In celebration of the upcoming holiday season, Starbucks unveiled a new green cup design featuring a mosaic of more than 100 people, all designed to convey connections between its employees and consumers. Upon hearing negative feedback via social media from a small subset of consumers, Starbucks later introduced a red holiday cup, set to release in its cafés on Nov. 10.
A column from Heatstreet alleges that the controversy surrounding the green holiday cups was not only overblown, but didn’t even exist since much of the backlash came after select people sent out sarcastic tweets. Nevertheless, the tweets — lacking tonal context — caught fire in numerous articles and were even lampooned on The Late Show With Stephen Colbert.
The RTP editorial team discusses whether it is possible in today’s political climate to make any kind of “statement,” no matter how seemingly non-controversial, without it generating heat from potential consumers. The editors also share what brands can learn from the Starbucks cup “controversy.”
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Debbie Hauss, Editor-in-Chief: The only redeeming value in this controversy is the media attention Starbucks is able to garner from the supposed controversy. I am amazed that this is getting any attention during a time when we’re in the midst of the most controversial presidential election in history. Maybe consumers need mindless comic relief in their daily routine. In fact, this whole controversy probably is a fake, yet even as a fake it has taken on its own life and is delivering media coverage and consumer attention. Nevertheless, it’s sad that anyone is trying to turn the concept of “unity” into a social media battle. Enough said on this one.
Adam Blair, Executive Editor: As a loyal Starbucks customer, I am outraged — that this manufactured controversy is stealing attention away from the truly important battles of our time, such as Star Wars vs. Star Trek, Marvel vs. DC Comics, and Brad vs. Angelina. I harbor a strong suspicion that the clever folks at Starbucks are shocked, shocked to find that people who believe there is a “War on Christmas” find their annual cup designs objectionable. Why else would they first release a “Unity” cup and then keep us in suspense (wink, wink) about their “actual” holiday cup design? As for other brands and what they can learn about handling potentially divisive topics, the New York Times recently spotlighted ads that get their power by soothing Americans’ exhaustion and disgust with the 2016 political campaign. My favorite is the response of Ringling Brothers: “As part of its effort to ‘Take Back the Circus,’ the company made a humorous video featuring several performers expressing their indignation over misuse of the terms. In one scene, a ringmaster turned to the camera and said, ‘People keep calling candidates clowns.’ A clown by his side responded, ‘But we’re real clowns, and we take clowning seriously.’”
David DeZuzio, Managing Editor: In these early goings of the holiday season, I am going to remain optimistic that the Starbucks coffee cup “controversy” is fake. Why? Because it would be utterly devastating to believe that anyone over the age of two would be enraged by some design on a cup. There is no way that rational adults with real-world concerns are actually affected by this enough to take a stand against a brand. Yes, this is great marketing for Starbucks, because even if some nut out there equates its iced coffee with ISIS coffee, its name is in the headlines once again and the coffee icon will sell a million more Caramel Brulée Lattes. Mmmm! Any retailer looking to avoid controversy with its holiday messages take this advice: you can’t please everyone. And yes, as sure as Rudolph’s nose is red, even mentioning, “Happy Holidays” will probably infuriate someone. Hopefully retailers and shoppers around the world will not allow a simple marketing campaign to dictate their holiday mood. In fact, let’s all heed the need to be good to each other as Howard Schultz, CEO of Starbucks said. Well, Happy Holidays everyone! Grab a coffee, get out to the stores and shop!
Klaudia Tirico, Features Editor: I strongly believe that people would still have some sort of issue with the Starbucks cup if it had images of kittens and puppies drinking coffee on it. If there is anything I learned this year (and last year; and the year before that), it is that the human race is offended by everything. Real or fake, any normal person would simply laugh at the backlash. I applaud Starbucks for using this so-called controversy as a means to promote their holiday beverages with a BOGO deal, as it did with its latest promotional video, as a means to treat its loyal customers. At the end of the day, if people truly had a problem with Starbucks cups, they wouldn’t be A. Talking about it, and B. Buying its coffee. There are so many other issues to fuss over in this day and age. All we can do is hope America will man up in 2017.
Glenn Taylor, Senior Editor: Without touching on the reactions of consumers or their level of response, it wouldn’t surprise me if Starbucks knew exactly what it was getting into here, particularly since the subject has been broached in the past. Any time a company makes a design switch to a logo or an affiliated product or service, there is going to be backlash, and this sentiment only increases when under a political microscope. Starbucks had to have realized that it could capitalize on this because once you get some talk going, people are going to have the brand in their head regardless of the color of the cups. If I wasn’t covering this industry (since I don’t ever travel to Starbucks), I wouldn’t have heard about the cups until people started discussing them on social media. Honestly, I think retailers can at least take this as an example of virality in today’s world, and how minuscule branding changes certainly aren’t going to go unnoticed both positively and negatively.
