink, even one modification and the Starbucks baristas come out and are rude as fuck. Probably because they’re teenagers. But it’s immature and honestly people seeing that online makes people argue back with them about how it’s their job so get over it. On a barista subreddit, yeah complain. Go ahead. But doing it on tik toks of drinks that aren’t even complicated is unessecary.
darthtinmay 1 points 2y ago
I completely agree. In my opinion, if they’re on bar, and there’s just a couple modifications to a drink (even like 3-4 modifications), you should be fast enough to get it out in the same amount of time. (Because some people have food allergies and they can’t have the same milk, ya know?) and even making drinks with some modifications can be fun. Sometimes it gets repetitive and boring making the same thing.
And to add to your point, I’m appalled whenever I see baristas leave horrid comments to a non-baristas post. That’s not okay to do. Even ignoring the fact that they’re talking about Starbucks, leaving hate comments is never okay.
Even the old “Tik tok” drink is really easy to make and we can get it out quickly. The venti iced white mocha with extra caramel drizzle and vanilla sweet cream cold foam... It ain’t that hard, it ain’t that deep.
So ya. Completely agree with you 100000%
And to add to your point, I’m appalled whenever I see baristas leave horrid comments to a non-baristas post. That’s not okay to do. Even ignoring the fact that they’re talking about Starbucks, leaving hate comments is never okay.
Even the old “Tik tok” drink is really easy to make and we can get it out quickly. The venti iced white mocha with extra caramel drizzle and vanilla sweet cream cold foam... It ain’t that hard, it ain’t that deep.
So ya. Completely agree with you 100000%
violet331 [OP] 2 points 2y ago
Yeah. I think it’s funny that most of the people on this post are mad at me or completely don’t read my post and then comment “I hate complicated drinks” I put a disclaimer for that. Lol and even the baristas who are nice in the comments or slightly agree with me get downvoted. Thanks for answering though. Have a good day!
[deleted] 0 points 2y ago
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seriouslystresseddd -5 points 2y ago
I completely agree. The job is not hard at all. Regardless of how long the recipe is. I think that a lot of baristas misunderstand their function. They are there to make drinks - not bitch about having to make them. Anytime I hear the complaints about normal everyday nice people ordering something they think they might like I just really wonder what gives them the impulse to complain about the sole reason why baristas exist. Lol
mama_mama_serpentine 3 points 2y ago
yes, baristas are there to make drinks and not complain. that is their job. but you have no right to police what those baristas choose to do after their shift! when they’re not in the store, on the clock, they are allowed to do whatever the hell they want.
literally everyone complains about their job, about customers, about something that they don’t like doing at their job, but suddenly when it’s starbucks baristas everyone acts like it’s the end of the world.
literally everyone complains about their job, about customers, about something that they don’t like doing at their job, but suddenly when it’s starbucks baristas everyone acts like it’s the end of the world.
violet331 [OP] 0 points 2y ago
It’s not complaining about your job, anyone can vent. It’s getting mad at people for an order with one modification. As I said in the post.
mama_mama_serpentine 2 points 2y ago
for that drink in particular yeah i’d be a tiny bit annoyed making it, just because the tea bags are frustrating to handle (they rip very easily and we aren’t supposed to touch them with our bare hands, but the tab is glued to the bag so there’s literally no way not to but they still expect us to do it with tongs which doesn’t work lol) but in general drinks like that with a simple modification are fine with most baristas.
working in a drive thru location can make it much more difficult for baristas though, and i can imagine most of the ones complaining are from drive thrus. management is constantly on your ass about speed, and drinks that stray from the typical recipe at ALL will end up taking them longer, and even the five seconds that it takes to change it up will cost the barista in the eyes of management. we aren’t even allowed to say welcome to starbucks on the speaker anymore, because it “takes too long”. a lot of the complaints stem from speed and uniformity being drilled into our heads by management for so long, because if we take too long we get in trouble.
working in a drive thru location can make it much more difficult for baristas though, and i can imagine most of the ones complaining are from drive thrus. management is constantly on your ass about speed, and drinks that stray from the typical recipe at ALL will end up taking them longer, and even the five seconds that it takes to change it up will cost the barista in the eyes of management. we aren’t even allowed to say welcome to starbucks on the speaker anymore, because it “takes too long”. a lot of the complaints stem from speed and uniformity being drilled into our heads by management for so long, because if we take too long we get in trouble.
seriouslystresseddd 1 points 2y ago
You complain all you want outside of work - not saying you can’t. I do, but I certainly don’t share that with the public. This subreddit is 95% negative sadly. Making drinks is our main job. I don’t see how drink modifications are difficult and throw you out of routine. That IS the routine. I worked at the busiest drive thru in the state. We had otw times of 30 seconds during peak. Trust me - I’ve worked my ass off for these customers. So maybe I have just seen too much, that *little* shit doesn’t bother me. Yell at us? Blame us for something completely out of our control? I’ll ask the customer to please stop or leave. Order drink modifications? SO what!? It’s what people like and I do not agree with making them feel bad about ordering.
violet331 [OP] 1 points 2y ago
Finally an answer that is not complaining and actually explains. Not getting mad at me for asking why one modification makes Starbucks baristas bitch at someone online. And you actually listened to me when I said I understand that orders with multiple modifications are annoying instead of making some statement about complicated drinks, which I already said I understand is annoying in my post. Thank you.
violet331 [OP] 0 points 2y ago
So I’m not insane. Lol thank you. I understand someone trying to order an espresso shot and add milk to get a cheap latte or something along those lines or someone with a bunch of kids ordering frappuccinos is annoying. Complain about those things. Everyone is allowed to vent about their job. But holy shit. I understand every job can be stressful but it’s an hourly position. You get paid the same regardless. Being a server and getting paid only in tips where customers determine my wages basically makes me really annoyed when baristas complain about EVERYTHING someone orders. That’s like me complaining about someone ordering a burger and fries with no modifications. Lmao it’s like why? Please get a new job at that point.
FelicityCecilia -1 points 2y ago
I agree. Our job is to make specialty drinks, ofc theres gonna weird or non-standard ones, that’s our job. Work as fast as you work, give 90% to not burnout, and get paid hourly. You can vent about your job or your day but its literally part of the job to make weird stuff for ppl.
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