Prescott's Design Blog

The customer service industry has been on a downward spiral for several years. But amid the noise and haste of minimum wage dummies working the tills at coffee chains across the globe, we have seen Starbucks as a notable standout. Still, I don’t think any corporate manual or after-hours training exercise mandates what just happened in Seattle: A barista at Starbucks is slated to donate a kidney to one of her regular customer-turned-friends.

The story comes from the NY Times and is pretty straightforward once you get past the initial shock. The two were friends, the one has kidney problems, the other got tested. Boom, a match.

But let’s take a branding point of view. This couldn’t have come at a better time for Starbucks. After slumping stock prices and other corporate jittering, the company welcomed back their founder, Howard Shultz, and began a series of brand initiatives. One might accuse that this is simply the latest in a series of PR stunts, such as the 3-hour closing across all it’s franchises, but would they really seek to cash in on a heart-warming tale like this?

At the heart of this story is the fact that Starbucks’ employees actually interact with the customers. Think of competitors such as McDonald’s and Dunkin’ Donuts — when was the last time you exchanged even 3 words with your opponent the clerk behind the counter? This focus on customer service is the most distinctive and most valuable brand asset for Starbucks, and it’s good to see that it’s still going strong. With a culture that focuses on training and building relationships (internal and external), I reckon they’ll be around for a long, long time.

I blog about Starbucks quote frequently but I swear this is not becoming a Starbucks blog.