Technically we're supposed to have a handoff barista in play. This person does front, runs food, and stands at the handoff helping customers find drinks. Hypothetically this person would be able to connect during those tasks, and they would definitely have the best chance of doing that out of the other people on the floor. But you see the problem here... There is literally never enough staff to put someone in that position. And if there were, the sheer volume of orders and crowd of people at handoff would prevent meaningful connections.

Friendly reminder that your customer connection scores are not going to benefit you, but rather your dm. So hang customer connections, just do what you need to do to get your paycheck and clock out, not a single thing more. If your dm wants high customer connections scores they can come in and make them themselves, but I’m sure as hell not putting extra money into the pocket of higher ups from my own labor

Exactly they gotta pick one, can’t have connections and fast times. It’s obvious we’re just an expensive fast food place now, not sure why Starbucks pretends to be its anything but that.

Starbucks wants to be McDonalds in terms of order volume, but they don't want to *be* McDonalds.

It's honestly really weird. I've started going to Dutch Bros for my caffeine fix and somehow I feel more connected with them than I ever did with anyone at Starbucks, and they aren't even doing anything drastically different. Like, there was one time where I felt that weird, forced connection that gave me flashbacks to Starbucks, but 9 times out of 10, they feel genuinely happy to be there, something I never experienced at Starbucks. Either Dutch Bros is hiring really good actors, or they're doing something to make customers feel appreciated more so than the siren.

Before COVID, we had a cafe attendant position at my store. I did it all the time. 8 hours of just fucking around and chatting with customers and giving out samples. I miss those days. We will never have those days again.

Ever since Howard stepped down I feel that everything is worse now.

Just comes down to poor local leadership, not enough ACTUAL emphasis on partner well-being, and corporate being far more concerned with profit over giving SMs enough hours to schedule the proper amount of baristas.

They shut down stores so nearby stores start getting twice the amount of customers, but corporate completely neglects taking that into account.

Then Regional managers get in trouble for high window times and low customer connections, then district manager, then store manager. Shit rolls all the way down hill to the people that are actually on the front lines. So we get hit with the shit boulder time and time again by people who either are under a tremendous amount of stress to meet impossible expectations (Store managers) or the higher-ups who have drank way too much of the corpo kool-aid and are very out of touch with the reality of the situation.

The customer support position should be the person in the Cafe interacting with customers and making connections but all they actually have time for is restocking cups and lids and brewing coffee. Since COVID, hardly anyone chooses to come into the Cafe, so even if that customer support role HAD the time to connect with customers..........

....the majority of the people who fill out the customer surveys are in drive thru. And those are the very same people who we're rushing through the line to get that window time. So, if the survey says "did my barista try to get to know me?" (which is the only question that counts toward customer connection score and they have to give you the highest score possible for it to even count), of course they are gonna say no because DTR just shoves drinks into their hand to get them to leave asap.

They're not indecisive, they know what they're doing. I don't know what to tell you if you don't think they're sitting, laughing their fucking asses off at home watching us struggle.

I can make two drinks to standard while maintaining decent conversation, but it's difficult

If you guys read Rossann’s last message in the partnerhub you’d be even more fueled. She’s such a pacifist and thinks that what she’s doing is enough

a good tip that i have is to talk to customers while you’re on bar or register. a simple “how’s your day going” or “what do you have going on today” really goes a long way. my store also utilizes questions of the day and approaches it as “do you want answer our question of the day before you leave” espeically with mobile orders

You make lots of good points. Corporate micromanages us with literally impossible standards. As for your idea of creating a new role called cafe floater (or for having a barista assigned to that position since it apparently already is a position?), your SM would have to have the coverage hours in order to put someone on the schedule to do that position. Coverage hours are slim. My SM cheats by scheduling baristas noncoverage hours, and those baristas are certainly never assigned to cafe floater.

As for customer connection scores in general, I just personally don't like them. I think it certainly could be the case that customers don't either and as a result select a low score on their survey. I think being polite, kind, and friendly to customers is good, but I think there's a reasonable limit as to what kinds of interactions customers want to have with employees at a workplace. I don't think it's appropriate, for more than one reason, to expect a barista to be a stranger's therapist for $12 an hour.

One of the many reasons why I quit. Do it, it feels great!! Lol

At our store we doing give a rats ass about customer connections anymore. Handoff is to take pressure off of bar so they can focus ONLY on making drinks

Bruh we can't have convos unless we talk to customers.......that so awkward

Coming from a store where there are often power outages which means we are the only hot food/coffee in town for hours, POS might be the best place for it in that situation. Become a concierge, it really calms people. just slow them down and set the tone with a sincere lil comment or question about their drink choice, comment on a good outfit, nail color, etc, or what they have planned for the day after being caffeinated, reassurance about how long their stuff might take... It's stuff we all think that maybe we could say aloud to include them in even a chaotic atmosphere (when we have time to think)... and may slow down to better pace the onslaught of drinks/food that are just going to wait in line behind the counter anyway.

Might work, might not, and when there are staffing issues or register troubles (or the angriest of impatient people), it's just not possible.

We actually have a Hand Off partner for peak and that makes all the difference for our little store. On the off days that we don't have the HO oh god is it awful. The HO also tops (whip or spice and stuff) and lids the drinks our bars finish so we can get them out faster too. Don't have to focus on the little finishing details.

I'm pretty sure this type of thing results from someone with a spreadsheet that has some information, but is missing a crucial fact.

Spreadsheets are incredibly useful, but making management decisions based on one while ignoring the fact that there are other factors at play results in these sort of pinch-points. It's great that office/corporate people go through barista training (or did) but learning to taste & make coffee is a separate skillset from operating the floor. Even if learning to make and taste drinks/food is still part of that training, it almost certainly does not include "store operations" and you end up with this sort of "remote management by spreadsheet".

​

It is not a new phenomenon, unfortunately. I'm pretty sure workers have been complaining about it for a few thousand years, though it has certainly escalated in the last decade. I'm sorry you are going through this.

It may not be much, but my suggestion is to go up the ladder as high as you can and loop in partner resources within corporate as well. No idea if customers would call as well, or if it would be a good idea, but that is at least something to think about.

​

edit: To your floater question, some years ago there was a position that was a float/task/loose position. They didn't (normally) sit and talk to customers, but they might chat them up in passing. They would walk through the cafe & patio areas, pick up/clean/straighten, check with people. They might merchandise, check the restrooms, spot-clean windows, spot-sweep the floor, do a few dishes or trash, back to the lobby, relieve baristas for breaks, etc. It was one of the first things cut when labor was first scaled back in a serious way about 6 or 8 years ago.

edit2: You can still be smiley and mindful of people, give a sense of urgency without rushing, but you won't have much more time than that. This still gives the customer a sense that you are paying attention even if you aren't indulging them. Whether that qualifies as a "connection" in the corporate sense is a different story, but from a customer perspective they will take away a sense of being handled respectfully even if not personally.

this is why i quit. it's not possible to have both.

I feel you, I work at a DT only store where they push both window times and connection pretty hard and it’s difficult to find a good balance 🙄

Customer Connection does nothing for any of the people actually in the store tbh, it’s only good for the district manager which is why they hound it so much. My stores customer connection score is a 36 last time I checked and it hasn’t done anything except make our DM comment on it a few times. Don’t worry about it too much tbh.

Being in bar means you don’t have to interact too much. Call the name on the cup and not what the drink is. Unless there’s no name. See if someone picking up a mobile has anything or if they’re waiting on something.

Honestly in my experience, the two positions that get you the most customer connections are going to be your register partner and your DTR partner. They're the ones who are going to make the most connections the easiest. Sometimes you can make connections with people if you're on cafe hot bar, say if you're making a drink and you see the customer whose drink you're making, you can try to have a short convo with them and let them know you're working on their order and make other small talk if the opportunity is there.

I say also if you're really struggling to make customer connections, try to make them only with people who you know have the Starbucks rewards app. They are the ones who are going to be getting the surveys anyway so there's little point in making other connections with people who don't have the app cause they arent going to be affecting the score.

So that’s why whenever I go to Starbucks, they compliment various things on me. I thought it was genuine.

My store seems to do pretty well. Our batistas are pretty experienced though and can chat while working. Also, we are not understaffed as our SM actually hires people when needed, so our DTR can focus on good connections.