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Starbucks New Cold Brews

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No, I haven’t tried them yet and didn’t see any promotional materials this morning when I got my fallback Caramel Macchiato. But the Vanilla Sweet Cream Cold Brew sounds overall awesome and the Nitro Cold Brew sounds intriguing. I think I’d try the Nitro first only because of its uniqueness, but it’s also not available everywhere, starting its rollout at  Seattle, Portland, New York, Chicago, Boston, Los Angeles, and San Francisco.

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So next time I’m visiting the coffee siren, I’ll order up a Vanilla Sweet Cream Cold Brew and give a quick review. I wonder which Hawaii location (if any) would get the Nitro?

Starbucks Rewards Is Economical

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I gotta admit that Starbucks has done a good job of finetuning its Starbucks Rewards program to its advantage. Of course, we all should have expected it over the years. As more and more of the public got caffeine-addicted, Starbucks gradually tightened their loyalty program. Now the siren has your credit card number stored (probably set to auto reload your gold card), and you making mobile orders without thinking of the (unseen) money being transacted.

In the early Rewards days, bonus stars were easy to accumulate. Remember the days when even loading up your rewards card using your credit card gave you a star? Of course that led to the abuse where large orders were split into many individual orders resulting in a bunch of stars.

And now we’re here where stars are based on amount spent. While seemingly fair for those spending a lot per transaction, it really has limited my personal star collection. Since the new Rewards program started on April 12, 2016, I have yet to accumulate enough stars for one free drink. I’m pretty sure I would have had a freebie by now with the former Rewards program.

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Oh well. That’s how economical Starbucks Rewards has become.

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The Largest Starbucks?

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This is most likely the largest Starbucks I have ever seen or been in, and this is at Universal Studios Hollywood. Keep in mind that Universal has several Starbucks locations. There’s one undergoing renovation at the CityWalk.

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Starbucks on Universal CityWalk

If you’re going to ride all those escalators to the Lower Lot, Universal has your Starbucks needs covered there.

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Starbucks at Universal Studios Lower Lot

But the biggest location is in the Upper Lot. Its signage doesn’t give away anything about the interior size.

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But when you walk in, you’ll see an expanse of people in line, waiting for orders, and dining in.

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While the ordering line may look daunting, it moves fast, mainly because there’s like four dedicated registers going at the same time.

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I had to stitch together a panorama to capture the vast dimensions of this location. When you really take a look, you’ll realize how big this place really is.

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There are some cool highlights of this Upper Lot Starbucks. The ceiling lights are distinctive.

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The product wall has interesting artwork.

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And I especially like its look at night.

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Even though inside an amusement park and servicing crowds of caffeine-deprived parkgoers, this Starbucks menu was up-to-date featuring the Caramelized Honey Latte that launched that day (March 22, 2016). Now, if Starbucks collaborates with Universal Studios for unique combinations that would be super cool. Butterbeer Latte anyone? A Chocolate Frog Frap?

Starbucks Pearlridge Changed to an Innie

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Whoa. Sometime in March, the Starbucks inside Pearlridge in Phase 1 aka Uptown went from an outie to an innie.

  
The location used to be flush with the walls which lended to poor visibility of the exterior shelves. This innie layout is way better and more inviting. It feels like you’re actually entering Starbucks rather than queueing up outside. Very nice!

Starbucks Going EMV

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Saw these new EMV credit card readers at a local Starbucks this week. These readers accept EMV credit cards with the secure chip along with the old school cards with a magnetic stripe.

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Of course, you can still pay via your Starbucks Card (physical or electronic) using the bar code scanner.

Starbucks Birthday Rewards Are Ephemeral

A few years back, I remember the Starbucks rewards for a free birthday treat had a duration of several weeks. This freebie in the form of a mailed card had a redemption window shorter than an earned reward, but it was long enough. Now with the proliferation of mobile devices and the push for mobile order and pay, your birthday reward comes electronically and is good for an ephemeral four days.

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I got a reward on Monday, March 7 with an expiration date of Thursday, March 10. Of course, I wasn’t about to let a venti Smoked Butterscotch Latte with an extra shot pass me, by so I redeemed it the following day. But if you forget or don’t have time, you’ll likely miss your birthday treat. How about at least one week Starbucks?

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