October 30th, 2006

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Vancouver
7 Comments »

Kitty Corner Starbucks

Yesterday Boing Boing wrote about the monopolizing business strategies of Starbucks, and how they may even open up across the street from each other. The referenced article makes a passing reference to Vancouver, but I thought I’d fill in the details for the non-local readers.

For years there have been two Starbucks kitty corner to each other in downtown Vancouver. They’re on Robson St., a busy shopping street, and have been locally infamous since they opened (when was that, anybody?).

In fact, they’re immortalized in the very enjoyable semi-improvised Christopher Guest film Best in Show, which was shot locally:

Meg Swan: We met at Starbucks. Not the same Starbucks, but we saw each other at different Starbucks across the street from each other. And Hamilton got up the courage to walk across the street one day and … approached me.

Hamilton: Yeah. I’d seen you at law school before.

Meg Swan: Yeah.

Hamilton: And I know that sometimes I’d be in one Starbucks and then you’d be in the other Starbucks and then I’d think maybe, you know, I should go over to that Starbucks the next weekend and then you’d be at the other Starbucks so we kinda crossed paths.

The above photo illustrates the Starbucks’s proximity nicely.

Comments: 7 Responses so far

DMack
October 30th, 2006
8:30 am

Lewis Black refers to such a location as “The End of the Universe”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_End_of_the_Universe
The worst we’ve got in Nanaimo is two Starbucks locations on opposite sides of the same shopping mall.

[Reply]

Meg
October 30th, 2006
10:32 am

I never get why people are so offended by Starbucks in obviously high-traffic, consumeristic areas. Why wouldn’t they move another one in if they have the clientele to put it to use? Few other companies can afford to rent or lease downtown anyhow.

I only get bent out of shape when they move in right next to espresso-driven indie operations with a community history… then it’s a clear market grab.

But then again, can you fault them that, either? If people would rather go to ‘Bux and get substandard fare (although they’re a hell of a lot better than a lot of espresso places in this city… indie does not mean “quality” automatically) then Starbucks has every right to access their dollars.

Granted, Starbucks CAN do it cheaper sometimes, so that becomes a financial draw more than anything, but if the product is better (listen up, indies!) people will still often pay more.

My Artigiano downtown clearly does better business than ‘Bux.

[Reply]

Laura
October 30th, 2006
11:17 am

Actually the Starbucks on the north side of the street at Robson and Thurlow used to be “my” Starbucks joint when I worked at my previous job. And as ridiculous as it appears at first glance to have the two Starbuckses (Starbucks’s? Starbucks’?) on the same corner, I was glad they did, because they line-ups were usually quite long in both and I can only imagine the long queues (and lost business) that would occur if there were only one location there.

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Jordan
October 30th, 2006
4:16 pm

I seem to recall there being a Tim Horton’s joint on either side of Barrington Street in Halifax, albeit a little up (or down) the street from each other. I always thought it was funny. Still, no matter how many Tim’s places sprang up (you can’t swing a hockey stick in Nova Scotia without hitting one, and it’s likely the same elsewhere in Canada), they always seemed to do a booming business.

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NorthVanDan
October 30th, 2006
9:54 pm

I think the two closest Starbucks in Vancouver are on Granville near Georgia. Sears has a Starbucks then across a pedistration only street (Granville) to the other location (neighbour of London Drugs). Both on the south side of Georgia, no need to cross two crosswalks!

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Tiffany
October 30th, 2006
10:53 pm

In London near Embankment tube, Villiers Street has two Starbucks on the same side with just a few shops in between. Crossing the street isn’t ‘a barrier’ in that spot. I think there’s just so much human daytime traffic that the street can support more than four shops - so Starbucks will have two, thanks.

Also I believe the south-side Robson Starbucks opened early 1996…

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O J Way » How Is Starbucks Doing Under Howard Schultz?
August 23rd, 2008
12:44 am

[...] To start with, I don’t think the quality of the coffee itself had much to do with their success or decline. Their Frappucinos are more like milk shakes than coffee. You can get better espresso elsewhere. To paraphrase McDonald’s Ray Kroc, they’re not in the coffee business; they’re in the real estate business. Starbucks packaged the sophistication of the Italian café and marketed it by putting one on every corner. Sometimes they put two on a corner. [...]

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