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this post was submitted on 17 Mar 2024
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Why do you think a business should be compelled to sell something at any given price? I mean sure, you can burn them in the court of public opinion, but it's another thing when you say that government regulation should dictate the cost of a coffee beverage. I think that's where most people are landing in this, they agree it's stupid for Starbucks to do such a petty thing, but when it comes to lawsuits involving ADA regulations it crosses a line for reasonable response.
It's almost like the lawsuit for hot coffee where the person argued they didn't know the coffee was hot
(https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liebeck_v._McDonald%27s_Restaurants#:~:text=McDonald's%20Restaurants%2C%20also%20known%20as,against%20the%20McDonald's%20restaurant%20chain.&text=Stella%20Liebeck%20v.,McDonald's%20Restaurants%2C%20P.T.S.%2C%20Inc.)
You mean the incident where McDonald made the coffee so hot it was beyond safe and the woman had 3rd degree burns fusing her pelvic region together?
That case is one of the most well known examples of how corporations turn serious safety incidents into “haha stupid customer not know obvious thing”, as if the victim was to blame for McDonalds wrong doing.
You chose that incident to argue your point? Wow, thank you, that makes my case here so much easier.
I still don't understand how the "hot coffee" debunking isn't known world round by this point.
Yeah the moment they mentioned that like McDonald's wasn't at fault I stopped reading anything else they had to say.
You can get third degree burns from touching water which is 150 degree F for around 2 seconds. Most coffee world wide is served between 160 and 180 F.
In that case the water was supposedly served at 190 F while competitors coffees were served at 160 F. The lawyers in that suit claimed that if the coffee had been in the 160 range it would have taken up to 20 seconds to get third degree burns. We now know that even at 160 F she would have gotten the same burns within 5 seconds.
What exactly is your point?
Coffee should not be served at 160f. That's undrinkably hot and just burns the coffee.
McDonalds only does this maliciously so you won't ask for a free refill.
Because the ingredients cost maybe less than a cent more and they change nearly a dollar for it.
"But they can charge whatever they like!"
No. They cannot. They cannot charge for tap water. They cannot charge for using the bathroom. They can't lock you in the Cafe and charge you to leave. They can't advertise for one price and sell another. They can't charge half price for milk that's gone rotten etc. There are lots of things they can't do. This is another.
Can you show your work on milk alternatives costing Starbucks less than a cent more?
Quite the specious analogy, but I fail to see how kidnapping is equivalent to charging a different price for a different product.
Open a grocery app. Search for oat milk, dairy milk, almond milk, soy milk. Alternative milks don’t really cost more than dairy anymore.
I don’t agree with the lawsuit, but I also don’t agree with Starbucks’ ridiculous upcharge for non dairy.
Does Starbucks shop at grocery stores? They likely buy non-consumer packaged milk, think 5 gallon plastic sacks, and cases of consumer packaged milk alternatives. Not to mention extra man-hours and extra refrigerated space.
Visit a Starbucks. They pull a gallon plastic milk jug from a drinks fridge under the bar when making drinks.
While there might be slight discrepancies between grocery prices and wholesale prices, the sheer size of Starbucks means they’d save on all varieties of milk (not just dairy) and I seriously doubt they pay 50 cents more per cup for alternative milks.
You literally have no idea though, unless you work in supply chain for Starbucks. You're guessing. Do they do their purchasing as a single corporation from one dairy farm, I doubt it. Plus you ignore the additional hours and need for refrigerated space. There's more to consider than just cost per unit. Also if you use less there's a greater chance of spoilage.
We will never know the exact numbers. However, from reported figures we know that $SBUX, $DNKN, $PNRA, $MCD all have similar margins across gross, ops and P&L (50-70, 10-20, 10-20 respectively).
the goal of all fast food centers is to produce a unit cost as close to $1, preferably lower, as possible and we also know from reported figures that 1 cent is the expected associated labor cost of a starbucks unit.
Knowing that the price of milk on commodities market is 16.42hwt or 1 cent / oz, knowing that SBUX coffee beans are 7cent/oz we can extrapolate that suitable extra costs for alternative milks must be in the single figure cent range.
Further supported by how if you are to go to a post-supply-chain-shipping-and-procurement wholesale vendor then the price of oatly barista edition oatmilk is 10c/oz and we can very safely assume that SBUX gets it much MUCH cheaper so we at least know the ceiling is $0.1
So, while I was exaggerating for effect in my original reply, the actual numbers- even if they are paying the same price as I would walking into a wholesaler (EXTREMELY unlikely):
So in the extreme worst case scenario for starbucks they are making an extra 6% profit per ounce on oatmilk over cow milk, so not at cost-to-price parity.
And that's the worst case, they are probably making more.
So in one comment you've gone from less than a cent to possibly 10 cents. And the price increase isn't a dollar, it's 70 cents.
Your calculations don't seem to include increased refrigerated space required, additional man hours, increased inefficiencies, and possible increased spoilage. The price increase does not strike me as unreasonable given the circumstances.
cf supra—
exhibit a:
exhibit b:
exhibit c:
waaaay ahead of the gotchas and objections my dude.
Additional space isn't an overhead rolling operating cost, and per unit is probably infestisimal. Additional man hours is a weird objection, do starbucks even track for "reaching for a carton slightly further away"? I imagine the time savings for moving a carton 4" closer are measured in the thousandths of seconds
oat milk has a longer shelf life (6 months) than cow milk (5 days) and when opened too (10 days vs 2)
The price doesn't have to strike you as reasonable or not because we are discussing whether we think starbucks are making a profit on oat milk or not. To me it's obvious they are making more of a margin on oat over dairy, whether or not that is good/bad, reasonable/unreasonable, fair/unfair is an entirely different conversation
Either they added a new refrigerator or made room in an existing refrigerator. To make room something needs to be removed, less room for regular milk means more trips to a walk-in to restock. More SKUs means more time on ordering and inventory. If they added a refrigerator then there's added electricity costs.
I meant once opened, which is more like a week. Which means they likely all need day dots put on them. More man hours (or minutes, or seconds)
They're a business, I assume they make a profit on everything. Oat milk lattes would seem to be a strange loss leader.
again I already addressed those objections in my post before you commented. Shelf space is cheap, refrigeration already exists and is not an added cost, expanded refrigeration is a single point cost that is quickly paid back by sales, I dont think adding day dots is putting starbucks out of business.
they already have separate supply chains for paper cups, crockery, beans, syrups and milks — I know this because I worked on a project that used their paper cup supply chain a few years ago. Plus they already have an oatmilk supplier so they're not even adding an additional sku.
yes, the point of this thread is "should companies by allowed to significantly profit more on allowances made for not being ablebodied" && "is charging more for dairy intolerance the same as charging more for using a wheelchair ramp or a braille menu"
Hand waiving something away isn't addressing it, but fair enough.
it's not Hand waving - an extra fridge is just cost of doing business.
Everything is a cost of doing business: payroll, electricity, inventory, etc.
yes, and what I was inferring is refrigeration is understood to be a necessary part of food service, so you can't really say "food companies shouldn't be regulated by preventing them charging extra for disabled patrons because they have to refrigerate the food!"
I can't fathom why you're constantly trying to drag this thread into a discussion about the minutae of drink service operation instead of the topic at hand.
Providing additional options, especially options that require refrigeration, have additional costs associated with them. My central thesis has always been that a business should be able to recoup its cost and make a profit, that is the purpose of a business. The "minutiae of drink service operation" is central to that discussion.
It's clear that this conversation is going in circles and serves no purpose. I find it quite reasonable for a company to charge $0.70 when their costs increase by $0.25 cents, and you don't. The ADA requires only a reasonable accommodation, there are several reasonable accommodations available in the form of non-dairy beverages. It isn't even clear that lactose intolerance would be considered a disability under the ADA.
literally Para 4 in the article
Ohhh...the Plaintiffs said it in their complaint! Well then it must be true! It would be impossible to list unsubstantiated claims in a complaint.
The ADA statute does not make specific reference to lactose intolerance. A court would have to determine that lactose intolerance is a disability under the statute, and I don't think it's clear on its face that it is.
Fused labia. Any time you think about whether the coffee was indeed too hot, I want you to think of the words fused labia.
Also think about the fact that they'd been warned about the coffee being unsafe multiple times prior. Also think about the fact that she initially wanted them to only pay for the reconstructive surgery after their coffee fused her labia, and they said no.
This is known as a red herring fallacy, the fact that it fused her labia doesn't change the nature of the situation, nor does it increase the gravity of the situation.
"She placed the coffee cup between her knees and pulled the far side of the lid toward her to remove it. In the process, she spilled the entire cup of coffee on her lap. Liebeck was wearing cotton sweatpants, which absorbed the coffee and held it against her skin, scalding her thighs, buttocks and groin."
Additionanally:
"According to a 2007 report, McDonald's had not reduced the temperature of its coffee, serving it at 176–194 °F (80–90 °C), relying on more sternly worded warnings on cups made of rigid foam to avoid future injury and liability (though it continues to face lawsuits over hot coffee). However, in 2013 the New York Times reported that it had lowered its service temperature to 170–180 °F (77–82 °C). The Specialty Coffee Association of America supports improved packaging methods rather than lowering the temperature at which coffee is served. The association has successfully aided the defense of subsequent coffee burn cases. Similarly, as of 2004, Starbucks sells coffee at 175–185 °F (79–85 °C), and the executive director of the Specialty Coffee Association of America reported that the standard serving temperature is 160–185 °F (71–85 °C)."
So not only did it not change the temperature at which most major brands serve coffee, the temperature that was proposed as reasonable by the defense attorneys was also still hot enough to cause third degree burns. I get that she might want them to pay for damages, but she literally dumped it on herself, the reason she was so seriously hurt was because she was 79 years old. If you're buying hot coffee that's freshly brewed then it should be obvious it's hot enough to seriously burn you. If it's over 150 F then you will get major significant burns.
As to the idea that they had been warned:
"Other documents obtained from McDonald's showed that from 1982 to 1992 the company had received more than 700 reports of people burned by McDonald's coffee to varying degrees of severity, and had settled claims arising from scalding injuries for more than $500,000."
McDonalds purportedly sells more than 50 million cups of coffee per year, over 10 years that was 500 million cups of coffee. 0.00014% is hardly a "warning."
Actually it was an appeal to emotion. The fact that the coffee was hot enough to fuse her labia together after such a short time is actual evidence of McDonald's negligence, so not a red herring. Also, pointing out a fallacy in your interlocutor's argument doesn't make you right. Also that part wasn't an argument, so it wasn't a fallacy in the first place.
700 reports is 700 warnings. I'm sure that McCock tastes good, but McDonald's does not need you as it's stoic defender. They'd kill you if they deemed it profitable.