Boing Boing reports than an Astoria, Oregon woman has been ruled to be in violation of Starbucks trademark, when she opened a coffee shop named after herself: Sambucks.
Note to Starbucks: get over it.
Anyway, this reminded me of a coffee shop we saw when we were in Vancouver, B.C. earlier this year, that was obviously copying Starbucks. It was pretty clever, yet I don’t think Starbucks could do anything about it:
Funny entry today on Scripting News:
I don’t like Starbuck’s anymore. Too strong…. Yesterday I bought a can of Chock full o’ Nuts coffee, and it’s just fantastic coffee. Lovin it. And get this, I got the pre-ground kind, because it’s too much of a hassle to grind my own beans. Maybe it’s the west coast Reality Distortion Field flickering off.
There definitely is a Reality Distortion Field out here, especially when it comes to coffee. Too many coffee drinks, too many gourmet whole bean coffees. Know what? I’m sick of grinding my own beans—I hate cleaning out the grinder. Should look into pre-ground.
When it comes to drinking coffee, I’m a minimalist: I like it hot, strong, and black, no additives, the way it was meant to be. If I’m buying coffee in someplace like Royal Blend, I’ll either buy black coffee or a café au lait, which is as close to a latté as I typically get. One day someone I was having a meeting with offered to bring me a latté. I told her to get me a café au lait. Her reaction? She seemed offended, so I relented and let her surprise me with some syrupy-coffee-drink-or-other.
The worst part? I had to explain to her what a café au lait was. Jeez, get some culture, people.
