Friday, December 09, 2005

"it only happens once a year"

I'm not one of those "Death to Starbucks!" folks, but I believe that smaller coffee houses generally offer a better product. But what do I know, really -- I'm not a coffee connoisseur.

I do find Starbucks' latest marketing campaign in SF a bit curious, however.

Apparently, there are vehicles (not sure how many) driving around the city with the red Starbucks cups affixed to the roof. The idea is that a passerby notices the cup balanced precariously on the roof of the car, and notifies the driver of said cup. The driver then informs the would-be do-gooder that Starbucks wishes them a happy holiday.

Unique marketing platform? Yes. Creating more traffic and pollution and wasting of oil resources to market for a company that needs virtually no marketing? Not so much.



Thanks to T.H. from flickr for this photo

4 comments:

  1. Yeah, I think it might be nicer if they offered the do gooder a gift certificate for a coffee...but that would make bigger traffic chaos...and I agree with you, they must have had a huge advetizing budget this year. But it is an interesting idea.

    ReplyDelete
  2. I'm glad I don't drink coffee, I'd probably run alongside the car and try to yoink the cup if I were addicted to the stuff.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Wow... you have to give them props for outside-the-box thinking!

    ReplyDelete
  4. Agree with all-They need absolutely no extra marketing-they are #1 by a landslide wether their coffee is good or not. I only drink Mocha Latte's and they are good everywhere but I have always loved the bumper sticker "Friends don't let friends drink Starbucks" That is a really interesting marketing ploy-if only they used hybrids then the polution problem could be handled. Hopefully they dont just drive to promote Starbucks but actually still follow an agenda, but who knows?

    ReplyDelete