For the record, I work at Starbucks part-time to cover my bills and also to get out of my basement home office for a little while. I’ve learned a lot about coffee and people, but I’ve also learned a little more about language.

There are a number of conventions that Starbucks’ uses to ensure consistency from store to store. I’m going to discuss calling beverages (i.e., once made, the barista calls the drink for the customer to pick up) :

• Iced Double Tall Vanilla Non-fat Latte
• Grande Sugar-free Vanilla Caramel Macchiato
• Venti Non-fat One Splenda Dry Cappuccino
• Tall Caramel No Whip White Mocha

I may be revealing some corporate secrets here and Starbucks will perhaps ask me to cease-and-desist, but there is a consistent order for calling beverages:

1. Number of beverages (e.g., customer ordered two of the same drink)
2. Type of cup (e.g., personal; hot or cold)
3. Decaffeinated
4. Shot quantity (i.e., the number of espresso shots)
5. Size (i.e., Short, Tall, Grande, Venti)
6. Flavouring
7. Milk
8. Customization
9. Beverage name

There are default options to each of the nine items that the barista doesn’t need to call, making the calling significantly easier. However, there also beverage names and brand names that need to be called that duplicate other items being called:

• Iced Tall Iced Coffee
• Grande Coffee Frappuccino Blended Coffee
• Venti Chai Crème Frappuccino Blended Crème

I happened to pop over to the McDonalds for a quick snack while working last night and came to an interesting realization about my double cheeseburger: at Starbucks it would probably need to be a double cheese double burger. The bacon double cheeseburger would be a double cheese with bacon double burger. A quarter pounder with cheese with no pickles would be a cheese no pickle quarter pounder.

One would hope that reason would be a factor in calling beverages, reducing the redundancy:

• Tall Iced Coffee
• Grande Blended Coffee Frappuccino
• Venti Chai Blended Crème Frappuccino

Just my opinion. Thanks for listening.

Image © Serghei Starus | Dreamstime.com