green LA girl

Starbucks Challenge 4.0

2006-05-02T16:19:00.000-07:00

Win a workplace dish set, a 2 lb bag of fair trade coffee, or an eco-friendly belt -- just for asking for fair trade coffee at Starbucks! Starbucks' official policy is that customers who ask for a fair trade coffee should be able to get a French-pressed cup without being charged extra. So take Starbucks up on this policy, and report the results!

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Pick your feed up

2005-12-18T15:55:00.000-08:00

**green LA girl's moved, to greenlagirl.com. Please update your links and feeds (rss).**

To the 50-odd people still subscribed to the old feeds on this blog --

Seriously, you're missing out. Haven't you been wondering why no new posts are showing up? Aren't you curious about the winner of Starbucks Challenge 3.0? Don't you wonder if I've knit any new cute things?

Let me lead you on to greener pastures --

**green LA girl's moved, to greenlagirl.com. Please update your links and feeds (rss).**

Feel the migration

2005-12-11T01:02:00.000-08:00

**green LA girl's on the move, to greenlagirl.com. Please update your links and feeds (rss).**

Yes, ironically, my new site was down for a couple hours today. Why? Not sure, but some other people using WordPress were having the same issues, so I don't think it was my hosting service -- Though before I found that out, I sent BlueHost an angry email demanding to know their refund policy...

In any case, I'll be slogging through WordPress support files to find answers to all sorts of odd techy questions I have (What the fuck is Valid XHTML? Why do my new posts also appear as comments to the old posts I link to?). So please lemme know if you run across any other bugs you'd like me to fix.

Meaning that I will really stop updating this site, as of after this post. Unless some kind of weird unforeseen circumstances require me to return --

So please, update your links and feeds (rss), dear readers. If you're a blog novice, just go to the new site. There, scroll down, and on the left sidebar you'll find lil buttons to help you update your MyYahoo! or Rojo or whatever reader service you're using to read my now-up-again-hopefully-for-good greenlagirl.com. If you have no idea what I'm talking about, just bookmark me.

If you're still lost -- Hey grandma! Miss you --

Starbucks scoop

2005-12-10T19:20:00.000-08:00

**green LA girl's on the move, to greenlagirl.com. Please update your links and feeds (rss).**

Getting some interesting scoop about Starbucks from company insiders. Check out this ex-Starbucks store manager's comment (comment #79, I think). It looks like (s)he quit before the Coffee of the Day program got phased out, but (s)he clearly points to some real issues in the stores: too little staffing, conflicting priorities, lack of training.

But the part I found most interesting: "The other issue is that Starbucks does not put an effort into teaching their partners about Fair Trade. If the partners had a connection with FT and understood what is really about they would then embrace the customers requesting that one-off French Press. Then Starbucks would run the risk of internal pressure from the partners wanting more FT coffee."

Too true. I mean, I've run into baristas who're personally passionate about fair trade (no thanks to Starbucks) and go out of their way to promote it it. I've also run into baristas who care about fair trade issues, but don't even know basic info that would allow them to promote fair trade in stores. One, for ex, was a fan of fair trade, but had no idea that Cafe Estima was fair trade certified.

It doesn't stop there. Jeni's reported that when she asked for fair trade coffee at some stores, baristas quietly point her to an indie fair trade cafe in the neighborhood. I'm not surprised. Take Faboo's neighbor (comment #78), who's worked at Starbucks for 3 YEARS but knew nothing about the fair-trade-coffee-on-demand policy. So he asked his manager, who told him: "Oh yeah. If they ask for it, try to offer them something else, unless the line is short."

Well... That "something else" is often misinformation, spun by Starbucks' headquarters. Take Gregg's comments on blogging.la, for ex. This Starbucks employee and "unofficial Fair Trade Coordinator" reports, "Starbucks does pay at or near fair trade prices for their coffees." I think Gregg's completely unaware that that Starbucks payment (an average of $1.20 an lb, to be exact) is often NOT what FARMERS are paid. Starbucks still buys a large chunk of its coffee from middlemen, many who take a good portion of that $1.20 for themselves.

In contrast, fair trade certification guarantees that the farmer co-ops themselves get at least $1.26 an lb for their coffee. But as City Hippy points out in his post today, Starbucks is more interested in claiming that ALL their coffee is "fairly traded" -- a phrase that means nothing -- than promoting actual fair trade certified coffees.

Stay this course, and Starbucks will lose its best customers and employees. What happened to the ex-Starbucks store manager (comment #79)? "I have since found Green Mountain Coffee Roasters and appreciate their commitment to Fair Trade and Organic coffee and really enjoy their coffee much more than any other roasters out there."

My green sweet tooth

2005-12-09T20:09:00.000-08:00

**green LA girl's on the move, to greenlagirl.com. Please update your links and feeds (rss).**

I tend only to write about fair trade stuff I can find in running (or at least bus-accessible) distance, but if you're a gourmet candy aficionado with a green heart, you might check out Cybele's CandyBlog.

Not all the stuff on there is fair trade certified, but Cybele factors in eco-socio consciousness into her reviews and ratings. So if you're looking for something more descriptive than my little "I ate it and it was yummy" type reviews, go there. So far, she's covered Green & Black's Maya Gold, Divine Chocolate, and Equal Exchange chocolate. An excellent resource for choco-loving activists everywhere!

What I'm hoping Cybele will review: The chocolate products from Intelligent Nutrients, a new company from the founder of Aveda (via KristenAndersen.com). The cocoa powder's fair trade certified, but the chocolate bar is not :( However, both are organic. A lil pricy -- $5 for the bar and $14 for the cocoa powder -- but they may make good holiday gifts --

Starbucks factsheet for fair trade activists

2005-12-09T15:02:00.000-08:00

**green LA girl's on the move, to greenlagirl.com. Please update your links and feeds (rss).**

Since we have a lot of new people joining in the Starbucks Challenge, I've put together a factsheet of sorts about Starbucks' current fair trade policies to help de-confuse new activists. This'll be updated as more news develops and/or I remember more stuff that should be included.

Starbucks factsheet for fair trade activists

Starbucks sells one, and only one, fair trade certified coffee blend in stores. That blend's called Cafe Estima, and it debuted Summer 2005. The old fair trade certified blend, creatively named "Fair Trade Blend," has been phased out -- although Starbucks still hasn't taken the blend off its website.

Starbucks' policy states that any of their company-owned stores will French-press a cup of fair trade coffee for anyone who asks for a cup of fair trade. This promise, however, isn't being carried out in many stores, especially in the US. Thus, the Starbucks Challenge. Got a specific question about the Starbucks Challenge? Read the Challenge FAQ.

Starbucks no longer brews fair trade coffee on the 20th of each month, at least according to headquarters. This program was phased out earlier this year, long before the Starbucks Challenge began. The reason: Starbucks used to do "Coffee of the Day, but they switched over to "Coffee of the Week." Thus, instead of brewing fair trade coffee on the 20th of each month --

Starbucks brews fair trade coffee as the "Coffee of the Week" at least 4 times a year. Technically, fair trade will be brewed more days (7 days x 4 weeks = 28 days, vs. 12 days in the previous program), which is a nice bonus. The downside is that if activists wanted to patronize Starbucks ONLY when the mermaid had fair trade coffee on brew to send a message to the company, it's a lot more difficult to figure out when that would be. Before, you could just drop in on the 20th. Now, you have to keep tabs on the "Coffee of the Week" page on Starbucks' website to get a heads-up on what's brewing. Or you can just add green LA girl to your bookmarks or fave blog reader, and I'll let you know ;)

According to Starbucks, 1.6% of its coffee is fair trade certified. Compare that to the 5% recommendation of TransFair USA, the company that certifies fair trade products in the US. That 1.6%, however, is still about a quarter of all the fair trade certified coffee coming into the US. That gives you a sense of how huge Starbucks is, like it or not.

Comment!

Patience is a silly virtue

2005-12-08T22:39:00.000-08:00

**green LA girl's on the move, to greenlagirl.com. Please update your links and feeds (rss).**

So I guess the sudden fair-trade-friendliness of my closest Starbucks was, indeed, an anomaly. Check out Jen's and faboo's comments (#77). It's still super tough to get a cup of fair trade coffee in Los Angeles.

As for answers to the questions in the letter to Starbucks: Cindy said she'll get back to me about those "before Christmas." Is that good news? Perhaps... Perhaps I should be grateful that the mermaid's getting back to us at all...

Of course, I don't think that the fact this challenge has dragged out for over 2 months is Cindy's fault -- I mean, it's very possible that she wants answers as much as I do. Maybe she's trying desparately to navigate the red tape in her company.

But one thing's for certain: Starbucks has become a large, unwieldly, slow-moving bureaucracy. The behemoth corp's moving further and further away from its mission to "develop enthusiastically satisfied customers all of the time."

Clearly, this hasn't been a priority. The focus, instead, seems to have fallen on this mission: "Recognize that profitability is essential to our future success." Net revenues are up 20 percent this fiscal year. Net earnings are up 27 percent.

Does it really take over 2 months for the mermaid to figure out what to do about educating its baristas about its own long-touted fair trade policies?

I mean, Starbucks can simply just choose to sit tight till challengers hit all the stores and reeducate their baristas for it. Why spend the money and effort at doing it itself, when there are Christmas blends to sell?

And by saying "before Christmas," the mermaid takes away the impetus from the letter deadline (Dec. 16) without actually doing anything. The way things are dragging on, I get the feeling Starbucks is just waiting for us Challengers to lose steam, pacifying us with promises of "soon, soon."

Cindy -- We'd really, really love to hear from you before Dec. 16.

Filed in: starbuckschallenge coffee csr fairtrade starbucks

Green LA girl in transition

2005-12-07T23:38:00.000-08:00

OK -- I'm really gonna put the kibosh on unreliable Blogspot, and move on to my very own domain: greenlagirl.com.

Check it out. I've been redesigning and moving the content over -- What do you think?

One major issue: Cuz the challenge is going on, and cuz some challengers are not regular blog readers and thus not all that blog-savvy, I'm afraid that immediately "quitting" this poor Blogspot site will cause major confusion. Also -- Although I've moved all the posts over, it would really take me forever to change all the links that refer to various Challenge-related articles to point to posts on the new site.

Hmmm. What to do... I'm thinking of doing double posts until Dec. 16, when 3.0 comes to a close, then permanently moving to the new site. But really, any suggestions on these issues or anything else to do with the blog -- design, etc. -- would be much appreciated --

Mornings hurt less after fair trade coffee

2005-12-07T17:19:00.000-08:00

8 am is a painful, painful time. It's also the time "Hip Solutions for a Healthier Planet" kicked off at New Roads. Seriously, I felt a lil nauseous when my alarm went off at 7 and really thought I might not make it.

Why do we do this to our teenagers? It's cruel and unusual --

But I popped a couple pain killers, washed it down with a vat fair trade coffee, and got my hungover ass over there.

Now, I wish I could be a teenager again -- if I can go to New Roads. These students were socio-environmentally conscious and engaged, and rather frighteningly cogent and articulate at a very, very early hour.

And they even take Starbucks Challenges in their free time!

Kimmy and I (right, with Che bag) talked about fair trade to 3 different big groups of students, some of who are working to sell fair trade coffee and chocolate on campus! They've already had a bake sale to raise some funds, and Monkey & Son donated coffee for the students to sample and distribute. Thanks Thom!

Anna -- serving local organic food, left, put the whole thing together. Hangover aside, it was fun :) Ah -- for my youth again -- I might even give up organic wine for it --

But back to reality: After I got home around 1:30, I fell into bed and woke up about a half hour ago.

Now I'm gonna hit publish, cuz I need to meet my friend Kristy for happy hour at Nic's in a half hour.

Filed in: starbuckschallenge coffee monkeyandson fairtrade starbucks

8th grade activism

2005-12-06T21:58:00.000-08:00

If Starbucks thinks this fair trade "fad" is a college student thing that's gonna blow over -- Well, they better brace themselves.

Bright and early tomorrow, I'll be at New Roads in Santa Monica, as part of a panel on fair trade activism. These middle school kids have been super busy, making posters, doing presentations, and even taking part on this half-day workshop that my panel's a part of -- "Hip Solutions for a Healthier Planet."

There the students will hear about everything from biodiesel to solar energy to grassroots activism. They'll also get to taste some fair trade coffee, courtesy of Monkey & Son!

No, I didn't bribe these kids -- These junior highers got into it themselves. They came up with their own slogans ("Think before you drink!"), took some Starbucks Challenges themselves, and decided to champion the fair trade cause by selling fair trade coffee and chocolate in schools to raise funds to get more fair trade stuff!

And local coffee company Monkey & Son was only too happy to step in. I met Thom, the Monkey, with his wife today, at the Starbucks on Robertson and Pico -- You know, the one that failed the challenge miserably the last time I went by.

Like a masochist, I challenged again. The barista was actually the same guy that turned down my fair trade request previously. I wasn't sure if he'd remember me, so I preempted him: "Oh, I asked you this the last time," I said. "Um, can I get fair trade coffee here?"

This time: a 180. Not only did the barista immediately offer me a French-pressed cup, he offered it to me FREE.

Of course, I bugged him for details. "This girl runs this blog," he said. Apparantly, Starbucks had a store meeting, handed out a "letter" (I'm guessing it was one of my posts) pointing at the store's challenge failure, and trained the baristas on the policy.

"They never told us about it," he said, "so I didn't even know we HAD a French press."

I believe him. I've heard the story like a hundred times now. Starbucks widely publicized the fair-trade-on-demand policy, without actually letting their baristas know about it. I guess headquarters though this fair trade thing wouldn't catch on, that no one would actually call them on it.

So challengers -- Is a 180 happening in your own stores? I mean, the store I went to is the one where the Dec. 16 meeting's gonna happen, so I'm not sure if this was a special case, or if a nationwide education effort has been unleashed. Please please please rechallenge your closest store before Dec. 16 and let me know.

I'm also not sure if the barista knew I actually WAS the blogger in question -- He kept referring to her as "this girl." This could've been a tongue-in-cheek thing on his part, but I was too busy talking to the Monkey and his wife about the Son to find out --

Filed in: starbuckschallenge coffee monkeyandson fairtrade starbucks

Blue bin wanted

2005-12-05T17:37:00.000-08:00

I'm not a big Michael Moore fan -- Not just cuz he's a lil over the top for me, but also cuz in Stupid White Men, he says recycling's pointless. Apparantly Mikey saw differently colored bins getting dumped into the same truck, asked the guys doin' the job a couple Qs, and concluded that the stuff we greenies so carefully sort doesn't actually get recycled.

So I was really happy to see this article in the LA Times today. Yes, those blue and green bins work! It's not all that cheap -- about $14 million a year -- but the stuff sent to landfills has decreased from 1.6 million tons to "only" about a million.

Which is nice consolation for all the recycling work my roommate and I've been doing, considering that my apartment doesn't even have blue bins. About a year ago we chatted up our neighbors, and now we keep bags of recyclables in our balcony area until trash pick-up day, when we haul the bags to our neighbors' blue bin.

The problem with this method: Trash gets picked up on Friday mornings when I'm still asleep. Which means the garbage keeps collecting on the balcony. Which displeases my other roommate, who's not into recycling.

What's an apartment girl to do? I checked out the county site for recycling info, to get only this bit of advice: "contact your building manager or homeowners' association about obtaining recycling services through your waste hauler."

Ok -- I'll bug our poor manager about this, but I was wondering -- Has anyone else successfully convinced a landlord or manager to offer blue bins? And if so, do you have any tips for going about this?

And while you're giving me advice: Please recommend a more reliable blog platform. Everyone who emailed about commenting issues yesterday is now writing again about how green LA girl won't load. Sorry peeps -- I thought it was personal, till I found out all of Blogger was down.

Weirdly, I'm still able to edit my posts -- which is what I'm doing now, after which I'll look into more reliable Blog platforms, after which I'll go see aqualung at the Silent Movie Theatre with Trill --

Filed in: recycle losangeles blog aqualung

Loneliness and blog bugs

2005-12-04T15:58:00.000-08:00

For all of you who tried to sign the letter to Starbucks, got an error message, and emailed me to ask what's up -- You're not alone. Sorry 'bout that (and hello!). Blogger had a lil bug I think, but it's better now -- Go back and sign.

Then come back and Frappr thyselves. Why, you ask? Well, over Thanksgiving, I had my lil sis and a lil pup keeping me company (right). Now they've gone back home. Sniff --

Actually, I mostly miss my sis's cooking -- Check out her ravioli flowers. Inspiring, but I have trouble getting motivated to cook like that. It's a lot of work, and after dinner, there's nothing left of it --

But blogging is forever, yes? You must, BTW, put something -- anything -- in the "shoutout" area to get Frappr to recognize you. Lil annoying glitch --

So gimme a shoutout. You too, Cindy and Major --

Starbucks Challenge 3.0: Demand an answer!

2005-12-03T14:30:00.000-08:00

So Starbucks admitted it hasn't lived up to its own highly trumpeted fair-trade-friendly policy to French press a cup of fair trade coffee for anyone who asks for it. It's a "break down in customer service," Starbucks said, and sent out some emails to its stores.

But two months into the challenge, things STILL haven't improved much. And the mermaid STILL hasn't answered our questions -- How does Starbucks plan to fix the problem? When?

Regardless of politics, most of us agree on one thing: If a company makes a promise, it should stick to it.

Demand an answer from Starbucks! Sign our letter here!

Win a prize!
On Dec. 16, on the day of our LA-based meeting with Starbucks, City Hippy and green LA girl will award a prize to 2 people who galvanized the most people into signing the letter.

The prizes? Some Monkey & Son Krakatoa fair trade organic coffee, and fair trade yummies from Clipper-Teas.com.

And keep taking the challenge:

1) Simply visit your local Starbucks and ask: "Could I get a cup of fair trade coffee?"

2) Tell us what happens next. Was it hard or easy to get a cup?

BLOGGERS: simply blog about what happened and tag it with "starbuckschallenge" (all one word) on del.icio.us (put the Starbucks location in the "extended" description). We'll pull all articles into a feed and run that on our site - you can run the feed too, of course, if you'd like. ALSO help us get feedback by telling people about this challenge on your blogs.

NON-BLOGGERS: tell us what happened by emailing City Hippy or green LA girl, and we'll do the rest.

Challenge results
We'll be in frequent contact with Starbucks, but on Dec. 16, City Hippy and green LA girl will go to Starbucks with the letter and demand some concrete details as to what the company plans to do, if anything.

Keep taking challenges, and please feel free to let us know what YOU think our next step should be as activists, and what you think Starbucks' next step should be as a company that says it wants to be a leader in corporate social responsibility.

Have a fair trade day.

City Hippy and green LA girl

Some fun stuff --

The original Starbucks Challenge launch post, and Starbucks Challenge 2.0.
The Starbucks Challenge FAQ.
Starbucks Challenge's del.icio.us feed.
Starbucks Challenge's Google Map.

Update, 12/8/05: Cindy says she'll answer the questions in the letter before xmas. But I'm hoping she'll bet back to us before the 16th --

Update, 12/9/05: A handy FAQ about Starbucks' current fair trade policies.

Update, 12/10/05: Some inside scoop about how Starbucks' corporate policy translates to store action.

Update, 12/12/05: Challenge on -- and be kind to baristas while you're at it.

FEED (del.icio.us/starbuckschallenge):

A letter to Starbucks

2005-12-03T14:00:00.000-08:00

**Readers and bloggers: Please help get an answer from Starbucks! As a comment, add your name and location -- and let us know where you found out about this letter in parentheses. Feel free too to add your own comments and questions. Go here for more info about the Starbucks Challenge.**

Dear Cindy, Major, and the rest of Starbucks:

We hate to bug you during a holiday-filled month, but we’ve been waiting for a long time for some answers and hope that posting our Qs in this more public form will help us get some much-needed info.

What we're wondering about during our coffee breaks:

Why are so many Starbucks stores out of Café Estima, the only fair trade certified blend offered in Starbucks stores? (see here, here, here, here, here, and the comments here and here) Is this the fault of the distribution system (for not getting it to stores), the district or store manager (for not ordering it), or the individual baristas (for not looking harder for it)? Or – more optimistically – has Starbucks run out of Café Estima due to overwhelming customer demand for fair trade certified coffee?

Which makes us wonder -- Are there concrete plans (i.e. percentage figures) a-brewing to increase Starbucks' fair trade certified purchases? As you can tell by the results of the Starbucks Challenge, stores have been discouraging and refusing customer requests for fair trade coffee. We think it’s pretty fair to say that Starbucks’ headquarters doesn’t have a good sense of how much demand for fair trade certified coffee is out there. You said you’d have more fair trade certified coffee if customers demanded it. We’ve been, and we are, demanding it. Will you deliver?

But back to what you've already promised -- What's Starbucks planning to do on a national and international level to make sure its stores meet the Starbucks Challenge? We’re looking forward to the LA meeting, set for Dec. 16, but as you know, stores are failing the challenge all over the U.S. and the world. Neither of the emails sent out by headquarters have done much to improve things, and the new barista training video won’t come out until May 2006 – a half year after the start of the Starbucks Challenge. Since Starbucks prides itself on “legendary service,” we hope the mermaid can more swiftly deliver on a customer service promise it’s been making for years. Will the mermaid take real actions – actions that actually effect change -- to ensure its fair trade promises are kept?

And in case you assert (again) than certification’s not so important because all of Starbucks’ coffee is fairly traded, is there any way we can find out the minimum price Starbucks pays farmers for a pound of green coffee? We're curious as to what the bare minimum is for this all-fairly-traded claim – especially since 41% of Starbucks’ coffee purchases don’t have transparency clauses that let Starbucks find out how much farmers are paid. We're confused: How can Starbucks know that the prices paid to all its farmers are fair, when Starbucks doesn’t know how much many of its farmers are paid? Please illuminate us.

Aside from the top Q, we’ve been asking for answers to these for quite some time – some for over a month. We gave you a chance to answer via email – but haven’t heard back. We don’t think these are difficult questions, but due to the silence, we're being forced to suspect that either Starbucks doesn’t care to make meeting its fair trade promises a priority, or that Starbucks doesn’t want to reveal this information, for whatever reason.

Please prove us wrong. Really hope to hear from you soon.

Siel, green LA girl, Los Angeles, CA (I wrote the letter)
Al, City Hippy, London, UK (I edited the letter)

CLICK HERE TO SIGN

**Update, 12/08/05: Cindy of Starbucks said she'll have answers for us "before Christmas." Please urge Starbucks, in your comments to have the answer to us before Dec. 16th, when Starbucks Challenge 3.0 closes.

CLICK HERE TO SIGN

Phonebook conundrum

2005-12-03T01:00:00.000-08:00

My e-friend Joseph asked me a while back: How can a greenie stop getting all those damn phone books? If you're like me, you never even use paper phone books anymore. I Google, mostly, so I can search businesses by distance. I like to get my stuff at places I can run to.

But actually stopping delivery -- Well, that's no simple matter. Still, the blogosphere's been tackling it! Check out this post from The Old New Thing. His tip: To figure out who to contact about getting off the list, call the "How to order more copies of this wonderful telephone directory" number.

Note to self: Calling at 1 a.m. is not productive -- The poor phone company drones only work normal biz hours. Plus -- Why should I have to call and wait on hold? So I tried emailing, and hope the paper waste stops. Contact info below, to be updated with my results --

SBC. 800.248.2800 or 800.343.7390. Between 8-5, M-F. I used its customer service web form and am waiting to hear back.

United Yellow Pages. 800.343.2046, then press 6. I emailed via their website, and hope to hear back.

Verizon. 800.888.8448, then press 2. . Between 8-5, M-F. I used its customer service web form and am waiting to hear back.

Yellow Book. 800.464.3215. Between 8-9, M-F, Central time. I used its customer service web form and am waiting to hear back.

What a green LA girl wants

2005-12-02T22:39:00.000-08:00

While I love BuyBlue, I'm not in love with their gift list. Gap uses sweatshops, and Starbucks hasn't improved their fair trade friendliness as of yet, even after admitting a "break down in customer service" 2 months ago.

I mean, I still heart BuyBlue, but I want what I want. And I wanna make it easier for anyone planning to get green LA girl a gift during this holiday season ;) Why make a list of gifts that people should buy other people, when you can make a list of gifts that people can buy you?

Thus, my totally self-serving, megalomaniacal holiday gift list --

If you don't have much cash, get me this Stapless Stapler. I've been curious about this gizmo for a long, long time, and wanna freecycle the stapler I have now.

If you heart gurl rock, get me a What would Joan Jett do? shirt, from BUST's boobtique. I'd like it in red, small. Thanks.

In terms of actual music, I'd love to get Andrew Bird's And the Mysterious Production of Eggs, Portishead's Dummy, Spoon's Gimme Fiction, and The Dresden Dolls' self-titled CD.

If you're tired of hearing me bitch about my "writer's block," get me this Recycled Paper Journal and Pencil Set from Gaiam -- The travel edition. We're talking recycled paper, soy based inks, newspaper pencils. I'll start writing again. I promise.

Don't like paper? Then check out the Turning a New Leaf journal from World of Good -- fair trade recycled cotton.

Conversely, if you're glad I quit writing, buy me more books so I'll spend my time reading instead of writing. You can check out the books I want here, and buy them at your local bookstore -- My 5 fave indie LA bookshops are listed here.

If you want me to start composting already, get me this Topsy Turvy Upside-down Tomato Planter. I'll start composting, and I'll never need to buy tomatos again. I just need a lil help getting it hung up in my balcony.

But if you can't help me with the hanging bit, get me a Garden-In-A-Bag. I heart fresh basil.

If you feel green LA girl's gone too green, buy me a pewter blue wide neck crew, avaliable from Pangaya. I'm hoping this organic cotton shirt feels as comfy as it looks.

If you're anti consumer products, dedicate a tree to me, through TreePeople. For $25, TreePeople will plant a tree in my honor -- This group's goal is to inspire the people of Los Angeles to take personal responsibility for the urban forest. The one annoying feature: You gotta call. It'll be worth it though. (818) 753-TREE.

Or, get me the Gift of Oxfam. Make a donation in my name, and send me one of the cute cards letting me know you did so. I'm especially partial to the "Can you dig it" card. Yes, I dig.

And if you want me to get back to blogging more serious stuff already, buy an ad. I'm worth it, and proceeds go towards buying a bike for yours truly.

Green gambles

2005-12-01T19:38:00.000-08:00

So you thought you challenged hard and good, but you weren't one of the 3 winners of yummy fair trade stuff from the Starbucks Challenge. Well, while you wait for 3.0 to kick off, you might embrace your inner gambler and consider these fair trade raffles and drawings --

Win a rug from Rugmark! This is no ordinary rug -- It's made by a Tibetan Buddhist weaver, Lobsang Tenzing, whose family fled the Chinese invasion of Tibet in 1949. Gambling cost: Raffle tix are $10 each or 11 for $100 -- Proceeds benefit Rugmark’s work to stop the exploitation of children in South Asia’s handmade rug industry and offer educational opportunities to former child workers.

Don't have the space for rugs? Go for coffee, and stay alert all year with a whole year's supply of fair trade, organic coffee and/or tea, courtesy of Pura Vida. How? Donate to Grist, a cute lil eco-zine offering environmental indulgences to offset your green guilt this season. Gambling cost: $25 or more gets you into the coffee drawing. Or if you're one of those weird people who don't caffeinate, you have your pick of an Xtracycle, carry-all bag, Newman's food, or brainy books.

Good luck -- And let me know if you win something -- I'll be green with envy --

Starbucks Challenge 2.0 Awards!

2005-12-01T10:00:00.000-08:00

After reading through 178 participating blogs, with 231 challenges taken in 13 countries, 29 states (welcome Tennessee!) , and Washington DC, City Hippy and green LA girl have picked winners for the second month of the Starbucks Challenge.

LA County Winner: Roger, gone green.
Roger, a stay-at-home -- or should I say stay-at-Starbucks -- dad, took a bunch of challenges, and even started an entire blog dedicated to Starbucks Challenges!

Award: A 12 oz bag of Monkey & Son Velvet Hammer fair trade organic coffee.

US Winner: Kristin in Boise, Idaho.
Although she's not a blogger, Kristin took a few challenges herself -- and even roped her hubby into taking a few during his business trips! Kristin's also a fair trade chocolate advocate, and pointed me to this interesting chocolate site.

Award: A 12 oz bag of Monkey & Son Velvet Hammer fair trade organic coffee.

Internationa Winner: Declan of Dec's Rambling.
Dec took a bunch of challenges, including two at brand spankin' new Starbucks that just opened up in Dublin. He also wrote about the challenge quite regularly, sometimes despite himself: "Another Starbucks posting, I should just rename this blog Dec's Starbucks Rambling."

Award: Fair trade yummies from Clipper-Teas.com.

What did YOU help accomplish through the Starbucks Challenge? The bad news: Starbucks sent out another email to its stores, which, again, was rather ineffective. The Challenge success percentage has actually GONE DOWN since the first month.

Now, the good news: The mermaid also set up a meeting for Dec. 16 in the LA area, which'll bring bloggers together with Starbucks baristas, managers, and CSR reps. Starbucks also said it'll include a lil video tutorial about the French-press-on-demand policy for its "store partners," beginning May 2006.

Clearly, Starbucks has overpromised and underdelivered on its fair trade claims -- and admitted it. Where do we go from here? Stay tuned: A new annoucement to come in the next couple days!

Have a fair trade day :)

City Hippy and green LA girl

Coffee Crisis 109: The Catch-22 of fair trade debates

2005-11-30T14:00:00.000-08:00

Before Ric of Groundwork decided to get one of his blends fair trade certified, he said he sometimes saw certification as "a preventative act" – to ensure that less-informed people didn't think Groundwork was a "bad" company.

I see his point. Just as there are people who blindly subscribe to one-sided, so-called "free trade" principles espoused by the right, I'm guessing that there are some kids these days who go to a Coldplay concert, hear about fair trade, then single-mindedly decide all non-100%-fair trade companies are slave-driving assholes.

As most of my blog readers know, this isn't true. Fair trade certification isn't without its shortcomings. The one that bugs me most is that, for coffee, ONLY co-ops can get fair trade certified, as of now. This means that big farms that hire outside workers cannot get certified -- even if they treat workers kindly. Individual farmers, too, are unable to get certified. You can imagine how nice coffee companies who've been doing business with these plantations and farmers for years would be reluctant to cut ties with them, just cuz they can't get certified under current rules.

Sadly this is what companies like Starbucks use as an excuse (PDF) for not buying more fair trade coffee. Starbucks will complain that they can't be an all fair-trade company, because certification isn't avaliable for large plantations.

So why doesn't TransFair, the company that licences US companies' fair trade products, push to allow plantations to get fair trade certified? Because there's already a lot of fair trade certified coffee that's NOT being bought at fair trade prices, due to lack of buyers.

So why's there so much fair trade coffee left over? Because companies like Starbucks aren't buying more fair trade certified coffee. If big companies like Starbucks bought more fair trade coffee, orgs like Transfair and FLO, which certifies farms as fair trade, would have the funds and impetus to certify plantations.

But because many big companies choose to buy only enough fair trade coffee to greenwash their company -- Starbucks, for ex, makes only 1.6% (a stat unpublished on the web) of its coffee purchases fair trade -- these nonprofit orgs just don't have the resources to go about certifying plantations. Like most nonprofit orgs, FLO and Transfair have to be pragmatic, putting their money and resources where they'll have the most impact -- which, right now, are co-ops.

It's become a real Catch-22. Fair trade certification is limited by financial constraints. But the companies that could ease these constraints point to the current limitations of certification as a reason for not increasing their fair trade purchases.

Yes, it's a complicated situation. But if Starbucks wanted to, it has the money and power to resolve it. The mermaid often complains that for a company its size, there just isn't enough (PDF) fair trade certified coffee around to satisfy its needs. Well -- Starbucks -- How 'bout coming back to us with that complaint AFTER buying a lil more of the fair trade certified coffee already out there? THEN we can talk seriously about getting big-farm plantations certified.

Meaning -- No one's asking Starbucks for a 100% conversion at this point. Behemoth companies like Starbucks have pretty much precluded that possibility, since their meager fair trade purchases won't allow for more certification to occur. But there's nothing stopping Starbucks from buying more fair trade coffee, making it a bigger part of the corp's purchases.

Nothing, except corporate greenwashing and reluctance.

(Yes, I know Starbucks is pushing its own C.A.F.E. pracitices thing. More on that tactic later.)

Fuck Amazon -- Buy local!

2005-11-30T00:20:00.000-08:00

Ok all you anti-Buy Nothing Day people over at Pandagon. Shop if you must, but shop local -- especially if you live in San Fran. Via the SF Chronicle, I found out about San Francisco's Shop Local First Week, from Dec. 5 to 10.

Why's it important to patronize local shops? In a Chicago neighborhood study, local stores returned $68 for every $100 to the local economy, while chain stores returned only $43 of $100. If you live in San Fran, you have lots of options: go here, here, here and here for resources. If you live in LA like me, however, the options seem to be limited, but not nonexistent!

As a grad student, I'd like to start with books. One indie bookstore owner was quoted as saying that "If people just buy 12 out of 20 (books at independent stores), that's all you have to do and we'll be fine." Apparantly, Borders returns only $13 out of every $100 spent to the community, while independent bookstores returns $45. BTW -- The LA Borders have been switching over their cafes to Starbucks' owned Seattle's Best. I guess dominating Barnes & Noble wasn't enough for the mermaid.

Anyway -- May I introduce you to my fave indie bookstores:

Beyond Baroque. 681 Venice Blvd. Venice. 310.822.3006. Prolly the most avant-garde bookstore in the LA area, this shop's also the most notoriously difficult place to actually shop -- but also the coolest. Unless you can make it there on Fridays from 11AM to 6PM -- its offical store hours -- get there during a reading -- The store'll be open before, during, and after those. It'll fulfill all your experimental poetry chapbook desires --

Dawson's Book Shop. 535 N. Larchmont Blvd. Los Angeles. 323.469.2186. An antiquarian bookstore with lots of great rare books about Los Angeles, and a lil gallery with interesting modern photography. The owner's also a great supporter of experimental poetry. We used to have cool readings here, before Andrew, who organized the readings, quit organizing to spend more time with his band --

Book Soup: 8818 Sunset Blvd. West Hollywood. 310.659.3110. My fondest memory of this place is a talk and Q&A by Lauren Greenfield, photographer and author of Girl Culture. The staff there has great taste -- I recommend their recommendations. Parking's tough, so try to get there via public transport. It'll be well worth the effort.

Dutton's Brentwood. 11975 San Vincente Blvd. Los Angeles. 310.476.6263. I haven't been here in a lil while cuz the last time I was there, the cafe dude was rude to me and it pissed me off. However, don't let that scare you away from the bookstore itself! It's a real book browser's paradise. The stacks are narrow, but packed with cool stuff, and -- the disgruntled cafe guy aside -- I've found the people there to be very knowlegeable, helpful and friendly.

Skylight Books. 1818 N. Vermont Avenue. Los Angeles. 323.660.1175. I love this place, but I haven't been there in a while cuz it's simply too far away from my fossil-fuel hating heart. But I love how they're a self-described "fiercely independent" bookstore, and I wish I coulda been there for the Bret Easton Ellis reading earlier this year.

These are just my five faves -- There are many others, and I hope they stay around. I also know we have some amazing indie kid's book stores in la la land, but as a happily child-free girl, I don't keep track of those. Feel free to mention them in the comments, however :)

Starbucks charged with union busting in US

2005-11-29T21:15:00.000-08:00

Finally -- The MSM has now acknowledged that Starbucks' employees are unhappy about the mermaid's anti-union tactics. I think it's the "No latte, no peace" chant that finally caught the MSM's attention!

According to the Wall Street Journal's article, the National Labor Relations Board alleges that Starbucks tried to block workers at 3 NYC outlets from union activities. A hearing's set for Feb. 7. The Starbucks Workers Union says 15 Starbucks officials are charged with numerous anti-union acts.

Even the NY Times reported the charges and a picket line held by baristas in NYC last Friday. Apparantly, labor organizers picketed a Starbucks in Union Square to push the chain to recognize the workers' union. The union wants rights to organize and guaranteed 30-hour work weeks for employees so they can get health benefits.

This complaint follows closely on the heels of the strike by Starbucks' employees in New Zealand for higher wages last week.

The US union struggle, however, has been going on for a while now. Back in May, Starbucks employees brought complaints in front of the National Labor Relations Board, after former employee Sarah Bender said she was fired from Starbucks for union activities.

I'd like to repeat once again that the Starbucks' union also wants the mermaid to increase its fair trade certified purchases --

Shop with a heart in downtown LA

2005-11-29T17:17:00.000-08:00

Whevever I critique American Apparel CEO Dov Charney's questionable ass-grabbing tactics, I get comments and emails demanding to know if I prefer companies that abuse workers in sweatshops.

Um -- Are those my options?

No, they're not, thanks in part to the Garment Worker Center in our very own downtown LA. This anti-sweatshop, pro-union center helps garment workers to organize and resolve work problems, while educating them about wage and hour laws, health and safety regulations and discrimination.

If you're reading this, you likely support fair labor practices. Bring that concern to the workers in LA, home of the largest garment industry in the country! This Friday, you can find out what's going on right at the source, at the "Shop With a Heart at the Garment Worker Center" event:

What: Community Reception and Sweat-Free Shopping Day. Find out what GWC's been doing in the last year, while shopping for union-made, cooperative-made, and fair trade products and enjoying free food and refreshments alongside Political cartoonist Lalo Alcaraz, who'll be there in support. I'm not sure if "refreshments" include alcoholic beverages, but I'm trying to find out so I can arrange for a DD if need be.

When: Friday, December 2, 2005, from 6 to 9 pm

Where: 1250 S. Los Angeles St. #213, Los Angeles (free street parking after 6)

What Else: $10 suggested donation

If you can't make it, but want to help, the GWC has a wishlist! Got a desk, bookshelf, or an extra yoga mat lying around? Donate it by emailing donate@garmentworkercenter.org!

And if you live in the westside and wanna go, let's carpool.

**Update, 11/29/05: There will be no alcohol! Boo plus hoo :( This, however, opens up the possibility for a myriad of post-event drinking sprees --

Vegan eats and Starbucks Challenges in Westwood

2005-11-28T14:54:00.000-08:00

Met Dawn for lunch at the Westwood Native Foods today -- for yummy vegan food without the Real Food Daily price tag. I got a Bali Surf Burger, Dawn got Tijuana Tacos, and we split both. Cost for the eats plus a chai latte for Dawn: $15 and some cents, after my KCRW Fringe Benefits Card discount!

Of course, I used this trip as another opportunity to take another Starbucks Challenge or three. There are, by the way, 3 Starbucks on Westwood within walking distance.

The first (left), on Olympic and Westwood, almost failed the challenge when the barista first said fair trade wasn't brewing, then tried to charge me extra when I asked for a French press. Luckily, a coffee master jumped in with his eggnog-latte-bespattered apron to save the fair trade day.

The second, on Westwood and Missouri, was PERFECT -- by the book -- the way all Starbucks Challenge experiences really should be, according to Starbucks' official, marketed policy. I asked for a fair trade coffee, and the barista said "I can French press one for you." Five minutes later, I had my fair trade coffee, and a second non-sexual crush on a Starbucks barista (go here for deets on the first crush).

The third, on 1161 Westwood (left), was technically challenged by Dawn -- I was on the sidelines, taking pictures. To the right's the barista who shiftily told Dawn "I don't think we have any in store," clearly reluctant to bother checking.

I'm kinda wondering why so many Starbucks seem to be out of fair trade coffee lately (see here, here, here, here, here, and the comments here and here). I mean, I'd rather not think all these baristas are lying about their stores' fair-trade-less-ness. Is it possible that customer demand has overwhelmingly surpassed Starbucks' meager 1.6% of fair trade purchases? Or is Starbucks' distribution system really this shitty?

Oh wait, I mean, I'm very thankful I got a couple cups of fair trade coffee from Starbucks today, finally. What's up with my glass-half-empty 'tude? This challenge is slowly killing my innocent optimism --

My brief flirt with pre-fab architecture

2005-11-27T00:57:00.000-08:00

Visited "A Tropical House" at the Hammer Museum, per Treehugger's recommendation. Made by Jean Prouvé, this house, installed in Brazzaville, capital of the Congo, in 1951, was super portable due to its proto-Ikea flatness, and way more practical in the Congo climate than the heat-trapping concrete buildings expat French bureucrats were living in at that time.

Wish I coulda walked into the house -- woulda found out how conducive the holey building is to napping -- but I was only allowed to gaze in from the outside through my zoom lens --

I actually had to speedily run in and run out of hammer, cuz dogs aren't allowed in -- and I'd made my sis wait outside with Joey. Luckily, students get free admission, so I didn't have to pay for my short visit.

The exhibit's been extended till Jan 2006 (via blogging.la), so I'm guessing it's pretty popular?

Poor Joey. I gave him my Hammer admission sticker as consolation.

Hammer Museum. 10899 Wilshire Blvd. 310.443.7000

Challenge update: "Break down" gets brokener

2005-11-26T12:24:00.000-08:00

207 challenges taken in 28 states (welcome Nebraska!) and 13 countries, with 170 blogs participating!

5 days to go, and 5 more reasons to take the challenge!

1. You wanna see if Starbucks employees had time to read their email over Thanksgiving.

2. You want on the spiffy Starbucks Challenge map.

3. You live in Alabama or Utah, and wanna represent.

4. You could really use some free, organic fair trade certified coffee.

5. You're a masochist and enjoy hearing "no."

Wondering if things improved at Starbucks this second month? I just did the stats: Nationwide, the fair trade success rate has GONE DOWN since the first month of the challenge, from 59% to 49%!

I'm proud to report, however, that the stores in California have improved -- a whopping 4%, from 55% to 59%. This anomaly was mostly due to the work of Roger, gone green, an uber-challenger who's made it his mission to personally educate the baristas he runs across, scaring them into compliance.

It's pretty clear that most store managers have no clue about the fair-trade-on-demand policy that Starbucks so proudly displays on its website. Perhaps a lil more embarrasingly, Starbucks employees evidently don't care to check out their website -- or read their emails, for that matter. Legendary service, my ass.

But before Starbucks' CSR department offers to send out yet another ineffective email, The promised LA meeting's been set up! If you live in the LA area, are free Friday, Dec. 16 from 10 until about noon, and would like to put in your two cents, email and let me know -- ASAP, cuz spots are limited.

The art of buying nothing

2005-11-25T13:42:00.000-08:00

Woke up excitedly to celebrate a brand new holiday: Buy Nothing Day! And as if on cue, Joey, the lil pup I'm dogsitting, tore apart a dollar bill. Here she is, with her handiwork. I taped the buck back together, but you can see the rip.

Then I checked my email -- to discover yet another reason why I don't subscribe to the LA Times. In a very dubya-like matter, the LAT editorial today celebrates the "United Shoppers of America": "It's easy to deride consumerism. Yet the crowds at the stores today and in the weeks to come will not just be grasping for the latest mass-marketed gadgets and gewgaws. They will be taking a leap of faith and making a vote of confidence in the resilience of the U.S. economy."

Idiots. Since when's buying useless crap a subversive act?

Joey and I went for a walk, and I thought about taking the Starbucks Challenge. The way they've been going, I figured my chances of actually getting (and paying for) a fair trade cup o' joe was pretty slim. After all, the Starbucks in Anaheim near my mom's place flunked another challenge I took yesterday. The barista said they didn't have any fair trade coffee in store.

But Joey pulled the other way, so I grabbed a free LA Weekly and we trotted on home. Check out my morning's toil, to the right.

My mom and sis are on their way up here -- We're gonna watch a movie I borrowed from a friend. All in all, it'll be a nice day -- and I won't be a penny poorer --

Guilt-free sushi

2005-11-24T09:24:00.000-08:00

At an Indonesian restaurant last Friday, I asked my date what he recommended -- He'd been there before, I hadn't. He suggested ordering a couple dishes to share -- and immediately, I rebuffed both his picks.

You know, cuz they had chicken in them. I'm not a big fan of eating these feathered friends, mainly because the thought of hormone-fed, antibiotics-packed flesh grosses me out, but also cuz I met such nice chickens during my last NoCal visit. What if I end up eating the funny looking one with the white feather 'fro?

I don't eat red meat or pork either -- due to the above issues, plus unresolved mad cow fears, plus everything I read in Fast Food Nation. I do, however, eat seafood. I simply can't give up sushi.

Now I know we have fishing-related environmental issues in the world -- and that lots of fish end up ingesting antibiotics too. Umbra wrote about this a few years back -- and things haven't changed significantly, as far as I can tell.

So what to do? On the Audobon website, I checked out the Seafood Lover's Guide, complete with a PDF Seafood Wallet Card detailing what fish to enjoy, be careful of, or avoid.

So detailed, in fact, that I found this fishy list rather daunting. Which is why I cut off everything except the "Avoid" section. I figure I can just start by excising the unlucky 13 on that list from my diet. It won't be hard -- it's not like I ever ate monkfish or shark anyway. And no tuna -- prolly my fave fish -- is on the list, except for bluefin, which I can't afford, really.

And I even glued the lil list on to the clothing tag to my moreTrees tank, to make the wallet card more durable.

Back to Friday: we ended up getting a shrimp dish and a tofu dish. I didn't have my handy card yet, so I'm not sure whether or not the shrimp was imported. But if it were, I'd have liked to just order my tofu delight without going into a long explanation about why I'd rather not get the shrimp dish even though I eat seafood.

He was a very nice, understanding boy. I just like ordering my own food --

Starbucks workers strike in NZ

2005-11-23T14:09:00.000-08:00

In the US, Starbucks is known for its generous employee benefits, cuz part-time baristas get medical insurance and other cool stuff. But I guess the Starbucks workers in New Zealand don't feel the mermaid's been generous at all. Starbucks "partners" from 10 different stores in NZ walked out today, asking for higher wages. (Thanks for the tip, tailos!)

Their complaint, according to campaign coordinator Simon Oosterman: “Starbucks workers start on $10 an hour, only fifty cents above the minimum wage. Workers hours are not guaranteed and can, and have been, cut from 40 to 20 hours. In Australia, Starbucks workers earn almost $5 more per hour than their New Zealand workmates. We are only asking for $2 more per hour."

With a lil help from XE.com, I figured out that the workers are asking for what would be a starting wage rate of $8.33 USD, up from the current $6.94 USD.

I have no idea how that compares to the pay rates in the US, but I do know that Starbucks works to bust unions here -- which helps explain why only 300 out of 80,000 workers globally are unionized.

BTW -- Last year, the relatively new Starbucks Baristas Union (organized in New York with IWW IU/660) joined Global Exchange's call to Starbucks to up its fair trade certified purchases to 5 percent of its coffee.

Currently, 1.6% of Starbucks' coffee is fair trade certified.

Every day to be a fair trade day @ USC

2005-11-23T13:57:00.000-08:00

It's happening! USC's going to start brewing a fair trade certified blend at most of its campus locations next semester!

This follows quickly on the heels of the fair trade coffee tasting, held about a week and a half ago. Lore of Hospitality Services said that the fair trade blends are already on order, but it'll take a couple weeks for the order to come in and work out some logistics. Considering the holidays and all, and considering that the last day of classes is on Dec. 2, Lore can't guarantee the new blends will be brewing until next semester. Still, USC Hospitality Services has been super helpful and relatively quick in responding to students!

The conversion won't be 100% -- but a fair trade certified blend will be offered at all USC outlets that offer Starbucks coffees. These, by the way, are not licensed Starbucks stores -- They're USC-owned cafes -- like Trojan Grounds -- that "proudly brew Starbucks."

BTW -- if, like me, you've been circling Doheny Library once a week to see if this mysterious Doheny Tea House is open yet -- The tea house hit a lil snafu with inspections and won't be open till next semester either. Not sure what happened exactly, but when it opens, it'll always have Peet's fair trade coffee on brew :)

Meet green Tank girl

2005-11-22T14:07:00.000-08:00

Checked out Whole Foods Market's new Lifestyle store in WeHo -- and got an organic cotton tank!

Finally, I can try green clothes on before buying them -- and I don't have to pay shipping fees! That's me, to the left, wearing my new autumn tree tank from moreTrees.

Afterwards, I went to a Starbucks across the street and asked for fair trade coffee. Barista1 didn't know what it was, and asked barista2, who went into the back to ask the manager. Then he came back and let me know that Cafe Estima's the new fair trade blend, but that this store doesn't carry it "because we're small."

Then the manager came out to tell me the same thing, and added that she tried to order Cafe Estima for her store, but "they wouldn't send it to us." She advised trying the WeHo1 store, across from the 24 Hour Fitness.

Is this true? Are small Starbucks forbidden to carry fair trade certified coffee? Cuz if so, they might mention that on the website claim --

But nothing can bring me down, cuz I've got my moreTrees tank on. I even bought white wine, so nothing bad'll happen even if I drink too much and spill things --

Whole Foods Market Lifestyle. 7859 Santa Monica Blvd. West Hollywood, CA. 323.848.4200. 11am-8pm.

Starbucks emails stores, again

2005-11-21T12:50:00.000-08:00

Since the first emails didn't make any waves at most of the Starbucks in the US, Starbucks decided more action was needed -- and sent out another email.

This new email, sent out last Friday, gives some basic info about Starbucks' support for fair trade, then reiterates all the info in the previous email letting baristas know about the French-press on demand policy.

A key difference though: While the first focused on customer service, the new email, titled "Fair Trade Certified™ Coffee and Brewed Coffee upon Request," has a stronger emphasis on fair trade certified coffee. A welcome emphasis for me, since it better reflects the Starbucks' frequent claim that they have "similar goals" as the fair trade movement.

The info's hardly new -- to the challengers, I mean -- since the email simply reiterates the fair trade promises that've been proudly displayed on Starbucks' website for sometime. It'll be new, however, to many of the managers and baristas whose stores've been failing the challenge repeatedly.

That is, if they read this email.

I babbled my concern to Major of Starbucks, pointing out that the first email didn't exactly do the job. He assured me that stores get this particular email on a weekly basis, and that "It is a communication that they consider their primary source for current and most high priority information related to operations so I believe it to be very well read and acted upon."

Hmm. Okay. Try a rechallenge this week, everyone --

The best thing since frappr shoutouts

2005-11-20T18:49:00.000-08:00

The Starbucks Challenge has a better map! This comes courtesy of Robert, aka Groby, super-programmer, game guru and author of Groby Unplugged.

In an amazing feat of technical prowess, Groby got the Starbucks Challenge del.icio.us tags to feed into a Google map!

We're still, however, working out some kinks -- due mainly to my laziness, aka hangovers. If you excitedly clicked over to the map to discover your challenge isn't showing up, this is cuz you:

Challenged in October. To put the challenge on the map, I have to tag it with the store ID number, which is kinda a long process for one lil blogger (Al of City Hippy's a busy dad as of Wednesday, of a brand spankin' new Mini Hippy!). So November challenges are tagged, while October challenges will get tagged in the next week.

Didn't give me enough info about which store you challenged. Unless you're one of the few people who only have 1 Starbucks in town, I need cross streets, addresses, or even the store ID number itself.

Challenged a store that's already been challenged, or a store that got rechallenged. As of now, we can only have one tag per store, though Groby's working on that.

Challenged a store outside the US that Starbucks doesn't provide driving directions for on its website. For technical reasons way over my head but not over Groby's head, driving directions are necessary for mapping. To fix this, we need to find a service that converts non-US addresses into geolocations. Drop us any words of advice.

And check out the map!

Groby and I also hard at work at our NaNoWriMo projects. I'm proud to say that as of today, I've written a whopping 732 words. I can still make it -- Just need to write 4926.8 words a day from now till the end of the month --

Starbucks: 1-800-23-LATTE for bullshit

2005-11-19T20:49:00.000-08:00

To increase my chances of getting answers to my questions, I sent the Starbucks' customer service department an email through their website. I also sent a comment card to Seattle's Best Coffee (owned by Starbucks) asking how often they brewed their fair trade blends.

This is the email I got back:
__
Dear Mr./Ms. Siel

In regards to your inquiry, we would like the opportunity to gather a bit more information in order to best assist you. Please call our customer relations department at 1-800-23-LATTE. Upon calling, please have reference #2274881 available. Our representatives are happy to help you with any questions or concerns you might have.

On behalf of Starbucks, I appreciate you taking the time to share your thoughts with us and look forward to hearing from you soon.
__

I got the same email for Seattle's Best, except my reference number for that one was 2295382.

Being the Pollyanna that I am, I called. I asked what the percentage of Starbucks' coffee met C.A.F.E. standards.

Kelly (Starbucks rep that answered the phone): That's how we've always purchased our coffee.

Me: So what percentage...

Kelly: I assume it's a hundred percent.

Me: Ok, I know that's not true.

Kelly: Um, hold on. Let me find out.

11 minutes later, Kelly came back on line, to give me some pound figures (no percentages) that didn't match up with what Starbucks has on their CSR brochures.

And about Seattle's Best? According to Kelly, they'll be brewing fair trade certified coffee "once in a while."

Starbucks Challenge: Stats update and wine bait

2005-11-19T00:43:00.000-08:00

Whoever's challenger #200 gets a bottle of Finca Solano Tempranillo Crianza from me, if you live in the LA area or are willing to make a trip out to talk fair trade over wine with green LA girl. I guess that means the challenger gets half a bottle -- or a quarter, to be more exact.

Latest stats: 194 challenges taken with 161 individual blogs joining in from 27 states (welcome New Mexico! Still waiting on Alabama and Utah...), plus Washington DC, and 13 countries (welcome Austria!).

Of the 31 challenges added since the last update, only 18 passed -- a few only after a lot of arm-twisting. A couple of the unsuccesses were proto-challenges we belatedly discovered -- but previous stats also contain proto-challenges --

I can feel Cindy and Major's blood pressures going up.... If they had it their way, this "break down in customer service" would've been fixed in October -- or better yet, never have happened to begin with.

They're getting an unfortunate taste of what I feel -- a sense of angry helplessness in the face of a large, postmodern corporate machine --

Another Challenge failure: How long's "a little time"?

2005-11-18T14:47:00.000-08:00

Way way back before the Starbucks Challenge even officially started, I tried to get a cup of fair trade coffee at the Starbucks on Hoover and Jefferson -- The one hundreds of USC students go to every day. I got my damn coffee, but only after so much hassle and pushing on my part that I wrote the "One tall coffee for the fair trade bitch" post.

This was on Sept. 6, two months and 12 days ago, AFTER several emails to Starbucks complaining about the store's fair trade failures.

How it all began: I emailed Starbucks' main customer service email mid-August letting them know the store in question hadn't brewed fair trade coffee in MONTHS (back then, stores were supposed to brew fair trade one day a month). In response, I got a form email on Aug. 20th with press-release info I already had, letting me know that stores brew fair trade "around the 20th of every month."

So I sent an angrier email back, to get a more personal response (see bottom of post) on Sept. 4 that said Starbucks would arrange a phone call with the district manager for the store.

Christine, the district manager, did indeed email me on Sept. 23. She let me know that the Coffee of the Day program had been replaced with Coffee of the Week.

I emailed her back the same day to thank her for her response, and to let her know about my fair trade bitch experience. Christine wrote back on Sept. 25, said she "connected" with Bryce, the manager for the store near USC, to ask him to educate the baristas: "Bryce did ask me to give him a little time to communicate this policy to all of his team, as it’s over 35 partners," she wrote.

So I held out, then dropped by the store today, Nov. 18, a week shy of 2 months since Christine's email.

Barista1: We only have Cafe Verona right now -- We only have one coffee brewing at a time.

Me: Oh, cuz I heard that Starbucks would French press...

Barista2: (interjects) Some stores do that. (to the girl standing behind me) Can I help you?

Barista1: Yeah, we just aren't able do that because this store's too busy.

And what does Christine think about this? I don't know. Despite her invitation to "please let me know if I can be of any more help to you," she hasn't bothered to respond to my post-September emails, sent Oct. 5 and Oct. 24.

Trash AOL's trash

2005-11-17T17:55:00.000-08:00

I've had a free AOL account since 1999, when I did a brief stint at a PR firm that had AOL as a client. Despite my pestering the HR girl about nixing my account so I wouldn't get charged for it, AOL never bothered to take me off the overhead.

So I gave my mom and my friend Jen a screename each. Both still dial-up, but at least it's free.

Never use the service myself -- reminds me too much of "work" -- but I can't get away from their damn CDs. Between me, my roommates, and my mom, we get around 6 a month -- which I'd been throwing in the trash till I got an email request for these things from an Eric via freecycle. His "accumulation project" collects AOL CDs, which'll be used to create a sculptural piece called "Pillars of Decency," an artistic and wry commentary on wasteful ad tactics.

So from now on, I'll collect these CDs to send off to Eric -- Prolly around May or so (his project ends in September 2006). There these eco-menaces will serve a brief artistic purpose, before getting shuttled over to No More AOL CDs. That's a lil Cali-based grassroots effort to collect a million of these to dump on AOL's front door, to get AOL to stop bombarding us and the environment with these unwanted objects. They've gotten some good press for their work.

What about those other unused CDs you have lying around? Try Greendisk. For just $5.95, you can send them up to 20 lbs of your "technotrash" -- And the more anal greenies will be happy to know that upon sending in your crap, you'll get a "Certificate of Destruction" -- with a bonded guarantee that everything'll be disposed of in an environmentally responsible manner.

Look, I started my stash (right). It's a long way to 20 lbs, but I can throw batteries, print cartridges, and other objects in there too.

Thinking of even throwing a technotrash bash -- Everyone can bring their junk, unload it on me, then drink organic wine and gloat greenly, self-satisfied in our eco-friendliness.

Keep your eye out for the evite --

My fave local organic vegan kosher restaurant

2005-11-16T17:51:00.000-08:00

Best place to go drinking with your Orthodox Jewish friend: Real Food Daily.

Here you can get local, organic vegan food and drink kosher wine too! After sliding into a seat across from my friend and mentor Roberta 30 mins later than promised, I ordered a bottle of their kosher cabernet sauvignon. Roberta went from peeved at my tardiness to delighted by my mere existence in just minutes.

Aren't drunk lunches great? After drinking most of the bottle myself, I took the bus home and checked the mail to discover that RFD even remembers my birthday.

Then I fell into a nap, had wine-soaked nightmares, and woke up at 5 p.m. with a lil hangover.

Other mysterious people keep remembering I'm a Scorpio too . Latest gift from unidentified beneficiary to the left -- all items off of my Froogle wish list.

Who are ya? And more importantly, will these keep coming? For how long?

Starbucks too hasn't forgotten me, though the mermaid's still mum on much of the stats and info I've requested. They are, however, super generous with things I haven't actually asked for. Not that I'm ungrateful -- Just, you know, wondering about the stats.

In any case, got a UPS package from Major of Starbucks today, right. Thank you, Major! I'm thinking of reading the book WHILE listening to the audiobook of the same -- Something I've never tried before.

A whole new Starbucks experience awaits me --

Starbucks: Transparant exagerrations

2005-11-15T18:40:00.000-08:00

I'm gonna have to write a whole post about Cindy's uber-long comment (comment #5), mainly cuz I'm getting bombarded with emails from USC students, TransFair people, and activists incensed by Cindy's words. While I encourage all of you to respond personally with your own comments, I'll try to air some of the concerns here.

For those of you unfamiliar with coffee farmer co-ops -- and this group, by the way, seems to include Cindy -- basically, these co-ops are a group of farmers that come together to pool their resources. This allows them to collect their coffee together to sell it in large units to companies. Plus, those farmers can make financial decisions that benefit the group as a whole -- buying better equipment they can all use or building a school or hospital, say -- that a lone farmer couldn't afford.

So why does Cindy say "it is important to note that the $1.26 goes to the cooperatives not the individual farmers"? I suppose that if I were part of a co-op, and as a group, we decided to use a chunk of the money earned to buy new farm equipment, I won't receive that chunk in cash to spend on, say, organic wine pour moi. That said, I'd get new farm equipment. I'd still consider that money coming to me, although not in cash or alcohol form.

Despite the tactful language, Cindy's remarks sound like a lot of mudslinging against the fair trade movement in general and against TransFair in particular. "We are asking TransFair USA for the same transparency and documentation we are asking from our other suppliers," she writes, as if TransFair has duped them in the past. She adds: "Because, unfortunately, not all coop leaders are honest or fair."

I think TransFair's aware corrupt people exist in the world -- FLO, the international organization of which TransFair is like the US wing, in fact found a corrupt dude once and took the co-op off the register. This is NO SECRET. This is also why FLO and TransFair have stringent auditing procedures in place to spot and weed out such meanies from the fair trade chain -- procedures that some consider bureaucratic and expensive (which is the most common complaint from co-ops and companies -- NOT corruption) but are, in my opinion, worthwhile.

In any case, this alleged corruption, from everything I've read and heard from activists and coffee companies, is hardly widespread as Cindy seems to intimate. Of course, I'm willing to be convinced otherwise -- but I need more than Cindy's hearsay.

What really bugs me is Cindy's claim that Starbucks gets attacked because of their transparancy. "I know Starbucks will always be a target.," she writes "... I guess that is the price Starbucks pays for addressing the issues; engaging with our critices and trying to be a leader in the industry."

Um, only 1.6% of Starbucks' purchases is fair trade certified. That isn't exactly leadership. And the small percentage of the coffee bought under Starbucks' own C.A.F.E. standards -- a percentage I've requested repeatedly and haven't received -- doesn't put them in the leader ranks in my book either.

And yes, Starbucks does indeed devote a large chunk of its website to social responsibility. But key facts are missing. The site implies that all Starbucks' coffee meets C.A.F.E. standards, when that percentage won't even reach the 50% mark until 2007. The site implies all farmers who sell to Starbucks make fair wages -- when in actuality, Starbucks has no idea what some of the farmers receive for their work.

What's sad is that if Starbucks wanted to, it has all the resources to really become a leader for fair trading practices in the industry. Instead, the mermaid keeps pointing blame, while implying things at Starbucks are better than they really are.

The thing is, Starbucks HAS done some great things for a company its size. The fucks at Nestle don't even pretend they care about being a "leader" in the industry. But Starbucks loses its "nice" creds when it exaggerates the scope of its current policies and belittles the strides that still remain to be made. Why not really opt for real transparancy, admitting shortcomings while also celebrating achievements?

Sean, for one, whose comment Cindy's was in response to, wrote to clarify that he's "very in favor of fair trade" and seems rather horrified that his comment has been twisted "into a self serving sort of way to make the shortcomings of fair trade make it appear they [Starbucks] are doing what's right when they clearly have a LOT of work to do."

And a TransFair employee writes: "The more I read Cindy's post the more incensed I get. She's dropping a lot of things here and there, casually, that are in my opinion-either plain ignorance or evidence of a deep institutional misunderstanding on sbux part."

Why doesn't TransFair weigh in officially, unanonymously? Well -- My thoughts on that later this week.

Starbucks: Fairly deceptive claims

2005-11-14T17:36:00.000-08:00

"The only way the oil companies could make more money would be if they were drilling for oil and struck Starbucks coffee." -- Jay Leno

Starbucks claims it's "committed to paying fair prices for all of our coffee." Starbucks' website boasts that in 2004, "Starbucks paid on average, $1.20 per pound ($2.64kg) for high-quality coffee beans."

Now will pillage for yarn (see comment #1) already has issues with this $1.20 figure, which is lower than the fair trade certification minimum of $1.26 an lb. "Like it would kill them to pay the other $.06/lb???" she asks.

But lately, I've been wondering if this issue is simply about 6 cents. Read the Starbucks' claim again: "Starbucks paid on average, $1.20 per pound ($2.64kg) for high-quality coffee beans."

Paid $1.20 to whom?

Until a few days ago, I blindly assumed that this $1.20 per pound was the average price of coffee for all farmers who sold to Starbucks. But Starbucks' careful wording gingerly skirts that issue.

I started to suspect something different when I read Sean's comment. Sean, who's been working with coffee farmers in Costa Rica, revealed, for example, that Starbucks' used to buy the coffee from those farmers via a "coyote" -- a middleman who skimmed off the farmers' profits. These middlemen often gouge farmers who have limited contacts, marketing skills, or access to transportation, then sell this ill-gotten coffee to companies who don't bother to find out how or where the stuff came from.

In fact, I get the sense that, for a big chunk of their coffee, Starbucks has no clue how much farmers are paid at all. Starbucks says it began inserting economic transparency requirements into standard contracts in 2001, and that "Today, we have economic transparency requirements for 59 percent of all coffee purchased to provide information on the payments made to farmers."

Meaning, that for 41 percent of Starbucks' coffee, it's pretty much impossible to figure out the cut that goes to farmers.

So how can Starbucks even know whether or not it pays "premium prices that result in a profit for the farmers and their families"? And where does the $1.20 figure come from?

I mean, I'm glad that Starbucks is working toward economic transparency. I wish assholes like Nestle would do the same. What I'm saying is, if Starbucks stated that they're aware not all their coffee may be "fairly traded" as of now, but are working to make sure this changes and plan to have full economic transparency by such and such a date, I'd be cool with that. I might even applaud that.

But why claim that all their coffee's already fairly traded? Why imply that the $1.20 per pound figure goes for all their coffee purchases? [Update, 12/11/05: Here, I mean that the figure goes TO FARMERS for all coffee purchases. Shoulda been more clear -- sorry]

Cuz I feel like I've been duped, and I'm pissed off.

Get your fair trade organic chocolate fix

2005-11-13T14:00:00.000-08:00

Want fair trade chocolate, without paying for shipping? Try Wild Oats. Their fair trade certified chocolate offerings:

Endangered Species Baby Bars: I found the Organic Snow Leopard and Organic Giraffe baby bars at the Wild Oats on Wilshire and 5th in Santa Monica, but hopefully the store'll start carrying all six -- 10% of profits support endangered species recovery. Totally affordable, at $1.49 each.

Green & Black's Maya Gold: Also organic :) You can read the story of how this bar came to be, here. $3.69 each.

You can get fair trade bananas at Wild Oats too, along with a good selection of fair trade coffees and teas --

Hoping Trader Joe's will follow suit. I've asked the nice employees a couple times about it while complimenting them on their fair trade coffee and tea products, but no fair trade chocolate bars there as of yet.

Trader Joe's does, however, offer a fair trade cocoa powder. You know, for those cold winter nights in SoCal when it drops below 70 --

Yum :)

Challenge inspires new Starbucks training video!

2005-11-12T16:22:00.000-08:00

What your participation in the Starbucks Challenge has done so far:

1. Starbucks admitted that there IS a problem: a break down in customer service.

2. Starbucks sent out a bunch of emails to take care of the problem -- which totally worked for the Starbucks in Singapore, but not for most of the US Starbucks -- especially many in LA.

3. Starbucks admitted the emails, sadly, were not doing the job, and said they'll set up, before the end of the month, a meeting between me (and hopefully some other bloggers), Starbucks CSR reps, and district managers in the LA area.

4. [*NEW*] By May 2006, Starbucks will include a lil video in its "new partner learning program" that'll reiterate Starbucks' policy to provide customers with a French press -- including Cafe Estima, Starbucks' lone fair trade certified blend sold in stores. This means new baristas will be officially taught about Starbucks French-press-on-demand policy through a video during their first few weeks of work!

Pretty cool, eh? Thanks everyone for challenging -- and please, take more challenges! As I've mentioned before, since it's still rather difficult to come by a French-pressed cup of fair trade coffee in many Starbucks all over the US, a meeting with the managers in the LA area will NOT be an end-all to the problem. [gratuitous USC fair trade coffee tasting pics, right and below]

Cuz, you know, I'm an impatient gal, and I want my fair trade coffee, any place where Starbucks sits, before May 2006! After all, Starbucks has been making this fair-trade-on-demand promise for a long long time. Starbucks headquarters has been able to get the word out about its holiday coffee offerings pretty speedily and efficiently -- which makes me think that, if the mermaid was pressured to, it could quickly get the word out about the "break down in customer service" situation.

I do think that Cindy and Major are working on the problem -- It's a matter of if and when they can nudge the behemoth corporation into doing the same. For that, more challenges are vital.

Somewhat relatedly -- Lloyd of The Year of the Coffee Blog interviewed me -- and the interview's avaliable as a podcast on The Coffee Sessions! You can hear me ramble about fair trade coffee and knitting while hung over and the general aimlessness of my grad student life.

I'd like to say that my voice is NOT as nasal or high pitched or staticky or machine-like as it sounds on the podcast! At least, I don't think so... I mean, back in college when I sang, I was an alto! The static/machine bit's kinda my fault -- I planned badly, and so had to do the interview via cell phone while sitting in Literati Cafe (thus the background noise), staring at and waiting to eat veggie lasagna --

Eh -- The lasagna was yummy --

A taste of what's to brew

2005-11-11T19:16:00.000-08:00

In my rather biased opinion, I'd say the fair trade coffee tasting at USC was a success. When I got there around 10:30, the Starbucks staff said they'd been getting about a student a minute. Yey!

And I met Major, a Starbucks "Coffee Master," who'd flown down from Seattle specifically for this tasting. "Oh, YOU'RE green LA girl," Major said when I "revealed" myself a few minutes into our conversation. "Cindy says hello." Major too's read the blog, and thanked me for the Starbucks Challenge, for "bringing this problem to our attention." Sweet --

My quandary: Both Cindy and Major seem like nice people, who really want Starbucks to deliver on their promises. It's uncomfortable, sometimes, confronting such nice people with all of Starbucks' uncool shortcomings -- but then I s'pose that's part of the job, theirs and mine...

In any case, Major quickly concurred that the emails Cindy sent out haven't done much. That didn't stop him, of course, from sending out one more email to the district managers in the LA area inviting them to the tasting. None had come by before I left, a lil after noon.

So what now? Major (left) said he'd work on setting up a meeting between me and some of the managers and/or district managers in the LA area to get something happening on this "break down in customer service." Maybe a lil face to face time -- with beleagured Starbucks' CSR reps and very angry bloggers -- will whip the LA stores into fair trade shape. And Major promised to have the meeting set up before the end of the month.

Wow. This sounds like action.

So I'm eagerly awaiting to hear the when and where. Though I'm concerned cuz -- while this meeting may resolve issues in green LA girl's 'hood -- breakdowns have been happening in many other places. Will all of those cities and towns need to hold their own meetings?

Lots more to come about this convo, cuz Major and I covered everything from fair trade to globalization to Starbucks' C.A.F.E. practices. But for starters, I left the tasting a little more caffeinated, and a little more hopeful.

Then I dropped into this Starbucks (right) on San Vincente and 26th to take the challenge.

The very nice barista: We don't have any fair trade in store now. We actually haven't brewed that in like two years.

Me: Two years!

Barista: Yeah, I don't know why they're not doing it anymore. I mean, fair trade's great, you know, cuz the money gets back to the farmers.

We nodded together in solemn agreement.

I could've told the barista that although Starbucks' old "Fair Trade Blend" has been phased out, the new Cafe Estima is fair trade certified.

But that's not my job.

Starbucks Challenge: old news

2005-11-10T23:30:00.000-08:00

Thought this Starbucks Challenge was a new fangled thing? Think again. Fair trade advocates have been trying to get a lil fair trade coffee out of Starbucks for a long long tme -- Read Derek's Jan. 2004 report on Global Exchange's website: "Walk into your neighborhood Starbucks and ask for a cup of freshly brewed 'fair trade' coffee. Chances are, you're going to be out of luck, unless it's the one day of the month (the 20th) that the company features fair trade brew as its 'coffee of the day.'"

That coffee of the day program's been phased out, by the way. Starbucks says they'll brew Cafe Estima, the only fair trade certified blend offered in stores, 6 times in the year to come. We're not sure what weeks that'll be, but I hope it happens.

Derek asked, almost 2 years ago: "why is it so difficult to drink fair trade coffee at Starbucks, when the company is the world's biggest coffee retailer and has posted 12 consecutive years of increased sales?"

Sound familiar?

Cuz I've been feeling a lil guilty about demanding speedier, more decisive action from Starbucks to remedy the "break down in customer service" the company's admitted to.

Turns out these demands haven't been speedy, AT ALL. Better documented perhaps, via the help of the blogosphere and del.icio.us. But the questions challengers have raised aren't at all new, or recent.

They just haven't been dealt with on Starbucks' end.

Cindy, and the rest of Starbucks -- We're waiting. You're in my StatCounter, so I know the last time you checked out green LA girl was at 8:21 pm this evening. You checked out the Tasting the Challenge post, and chose not to respond to our questions.

That's OK -- Starbucks' CSR department has a lot on its plate. I, for one, would just like to know if the promised meetings with Starbucks' communications and retail operations departments have taken place, and, if so, what Starbucks plans to do regarding the "break down in customer service." Cuz, as all of us can tell from the recent Starbucks Challenge results, the emails sent out haven't done shit in the US stores.

You have my cell number.

Coffee concoctions

2005-11-10T17:09:00.000-08:00

For anyone swayed by lawyerboy2's less-than-brilliant argument regarding coffee, be swayed no longer. Coffee is good for you, according to health researchers. You know, antioxidants.

The same study reports that drinking cola's not so good. I first heard about this study via Doug of Bloggle, who, incidentally, works for Green Mountain Coffee Roasters, which, incidentally, just launched a certified coffee soda, called Double-Bean Elixirs.

Apparantly, it's the world's first organic fair trade certified coffee soda, so no real complaints from me -- just a mild curiousity as to where this concoction might fall on this health issue --

Nestle's patented its own concoction: coffee beer (via Dec's Rambling). Not only is the coffee not fair trade, the beer isn't alcoholic. What's the point?

Starbucks fight, memo, snow, and some words from Cindy

2005-11-09T15:04:00.000-08:00

With 164 challenges taken and 145 blogs participating, The Starbucks Challenge has officially hit more than half the US states -- We're now at 26 plus Washington DC! (Welcome, Idaho and Ohio! Still waiting on Alabama and Utah...) We've also added Austria: 12 countries total!

Fun Starbucks stuff I discovered on the web for your amusement:

The Space Hijackers' Starbucks site details a hilarious Starbucks fight (pic right) in Leicester Square, UK.

Closer to home, the LA Weekly report on a Rev. Billy's Church of Stop Shopping event at the Hollywood and Highland Starbucks is spectacular. Evidently, Billy's caused enough havoc that Starbucks distributed a memo to all its franchises titled, “What should I do if Reverend Billy is in my store?” The H&H Starbucks certainly knew what to do -- Perhaps Starbucks might send out a similar memo about the fair trade French press issue before challengers are forced to resort to Rev. Billy-esque tactics?

In other news, Cindy of Starbucks dropped by the blogosphere yesterday to comment here and here. The followup comments by Sean and jeni of on au··to·pi·lot are especially interesting -- Check them out!

And my friend Jen reports (see comments) that Starbucks will be making snow for Angelenos this winter. Which reminded me about Starbucks' use of prison labor to wrap its holiday offerings, reported by Seattle Weekly in 2002. I called the main Starbucks number today to see if this practice was taking place. Kelly (sp?), the Starbucks phone rep who took my call, put me on hold to get more info, then came back on to let me know that Starbucks "doesn't do it any longer." Apparantly, Starbucks quit doing mail orders a few years back, which is what the prison laborers were wrapping up.

Errand running

2005-11-08T17:44:00.000-08:00

Lately I've been trying to run my errands -- literally. This was inspired by my friend Jen's observation that today's working woman -- man too -- is like a hamster, caged up in a little cubicle all day, then getting on the spinning wheel for a sad little workout.

So why not make moving around and getting things done one smooth, incorporated activity? Today I ran over to the UPS store to mail a package -- ok, I walked this part cuz the package was heavy -- then I ran to the voting booth, where I sweatily inked my ballot and talked the guy with the "I Voted!" stickers into giving me one still on the wax paper so I could put it on my post-shower outfit.

After that, I ran over to the ATM to deposit some checks and a mailed a couple letters. Total mileage: almost 3 miles! Here's a map of my route.

Other bonus: I didn't have to drive to the gym. I'm currently in the process of trying to quit my Bally membership, and would appreciate any advice from people who've achieved a successful divorce from Bally's in the past --

An aside -- I got a Bright Eyes CD in the mail. I think it's a birthday present, but I have no idea who sent it -- Reveal thyself so I can send a thank you note :)

Vote!

2005-11-08T00:00:00.000-08:00

How I'll be voting today -- Each prop is linked to BuyBlue's more detailed analyses of the special election props:

7 3: NOOOOO!!! Say no to backalley abortions for teenaged girls. There are so many reasons to no on this, covered here.

74: No. This tenure law would make it even tougher for LAUSD to hire good teachers, and doesn't address the actual problem: Our educational system's underfunded.

75: No. This prop would weaken public employee unions.

76. No. Unless you wanna give the Governator unlimited control over the State budget, vote no.

77: No. Unless you want a Republican majority in the state senate, vote no.

78 vs. 79: No, Yes. I think there's still a large chunk of the California population that's still not aware that these two props are an either or deal. 78's the drug companies' deal; 79 helps more people.

80: (**Update: I ended up leaving this one blank. See comments.) Yes. This'll likely support green energy.

**Update, 11/9/05: Yey!

Singapore steps up

2005-11-07T19:41:00.000-08:00

SoCal Starbucks have been dragging their feet, but the ones in Singapore quickly, efficiently stepped up to the Starbucks Challenge -- showing that following corporate policy is not an impossibility, even for the mermaid.

It all started with the media slut's first challenge at Capital Towers, Singapore. The slut got her fair trade coffee -- it was already brewing -- but also reported that the baristas were dumbfounded and that no posters or flyers about fair trade could be seen.

Which set the Singapore Starbucks in motion. One Starbucks employee, ShiDah IshDah, even cited the slut's blog and posted about Starbucks' fair trade training efforts (see Oct. 30th entry): "they have send out an email to all the stores and my partners and i actually noe wat to do.. i hope!"

What's cool is that at least ShiDah IshDah welcomes this new training -- "itz really fun and we can actually learnt from it... so go on partners, do Singapore SB proud!" In fact, ShiDah IshDah even encourages people to join in! "pls do try the challenge out then let me noe wat you get."

What's scary is that the Starbucks in Singapore look exactly the same as a Starbucks in LA. See the pic below, nabbed from the media slut's site. It looks like any one of the 12 or so Starbucks in LAX.

But I digress.

Two weeks later, when the media slut visited a second Starbucks in Singapore, there was signage, and there were fair trade savvy baristas. "Ohh.. themediaslut was impressed," she writes.

I asked Cindy of Starbucks about this -- Why did Singapore hop to while SoCal Starbucks are still saying they don't carry fair trade, they don't French press, they wanna charge extra, etc. etc.? Cindy said it depends on who's leading the region: "We sit in Seattle and we don't actually know what's going on around the world," she said apologetically.

Which makes me wonder what kind of bums they have leading the LA County region. I mean, do the baristas really have to rely on 8th graders (see comment #2) to train them on Starbucks' policies?

Starbucks: All talk and only pseudo-action

2005-11-06T18:00:00.000-08:00

After the ordeal, my friend Robert was like: "I would've given up so long before you did."

Then again, I did manage to get the damn cup of fair trade coffee. Whether or not this counts as a successful Starbucks Challenge, however, is somewhat up for debate.

From the top: I asked for fair trade coffee. Barista1 thought that fair trade was discontinued; Barista 2 was unsure.

Me: Um, well, Cafe Estima's fair trade certified.

So B2 went to get a bag off the shelves, and B1 asked whether I wanted the bag, or the cup. The cup, I said, and B1 started looking around for a French press.

B2: Oh yeah, we haven't done one of those in a while. It's a different price. (starts punching buttons on the cash register).

Me: Really? I was told by your headquarters that the prices were the same.

B2: (still poking around) No, no -- They're different. (smirks a little) You have to pay for the cost of grinding the beans and the whole French-press.

B2 couldn't find a button for the "specially-priced" French press, and so magnanimously, if a little bitterly, said he'd sell it to me at the regular price.

So Robert and I got our fair trade coffees, which the much nicer B1 brought us about 4 mins later. Since we did, in the end, get fair trade, I'll put this down as a success -- but really, if I'd been less assertive (bitchy, according to B2, prolly) it wouldn't've happened.

Still, I can understand B2's bitterness about my telling him about the rules of his job. So I'll stop doing that. After all, I shouldn't have to. And I'm skewing the Challenge stats in Starbucks' favor.

This was visit #2 for me to this store (Westwood & Pico) -- At visit #1, no fair trade coffee was in store. Since then, Cindy of Starbucks sent out several emails to stores; she also says she forwarded challenge results -- which would mean the findings of my first visit -- to the specific district managers.

Cindy -- The district managers aren't reading your emails. Either that, or they just don't give a shit.

Will things change at this Starbucks, ever? And if things don't change, will headquarters do anything?

Organic wine and angry lawyers don't mix

2005-11-05T20:14:00.000-08:00

Last night could've been one of the yummiest in a long time. I went to a benefit for the Organic Consumers Association, held at Bonsorte Studios in Santa Monica. For a mere $20 -- all of it going to the OCA's California program -- I got delish organic food and wine, a cute show by Lily Wilson, and a rousing speech from Ronnie Cummins, national director of the OCA.

The problem: I had to go to the benefit with a guy -- let's call him Lawyerboy2 -- to whom I'd said just hours before: "I don't think I can date anyone right now."

OK -- I totally take responsibility for the fact that I should've done this earlier -- My procrastinating habit's really getting me into trouble now. I just, you know, can't get myself motivated to deal with uncomfortable situations.

So I called, said the above, and said that if he wanted, we could still go to the benefit together as friends. This was met with a long silence, then: "Ok. I'll pick you up at 7:30."

Shit.

Lawyerboy2 (right, in a blur) had enough pride to refrain from needling me with questions about my not wanting to date him. This did not, however, keep him from passive aggressively trying to pick fights with pointless questions, kicking things off with a "Why aren't you trying to quit coffee? It's bad for you," punctuated with a wagging finger pointed at me, as we got on the freeway. Apropos of nothing.

I drank SO MUCH organic wine once we got there.

It was pretty yummy Frey wine, at least. And I deserved it, cuz during the drive back, I had to hear about how organic food didn't matter, that its scope as a movement is limiting and basically useless. And being drunk, I sunk down to Lawyerboy2's level to actually debate this drivel.

The only side benefit is that I think he never wants see me again, and will run the other way if we ever cross paths. Which is really all I wanted to happen in the first place.

Still dealing with a hangover. The lesson learned here? I'm so not listening to my friends any more about giving guys more of a chance. As soon as I sense my dislike growing, I'm outtie. Break up early, break up fast, and don't even try to be friends. Cuz even if Lawyerboy2 seemed like a nice fellow, suggesting the OCA benefit and all, he turned into an argumentative asshole pretty damn fast.

Also, I'm never dating a lawyer again. Unless he works for the ACLU, maybe.

Nice baristas vs. couldn't-care-less managers

2005-11-04T17:01:00.000-08:00

Once a week or so, I'll get an email or comment from a Starbucks barista about the Starbucks Challenge. This granola-hater aside (see comments), most of these baristas say they like the challenge, but that they wanna clarify some issues.

Take Alexander Horre, for example, a barista and Univ. of San Francisco student who emailed me late October. He clarified that, yes, baristas should offer customers a French-pressed cup of fair trade coffee upon request -- and added that this policy goes for ANY blend, pretty much, unless the store's running low on it.

If anything, Alexander sounded psyched about the challenge. "I like your campaign," he wrote, adding that if a customer requests fair trade when the store's already about to rebrew a brewer, "we at times will use the entire bag for brew! My store does it all the time."

But here's the kicker: Alexander says "this policy is only as good as the Store Manager, or Supervisor on duty."

Of course, there are corporate checks in place. He noted that stores get secret shopped, as well as graded on the customer comments. He says at his store, monthly comment-reviews get posted. "Legendary Service always," Alexander writes. "If it doesn't happen, request a mission review card and send it to Starbucks. They see them, and will put the foot down on that store."

Hmmm... I have no doubt that Alexander himself is an uber-motivated barista, and that his store works hard to provide "legendary service." But what about Sharon's report? Sharon sent in a complaint comment card and heard nothing. And what about the mechanized, form responses to my email compaints to Starbucks' headquarters about problems going on in the specific stores around me?

Even after getting two LA-based district managers' email addresses from Cindy of Starbucks, I've yet to hear back regarding my complaints about the stores' fair-trade-unfriendliness. And that's just for the managers to whom I sent personal, empassioned emails (Hello Christine! Hello Brenda!) . Cindy also says she's been following up with the stores that failed the challenge, to make sure that things improve in the future. Have I heard from any of them? No.

I asked Cindy of Starbucks on Monday if there were any corporate procedures or guarantees in place that mandated -- or at least asked -- managers to get back to consumers regarding complaints. She didn't know, but said she'd back to me about it.

I hope she does.

BYOB, in style

2005-11-03T16:26:00.000-08:00

My latest drinking companion -- a byobag for wine.

You can get these things for either one or two bottles of wine, and say goodbye to those little useless brown paper bags forever.

I found this fashionable wine tote through my friend Anna (pictured here), who's trying to get people to bring their own bags to the grocery stores, cups to the cafes. Through her site, I found Reusable Bags, and even googled a coupon code (click on "download coupons") for free shipping.

And while I was at it, I got the lunch byobag (right) which fits my lil coffee travel mug perfectly in its side pocket.

A cool feature is that the bag's made of neoprene -- you know, the wetsuit material -- so it's stretchy and bounces gently in your hand as you happily skip back home to start drinking.

Ok -- I just read the bag's tag, which says the byobag "holds anything in a bottle." So I supposed you could use it for, say, Yoohoo. But if it's wine, make it organic!

And if you're near a Wild Oats, you can buy the wine byobag there, I saw Monday. The bags do come in different colors, but the red, in my opinion, is the most striking. It's also my fave color. Already, I've gotten lots of compliments on it at Trader Joe's (blush).

BTW -- If you bring your own shopping bag to most chain grocery stores, you can get 5 to 10 cents back. At Wild Oats, you can even opt for a wooden nickel which lets you easily donate the money to a charity. No such bonus at Trader Joe's, but the one in Culver City will enter you into a drawing for a $25 gift certificate!

And at Starbucks and Peets, you'll save a dime every time you bring your own mug -- So take your own mug to the Starbucks Challenge!

Of course, Anna's had some trouble getting cafes to actually promote this great policy...

Tasting the challenge

2005-11-02T18:58:00.000-08:00

Flipping through radio stations while driving down Santa Monica Blvd. today (I had to get an oil change), I heard the last bit of a lil Make Trade Fair clip Chris Martin's recorded (mp3). Wow! It's hit the mainstream!

When I got home I had an email about Oxfam's Fall Action Center waiting. I checked out the site, emailed Oxfam about some broken link issues they have going on, and submitted the upcoming fair trade coffee tasting at USC to the events section.

All Trojans -- Be there for your free fair trade coffee:

Where: Trojan Grounds, University Park Campus, at USC
When: 8 am to 4 pm-ish. Friday, Nov. 11.
What: Taste Starbucks' fair trade offerings, give feedback on the different blends, and learn a lil about fair trade.

The Trojan activists have been rather busy. Gloria of Oxfam-USC's been writing a letter to the editor for the student paper, and contacting a reporter who'll hopefully write about the event. Sean of USC Costa Rica's readying the emails to various student listservs and securing a large stack of used office paper to print flyers on.

Odd working on a somewhat Starbucks-promotional event, while also working on the Starbucks Challenge -- though I guess the latter, if Starbucks really decided to meet consumer demands, could be turned into a promotional event too... As Sean says, "I'm very impressed with how well this has been going. It's kind of awkward to shake hands with the devil, however."

Ok ok -- Once again, I don't think Starbucks is the devil. It's a hyperbole. I mean, I'll have to see what happens with the Starbucks Challenge 2.0 to really opinionate on that.

**Update, 11/11/05: The tasting, covered here.

Starbucks Challenge 2.0

2005-11-02T02:17:00.000-08:00

(**Update, 11/2/05: Starbucks Challenge 3.0 launches, with new prizes and new goals! Double the fun -- Join in!)

So Starbucks agreed that, according to its own policy, company stores should French-press a cup of fair trade coffee for you, any day of the week, in the 23 countries it is licensed to. And when, during the first month of the challenge, we found out otherwise, Starbucks admitted a "break down in customer service" and sent out some emails.

But things haven't improved since then.

Regardless of politics, most of us agree on one thing: If a company makes a promise, it should stick to it.

Join the challenge:

1) Simply visit your local Starbucks and ask: "Could I get a cup of fair trade coffee?"

2) Tell us what happens next. Was it hard or easy to get a cup?

BLOGGERS: simply blog about what happened and tag it with "starbuckschallenge" (all one word) on del.icio.us (put the Starbucks location in the "extended" description). We'll pull all articles into a feed and run that on our site - you can run the feed too, of course, if you'd like. ALSO help us get feedback by telling people about this challenge on your blogs.

NON-BLOGGERS: tell us what happened by emailing City Hippy or green LA girl, and we'll do the rest.

Win a prize
On Nov. 30, we'll select three people who contributed:

Prize #1: A 12 oz bag of Monkey & Son Velvet Hammer fair trade organic coffee, for the challenger who challenges the most Starbucks in Los Angeles County.
Prize #2: A 12 oz bag of Monkey & Son Velvet Hammer fair trade organic coffee, for the challenger who challenges the most Starbucks in the U.S., outside Los Angeles County.
Prize #3: Fair trade yummies from Clipper-Teas.com, for the challenger who contributes the most amusing or informative post outside the United States.

Survey results
We'll be in frequent contact with Starbucks, but on November 30, City Hippy and green LA girl will contact Starbucks to find out what Starbucks thinks about the results of the challenge -- whether positive or negative -- and to get some concrete details as to what the company plans to do, if anything, in light of them.

Have a fair trade day.

City Hippy and green LA girl

Update: Some fun stuff --

The original Starbucks Challenge launch post.
The Starbucks Challenge FAQ
Starbucks Challenge's del.icio.us feed.
Starbucks Challenge's frappr map -- Put your challenge on the map!

**Update 11/5/05: A Starbucks barista's response to the challenge.

**Update 11/7/05: Starbucks in Singapore step up to the challenge.

**Update 11/9/05: Cindy of Starbucks puts her two cents in the blogosphere. Plus some interesting anti-Starbucks activist tactics --

**Update 11/10/05: The "break down in customer service" has been going on since at least January 2004 --

**Update 11/11/05 and 11/12/05: Major of Starbucks promises to set up a meeting with green LA girl, Starbucks CSR reps, and Starbucks district managers in LA -- before the end of November. Starbucks also said it'll add a lil video in its "new partner learning program" that'll reiterate Starbucks' policy to provide customers with a French press upon demand.

**Update 11/14/05: Wondering about Starbucks' claim that all their coffee's fairly traded? Wonder no longer.

**Update 11/15/05: Confused by the claims on Starbucks' website? Clear the confusion.

**Update 11/18/05: No fair trade improvement at all at the Starbucks near USC.

**Update 11/19/05: Challenge stats update: 194 challenges, 161 blogs, 13 countries, and 27 states plus Washington DC. Also, don't bother calling Starbucks' customer service about fair trade issues. They don't know shit.

**Update 11/20/05: The Starbucks Challenge gets a new, cool map! Check it out!

**Updates: The Starbucks CSR department tries emailing its stores, again (11/21/05) and fails a SoCal challenge, again (11/22/05).

**Updates: Starbucks workers strike for better wages in New Zealand (11/23/05) -- and are charged with union busting in New York! (11/29/05)

**Update 11/26/05: Starbucks Challenge stats get WORSE during this second month.

**Update 12/1/05: Starbucks Challenge 2.0 winners announced! Congrats to Declan, Kristin, and Roger!

FEED (del.icio.us/starbuckschallenge):

Starbucks Challenge 2.0: Special call to Angelenos

2005-11-01T23:36:00.000-08:00

About every dozen or so emails, comments, or posts I've read in response to the Starbucks Challenge has had to do with how Starbucks drives out small local businesses. I'd take the challenge, these e-missives will say, but I'm too disgusted with how Starbucks kills mom-n-pop shops to even set foot in one of their cold, sterile stores.

And right now, I'm a lil inclined to agree with them.

For those of you who didn't already know this about Starbucks, check out what's happening over in Bozeman, Montana -- painfully detailed in A Thought Over Coffee, a blog run by would-be-indie-cafe-owner Jason. He was all set to sign a lease for Cafe Evoke -- an indie fair trade coffee shop-to-be -- until Starbucks decided, again, that they might be interested in opening up yet another shop two doors down.

This is really painful news for me, because I've been tracking Cafe Evoke's progress for some time now, cheering it on. Even from afar, I love hearing about these cute lil local coffee shops -- cafes that not only care about the individual character of their immediate communities, but also care deeply about global social and environmental justice.

I'm still not saying that Starbucks is evil, or that Starbucks doesn't do some good things. I'm saying that -- if Starbucks is gonna drive out our good fair trade community cafes -- they'd better be prepared to give us something at least as valuable.

This isn't helped by the fact that the Starbucks in Los Angeles have had pretty much the WORST record of all cities in which the Starbucks Challenge was taken. Out of 18 challenges taken in the city proper (sorry, Culver City, Santa Monica, and Pasadena), only 7 fair trade cups of coffees were received -- and most of those came only after much insistence, cajoling, and education done about Starbucks' policies on the CHALLENGERS' part.

Ok. So Starbucks admitted a "break down in customer service" and sent out some emails. But things haven't improved since then.

And Ok. So Cindy of Starbucks promised to talk to Starbucks' Retail Operations and Communications teams. When can we expect some changes? I asked, and got no firm dates -- just that this would take some time. In fact, Cindy said Starbucks still has no idea why this "break down" happened -- much less any idea as to how to fix the "break down" at this point.

I get that change takes time. I mean, if we're talking about rewriting the barista manuals, changing barista orientation programs, and possibly making some less-than-motivated district managers' heads roll, these aren't overnight endeavors.

But still -- When?

It would be one thing if we were pushing for NEW, additional fair trade-friendly policies. But we're simply asking Starbucks to do what it already says it does -- often said in order to shush fair trade advocates who raise complaints.

So as a part of Starbucks Challenge 2.0, I -- with a lil sponsorship from Monkey & Son -- will be offering 12 oz. of Velvet Hammer to whoever visits the MOST stores in LA COUNTY before Nov. 30. All challenges taken since Oct. 4, when the challenge launched, count toward the tally, so people who've been with us from the beginning won't be starting from scratch.

And if we don't see some changes by Nov. 30, I can assure Starbucks that they won't know what hit them. They may think they're popular now -- that most consumers don't give a shit about corporate promises as long as they can get their grande lattes, no foam -- but I have a close-knit group of fair-trade loving English grad students and professors who're itching to write passionate letters to the LA Times, LA Weekly, student newspapers, and local papers. I have a small but uber-motivated fleet of xtracycle riders who could flyer the city in no time flat. I have a handful of Prius-driving green friends willing to do the same. And I have myself -- I'm willing to personally stand in front of a different Starbucks outlet every day, handing out info sheets to would-be customers about how Starbucks isn't doing what it says it does.

And most importantly, I'm in contact with bloggers all over the world who'd like to see Starbucks live up to its promises.

So for now -- Angelenos -- take the Starbucks Challenge 2.0 at your local store. And let me know -- either via comments or via email -- what YOU think we should do if we don't see changes by Nov. 30.

And to the non-Angelenos -- There'll be a contest for you too! Details to be announced shortly -- City Hippy and I are just trying to hammer out some last minute stuff --

A monkey for the fair trade movement

2005-10-31T20:23:00.000-08:00

Considering all the fair trade certification problems that've been pointed out (See the Coffee Crisis series for more details, or this post for a quick run-down), you'd think that it'd be pretty much impossible for small, local companies to pony up the money and resources and get fair trade certified.

Not so, necessarily. Thom, founder and monkey of Monkey and Son Coffee Company, is not only small and local, but also 100% fair trade AND 100% organic certified.

The reason? Simple: "I believe in it."

Thom comes from a long line of farmers in Northeast Montana -- His father had to quit farming because the farm went under. So when Thom's own son was born 13 months ago, he started Mokey and Son. "That was something for my kid. When he was born -- I wanted to give something back."

Aaaahhh -- I know. Too sweet. But Monkey & Son isn't just hearts and flowers -- It's about pragmatic, forward-looking business savvy too. According to Thom, the fair trade revolution's just begun: "I think people are beginning to see the writing on the wall," he says.

Meaning that as consumer demand for the fair trade label grows, companies without the certification will begin to get somewhat stigmatized. Part of Monkey & Son's biz strategy is to stay ahead of that trend.

Of course, Thom's quick to point out that Transfair, the company that does the fair trade licensing for US coffee companies, is not perfect. And while he's opted for 100% certification, he says he can understand, to a degree, why some of the more consciencious coffee companies have opted against it. "I don't look down on them," he says about those companies. "Transfair IS very bureaucratic."

But Thom's stance is -- "you gotta start somewhere." Like it or not, TransFair IS the only company doing fair trade licensing in the US right now. So if coffee companies want to engage consumers about fair trade issues, companies need to work WITH TransFair, even while pushing TransFair to address issues of concern: "It's about doing the right thing." And, despite the organization's faults, the people at TransFair are "really good people," Thom says, with limitations, difficulties, and challenges of their own as a nonprofit organization.

His biggest critique is for the coffee companies that complain about the cost of certification. "Why not just pay the few extra cents? I think it's a cop out."

If you've been following the Starbucks Challenge at all, you know my opinion here's biased -- That's no secret. Monkey & Son provided one of the prizes for the first Challenge awards -- and he'll be providing the second too! (More deets on that tomorrow) Still, this socio-enviro conscious lil local coffee company is one after green LA girl's own heart. And the Velvet Hammer is really, really yum.

What does Thom think of Starbucks? He still goes there sometimes, and is impressed by their consistency. But he's turned off by their efforts to cut out mom-n-pop stores, saying that whenever an indie coffee shop opens, Starbucks plants new stores on either side, driving the indie cafe out. "That's what Starbucks is about," he says.

And as a musician himself, he's peeved that Starbucks' CDs only market already-successful artists. "I'm kind of sick of Starbucks' Walmart approach to everything," Thom says. "Support the little guy!"

Starbucks Challenge Awards!

2005-10-31T00:00:00.000-08:00

After reading through 133 participating blogs, with 135 challenges taken in 11 countries, 24 states, and Washington DC, City Hippy and green LA girl have each picked a winner for the first month of the Starbucks Challenge.

City Hippy's choice: Thanks for not being a Zombie.
Not-Zombie took loads of challenges -- all with awesome, detailed descriptions and thoughtful commentary. City Hippy found the posts thorough and humourous -- especially the post where Not-Zombie mentioned the "man in colonial dress riding a Segway" -- we spent a good 10 minutes chuckling at that image.

Award: Fair trade yummies (coffee, tea and hot chocolate from Clipper-Teas.com )

green LA girl's choice: Dirty Greek
In addition to taking a couple challenges himself, Dirty Greek fielded questions (insults?) not only about the Challenge but also about fair trade in general from less-than-knowlegeable people on The Wolf Web. Dirty Greek got a lil help from J_Gatsby, who in frustration ended up calling naysayers "plebian fucks." Tee hee!

Award: A 2 lb bag of Monkey & Son Velvet Hammer fair trade organic coffee.

What did YOU help accomplish through the Starbucks Challenge? Starbucks sat up and took notice, contacted us, then admitted that they weren't living up to their "legendary service" promises. Cindy of Starbucks acknowledged Starbucks had a "break down in customer service."

So all North American stores, regional VPs, and international market presidents got emails "reminding" them about the coffee press policy for customers requesting fair trade. Cindy also forwarded bloggers' feedback to relevant district managers for follow-up.

The effect of these efforts on Starbucks' part? Mixed, to say the least. Some challengers have since noted that their Starbucks has gotten markedly fair-trade friendlier; others, not so much. At the last challenge green LA girl took, the barista flat out lied to avoid French-pressing a cup of fair trade coffee.

Cindy says that she'll present the findings of the Starbucks Challenge to Starbucks' Retail Operations and Communications team, "so we can find a solution." We'll keep you posted on that promise.

So -- The challenge challenges on! New prizes to be announced shortly -- We're determined that one day, Alabama and Utah will participate.

And even if you're not "challenging" any more because your store's passed the test, we hope you'll ask for fair trade coffee every time you go to Starbucks. After all, Starbucks says that if consumers demand it, they'll make fair trade coffee more easily avaliable -- though as of now, we question how Starbucks is measuring this demand....

Have a fair trade day

City Hippy and green LA girl

FEED (del.icio.us/starbuckschallenge):

Some new blog toys

2005-10-30T18:17:00.000-08:00

Thanks to Nuthatch's suggestion, the Starbucks Challenge has been frappred. City Hippy and I, however, are too overwhelmed at the moment to input the 130+ locations onto the map by our lonely selves.

So -- If you've taken the challenge, please frappr yourself. Make your mark here, with deets as to your fair trade success or non-success in the "Shoutout" section.

BTW -- Radical Congruency's working on a map on Geektronica.com that'll automatically pull the info from del.icio.us. If any challenge-friendly techies out there know how we can make this happen, let me know, and I'll let RC know.

Pet chickens in the park

2005-10-30T14:17:00.000-08:00

The most shocking things about visiting my friend Scott in NoCal earlier this month: Friendly chickens.

I'm all for free range chickens, but I really wasn't prepared to share a park with crowing roosters. And when Scott and I went to eat at Sunflower Drive-In (I recommend the nutty burger -- It's veggie), these chickens came right up to beg for food, puppy style.

It's great to know they're free to roam around, though I wonder how the owners keep track of their feather friends. Also -- I'd imagine it'd be tough to kill and eat these things after they've become household pets. Some of Sunflowers patrons lovingly scratched the chickens' heads -- Something I was really afraid to do, cuz those beaks looked sharp!

I don't eat chicken, and rarely eat eggs, but this chicken-as-pet thing really fascinated me -- Especially after reading in blogging.la about an odd battle between the Humane Society and Trader Joe's over eggs -- which prompted TJ's to promote a letter about their egg standards on their homepage.

Of course, what interested me about the blogging.la post was not the eggs, per se, but that, due to a silly comment by someone called Lee, the discussion deteriorated into bizarre insults ("I think FOX News is hiring, if you send them your resume, I'll be a reference."), name-calling ("keep your PETA-loving nose out of my kitchen") and name-denying ("[my nose] is not PETA-loving").

And less relatedly -- To the right is Scott and I, after a few drinks, at Celestin's in Sacramento. We miss you Scott -- Move back.

Oxfam concert: Fair trade put to music

2005-10-29T19:26:00.000-07:00

Music to feel good about -- Oxfam's sponsoring Make Trade Fair Live at The Avalon Thursday (11/3).

The performers: The Thrills, Hot Hot Heat, Damien Marley, Good Charlotte, Minnie Driver, Akon, and others. Things kick off at 7:30.

I'm not quite sure what the Oxfam "sponsorship" means -- No details about whether the money is going toward the Make Trade Fair campaign or the ONE campaign, both of which are mentioned in the email I got from Oxfam.

In fact, I feel like Oxfam could use some PR help -- No mention of the concert on the Oxfam, Make Trade Fair, or the One campaign websites, and Hot Hot Heat doesn't even mention the gig on their gig list, though some Good Charlotte fans are chatting about it a little. Maybe Oxfam wants this to be a small, intimate gathering? Unlikely, considering the venue...

Anyway -- Tix are $42.00 before ridiculous Ticketmaster fees, but I just bought 4 for $40 each from a guy called Michael off of Craigslist. Of course, I did this before I rounded up people to go, and it's turning out to be a bad night for many of my friends. If you're in the LA area, and want to go, email me.

**Update, 11/02/05: The show's cancelled! Why? I'm wondering if it was due to lack of ticket sales, due to lack of PR :(

Starbucks Challenge update

2005-10-29T01:34:00.000-07:00

Quick stats update: 127 blogs participating, with 131 challenges taken in 11 countries, 24 states (welcome, Kansas, Maine, and Maryland!) and Washington DC.

I guess I'm gonna have to give up on Alabama and Utah...

Bike me

2005-10-28T23:00:00.000-07:00

Lately, the blogosphere's been sending me one very consistent message: Get thyself a bike.

The first message: My blog friend Anna told me about Xtracycle -- a bike with an attachment for hauling your stuff. Here's Anna (left), on her Xtracycle, in front of McCabe's where once she hopped off her bike, we went in, had drinks, and shot pool, sort of. In a mild drunken excitement, we made tentative plans for a huge, bike-fueled Starbucks Challenge parade that pedalled all over Los Angeles --

The second message: Roger, gone green. Just about every other of his comments has to do with how, if I had a bike, I'd be able to do more stuff without grumbling about driving.

And the most inspiring message of late: eecue's bike posts. This dude cobbled together a DIY bike with a lil help from the Bicycle Kitchen, (photos here), and even posted a lil map of his first fixie ride. Now, he's offering up DIY advice to would-be bikers!

Despite this blog enthusiasm for biking, LA still has some serious kinks to work out to make biking more accessible. It's pretty much impossible to register your bike, for example. And though eecue and others are adamnant that biking in LA is not dangerous, I've been scared shitless about biking since 2 bikers were killed in an accident on the PCH last month.

I'm not sure if I've been inculcated into an irrationable fear of biking through gas-lovin' naysayers in the MSM, or if my fear really is warranted. While I figure that out, I'm gonna start running blogads, so that by the time I get over my fright, I'll hopefully have enough cash to buy an xtracycle.

Unrelatedly -- My fave eecue post is Brick!, about a helicopter-heavy night when a somewhat crazed man threw bricks off the roof of the Alexandria Hotel. Something about this post -- now updated with a pic of a smashed brick -- makes me reflect on the incident constantly. Dunno why -- Maybe the painful brick beauty of incidental urban art, or the smashed-up madness of this brick-built society, or some other crazy half-baked brick of a notion --

Supersize my fair trade coffee: McDonalds joins in!

2005-10-27T19:02:00.000-07:00

I'm so shocked about this that it'll take me a lil while to digest what it means for the fair trade movement, but guess what: McDonald’s is gonna sell fair trade coffee!

For now, let me just say that Starbucks better get their shit together. Surely the mermaid behemoth wants to do more for the coffee farmers than McDonald's?

The deets: McDonald’s will begin by serving fair trade coffee in 658 of its restaurants in New England and Albany, NY -- beginning on Nov. 1, my birthday. Coincidence? ;)

And -- there'll be none of this hassling the barista shit. Participating locations will be switching to 100 percent fair trade certified organic coffee from Newman’s Own Organics, roasted by Green Mountain Coffee Roasters. No reviews of the coffee yet, but Green Mountain's known for roasting some yummy stuff.

Starbucks -- What's your move?

**Update: There'll prolly be a slight price increase: "Green Mountain executives said they understood there probably would be a 10- to 15-cent price increase." That's still like half the price of a tall cup of non-fair trade, non-organic coffee at Starbucks.

**Update, 10/29/05: BTW -- for those trying to cut back on caffeine intake -- McDonald's will be offering both regular and decaf (see paragraph 7).

One out of three -- and an outright lie

2005-10-26T23:46:00.000-07:00

When a lil drink thing got moved all the way to the Good Microbrew & Grill in Silverlake, I freaked out about the driving & pollution issue. Then I thought, hey, I'll take the Starbucks Challenge at a store on my way there! 2 birds with 1 stone.

Then I looked things up. There are SIX Starbucks between me and Good Microbrew. I'm not talking about any of the side roads -- just the ones strictly on La Cienega and Sunset -- the most efficient route, according to Mapquest.

In the interest of time, and to minimize parking stress, I decided to just hit the four on Sunset.

The first victim: The Starbucks right next to Saddle Ranch. The barista told me there was no fair trade coffee in store, and that their manager had stopped ordering the blend entirely, so none had been on the premises for quite some time. He also said, quite confidently, that all Starbucks brew fair trade coffee on Wednesday mornings.

I'm not sure how they even come up with this stuff. Are the baristas actually fed this misinformation? And if so, by who? And -- how can all stores brew fair trade coffee if this store doesn't even keep it in stock?

Second victim: The Starbucks on Sunset & La Brea (right). I asked for fair trade, and the barista told me what they had on brew. I asked if they could make a cup of fair trade for me, which she agreed to do -- in 10 minutes.

Then she started scanning the shelves, and asked if I'd like the Serena Organic Blend.

Me: Um, is that fair trade?
Barista: I don't...

Another barista piped in and said that it wasn't. I actually had to scan the shelves myself and pick out a Cafe Estima bag for her -- at which point she said the blend was "really good."

So for 10 minutes, I looked at this drawing of a rather phallic bird (above left).

Then I played with the Starbucks Bearista (left, made in China).

But still, I got my fair trade coffee.

Third victim: the Starbucks at Gower Gulch (right). The barista, again, repeated what they had brewing a couple times.

Me: Oh. Um, can you make a cup of fair trade coffee for me? Or is that...
Barista: Uhhh -- Let me go ask my manager.

He did, while I waited. When he came back: "Sorry, we don't have any fair trade coffee in store right now."

Of course, while he was talking to the manager, I took a picture of one of the many bags of fair trade coffee on the store shelves (right).

[**Update, 12/12/05: A kind barista has since informed me that my request may’ve been taken as a request for Starbucks’ old “Fair Trade Blend,” which has been replaced by Cafe Estima. But couldn’t the manager have told him that?]

Thanks, I said, and walked out.

2 strikes out of 3 -- including not just bad customer service, but an outright lie. I was running late at this point, so had to skip the last Starbucks -- the one next to Vons.

Yeah -- Those emails Starbucks sent out are really changing things around here...

Starbucks challenge stats update

2005-10-26T16:03:00.000-07:00

It's been crazy fun the last couple days with all the kottke.org and Lifehacker readers joining in the fun --

102 blogs participating, with 111 challenges taken in 10 countries, 21 states (welcome, Michigan and Oregon!) and Washington DC.

So no one knows anyone in Alabama or Utah?

Pick your cause wisely: Fair trade v. Organic?

2005-10-25T20:23:00.000-07:00

While setting up the fair trade coffee tasting at USC, I kept hearing about Starbucks' other "green coffees." Jonathan, the Starbucks' food service account manager who was helping me out, wanted to bring along the organic and shade grown blends to the tasting too.

Cindy of Starbucks brought these up in conversation too, saying Starbucks has a coffee for whatever customers are "into." So the shade-grown advocates can get their Shade Grown Mexican, and the organic drinkers can opt for Serena Organic Blend. And fair trade girls like me can sip on Cafe Estima.

While I like that Starbucks is paying attention to these issues, I'm a lil uncomfortable with the way important social and environmental issues get isolated into individual "pet cause" categories consumers have to pick between. I mean, I like my coffee fair trade, organic, and shade grown -- Must I choose?

I usually just go for fair trade, since the fair trade certification encourages and helps farms go organic, generally moving toward more sustainable farming methods. I figure it's the easiest way to try to cover as many bases as possible.

Of course, the diehards choose not to choose -- They buy their triple certified coffee from Caffe Ibis.

This issue's not Starbucks-specific, or even coffee specific. In fact, it looks like everyone could benefit from ALL the food-related "causes" out there -- fair trade, shade-grown, organic, local -- and I'm sure there are others.

Cuz organic doesn't mean good working conditions -- which is why we have the fair trade label. But that label isn't avaliable for US farms -- and apparantly, conditions for workers on organic farms in California are quite sucky. This isn't just big ag corporations bullying workers -- Many owners of these farms can't afford health insurance for themselves, let alone for their workers.

And the US isn't alone. Welsh farmers want their milk to sport a fair trade logo, alleging that they don't get a good deal from supermarkets.

It looks like we need a fair trade movement for farmers everywhere --

**Update, 11/10/05: And now UK's National Farmer's Union, including Scotland's farmers, put in their 2 cents against the supermarkets --

Starbucks update: Progress? You tell me

2005-10-25T00:23:00.000-07:00

When Cindy of Starbucks, responding to the Starbucks Challenge, kindly asked me if I had any questions about Starbucks policies, I asked her this:

"Does Starbucks have any more detailed information as to why this "break down in customer service" occured? I understand that sometimes, store managers and district managers, say, don't read all the information they receive from headquarters. But I think many of are wondering why the lapses in customer service have been so widespread -- and, more notably -- so similar from store to store (i.e. rattling off the list of currently brewing blends, charging venti prices, etc.)."

This is the reply I got:

"As for why the “break down in customer service”…good question. We assumed that because the “coffee press upon request” policy and the above Fair Trade information was in the training and resource manuals, that our store partners knew the information. We take full responsibility for the break down in communications. It is definitely our intention to provide a coffee press upon a customer’s request as you see from the manuals, but for a variety of reasons, it is not always the reality in our stores. In all fairness to the baristas, we did not send them additional, highlighted communications regarding the coffee press policy this month until the issue was brought to our attention through the Starbucks Challenge. So thank you and your fellow bloggers for pointing out our miss and helping us provide better service to our customers. Below is an update to what Starbucks has done so far:

Sent an email communications to all our company operated stores in North America reminding them of the coffee press policy (that is the one I forwarded to you)
Sent an alert to our regional vice presidents regarding the policy
Sent an alert to our international market presidents
Forwarding bloggers’ feedback to relevant district managers for follow-up with individual stores"

I appreciate what Cindy's done -- Taken full responsibility, and sent out communications to try to remedy the situation. For a couple of the Starbucks outlets that've been repeat-challenged so far, the "reminder" emails seem to have been received and noted.

Sadly, this hasn't happend at my local Starbucks. Or at many others. The percentage of stores ignorant of Starbucks' fair-trade friendly polices -- as reported by Starbucks Challenge participants -- hasn't changed since Starbucks sent out the email.

And more importantly, I still haven't gotten an adequate answer as to why the break downs in customer service have been SO UNIFORM, in various states across the US, if the corporate handbook mandates are completely different.

I'm facing a bit of a conundrum here. I heart Cindy's dedication -- but her personal convictions seem out of line with Starbucks' realities, and her efforts, so far, aren't exactly creating company-wide change -- Exactly what I feared when Makower interviewed me for his big-corp friendly green blog.

Of course, it hasn't been that long. Perhaps this is a lesson in patience for green LA girl. After all, Cindy promises that:

"after I get the results from your challenge, I will be presenting your findings to our Retail Operations and Communications team so we can find a solution."

More to come. But for now, challenge on. We need solid data for credible activism --

Starbucks: Less false press releasing?

2005-10-24T19:56:00.000-07:00

When I wrote about Starbucks' rather misleading press release a couple weeks back, I didn't really think they'd care much. Then the latest "Starbucks Social Responsibility Newsletter" hit my inbox today.

What bugged me about the original press release? Among other things, Starbucks wrote: "Additionally, U.S. Barnes & Noble cafes serving Starbucks coffee will serve Cafe Estima Blend on a daily basis as one of several featured coffees." But when I called Cindy of Starbucks about it, she told me that this applied only to B&Ns located on college campuses -- and then, only after those campuses specifically requested fair trade blends.

Now, check out the revised press release: "Additionally, licensed stores and Barnes & Noble cafés serving Starbucks coffee on U.S. college and university campuses will have the opportunity to serve Café Estima Blend on a daily basis as one of several featured conservation and/or certified coffees beginning this fall."

Still quite flowery, but at least somewhat less misleading. Is Starbucks reading me seriously? Or is that my organic-wine-soaked ego talking?

I'm hoping other fair trade friends grumbled about the press release too -- I don't wanna be the ONLY fair trade bitch out there --

Get your challenge on -- 1 week till prizes!

2005-10-24T16:23:00.000-07:00

Starbucks Challenge stats to date: 89 challenges, 69 individual blogs, 8 countries, 19 states plus Washington DC -- and climbing!

Top 11 reasons to challenge (or to challenge again!):

You want attention. Lotsa people are tracking the Starbucks Challenge del.icio.us feed. Participate, and we'll add you -- and you'll get lots more visitors to your blog from all over the world -- including the CSR department of Starbucks.

You wanna meet friends for drinks after work, but you're trying to cut down on your happy hour appletini excesses.

You want cool friends. I personally have met -- physically met -- 2 very fun SoCal green people through the Challenge -- and keep up a correspondence with many more. Another cool blogger will be down in LA from NoCal this weekend, and we're going to a Bill Maher taping together. Thought blogging was for loners?

You've always wanted to be part of an international movement, but you're afraid to protest the WTO.

You wanna end global poverty, but don't know where to start. Start with the Starbucks Challenge. Revolutions begin with baby steps.

You want a valid excuse to feed your Starbucks habit, which you're a little (or a lot) ashamed of.

You want big corporations to actually DO stuff instead of just SAYING they'll do stuff.

You wanna think globally but act locally. The kind of coffee you buy really does change people's lives.

You want green creds. Years from now, people will be talking about the Starbucks Challenge that revolutionized the way we think of global trade policies ;) Take the challenge now, and you'll be able to say "Been there, done that."

You really need a break from the office. Chances are, your closest Starbucks is just downstairs or around the block. Stretch your legs, drink some coffee -- an excellent source of anti-oxidants.

You want good coffee and don't wanna pay for it. The award date -- Halloween -- is fast approaching! Win yummy coffee or tea!

And notice there's a handy "email post" link at the bottom of this post. I'm trying to get as many different states on the list as possible, so if you know anyone from, say, Alabama or Utah, please consider sending it on :)

[States participating so far: Alaska, Arizona, California, Connecticut, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Illinois, Massachussets, Minnesota, Missouri, Nevada, New York, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Texas, Virginia, Washington, Wisconsin.]

**Update, 10/26/05: Stats update -- We're at 102 blogs now!

Go green to get green: LA DWP rebates

2005-10-23T16:54:00.000-07:00

Easy Green already wrote about this for Pasadena, but for the "real" Angelenos who haven't run off to the suburbs, get green electricity via LA DWP (Dept. of Water and Power).

Sign up for LA DWP's Green Power program, and all your electricity will come from green sources, like solar and wind power. It'll cost you about $3 extra a month -- but for signing up, you'll get two complimentary compact fluorescent bulbs, which'll save you money in the short AND long term and hopefully even things out a bit.

To be honest, signing up's a bit confusing. The 3-step web sign-up form's simple enough, but when I thought I was all done, I got this message:

Thank you for completing the Green Power Program Form online. As requested, the program or sign-up information will soon be sent to you.

Huh? Am I signed up or not?

The LA DWP could really learn some lessons in e-user-friendliness. Shrugging off the Green Power conundrum, I tried to pay my water and power bill online -- to find out I'd have to sign up first -- meaning fill out a PDF form with my checking account info, then snailmail it in. Then, after 2 weeks, I'll be able to finally log on to pay my bill. Yes, there is an option to pay instantly by credit card, but that tacks on an extra $5.95 to my bill -- money I'm planning to put toward the Green Power thing.

Still, LA DWP really does run some cool programs. In addition to the Green Power option and the widely publicized free tree program, Angelenos can get rebates for buying a myriad of old and new house products. Check out this list:

Your old fridge: The REfrigerator Turn-In and REcycle Program (RETIRE) program will pick up and recycle your old fridge or freezer, and give you a free 6-pack of compact fluorescent bulbs to boot.

Your new toilet: The Ultra-Low-Flush Toilet Rebate Program will give you between $75 and $100 for replacing an old toilet. Fill out this form to get a rebate application.

Your new washing machine:The High-Efficiency Clothes Washer Rebate Program gives you up to $150 back if you purchase and install high-efficiency washing machines. Fill out this form for a rebate application.

Want more? The Consumer Rebate Program gives you money back for everything from your air conditioner to your ceiling fan to your windows. Check out the PDF application.

Sadly, I rent, so I can't really take advantage of the rebate programs. I thought of bugging my landlord, but my lease is month to month -- What if I get my roommates and I kicked out?

In the meantime, I'm waiting to hear back about my Green Power status. Once I'm definitely signed up, I'll feel a little less bad about my roommate constantly leaving the TV on with no one watching ...

**Update, 10/26/05: Ed from the LA DWP emailed me back! I'd asked, per avs's question (see comments) where the money for these green programs comes from. Here's his response:

Thank you for your kind words about LADWP’s Green LA programs. In response to your question, LADWP is required to collect 2.85% of its gross revenues for Public Good programs. LADWP energy efficiency programs, tree planting programs, low income customer subsidies, and the like are all funded from this source.

Again, thank you for the kind words of acknowledgment.

Groundwork breaks new fair trade ground

2005-10-22T17:45:00.001-07:00

For those who think an individual can't make a difference -- Think again. Groundwork Coffee is gonna get fair trade certification for one of their coffee blends! Read the informative and encouraging post on Groundwork's newly-redesigned homepage. (Note to readers: The Groundwork site, as of yet, is not Firefox friendly. Dig out your MS Explorer from your trash bin.)

For those new(er) to green LA girl, Groundwork is an LA-based, mostly-organic coffee company. I had a long chat with Ric, Groundwork's COO, not too long ago. The result: Groundwork's Rwanda Karaba blend is on its way to getting certified.

Of course, Groundwork's never really been part of the coffee crisis problem. Ric emailed me today to let me know that Groundwork's year-to-date average price per pound for green coffee purchases is above the fair trade minimum price for organic. This means farmers are getting more than $1.41 for their coffee beans -- way higher than Starbucks' $1.20 average per pound price for their coffees.

You might ask: If I already know that Groundwork does good, why do I care so much about the sticker?

To me, the sticker is a clear, tangible symbol of a company's recognition that the choices of individual consumers matter. The reason for the sticker: So you and I can tell at a glance that a company cares about fair trade issues. By putting the money and effort into getting stickered, a coffee company is inviting you and I to put our money where our social passions are. The sticker is a testament to the fact that YOUR INDIVIDUAL DECISION does make a difference, does make a statement as to the kind of world you want to live in.

And combined together, we can make some serious changes.

Of course, TransFair USA, which provides the fair trade certification, hasn't been helping matters at Groundwork. Ric contacted TransFair over 2 weeks ago -- and has yet to get any adequate response from the nonprofit to get the certification process rolling.

Which is why neither I nor Ric have any firm dates as to when the Rwanda Karaba blend will actually get the damn sticker. At this point, I wanna take TransFair by the shoulders and shake the nonprofit, yelling, "Help me -- help you," Jerry Maguire-style.

Even Thom, the owner of all-fair-trade-certified Monkey & Son, openly admits TransFair's got some issues. "It IS a bureaucracy," he says, "though it's been getting better."

I'll be keeping tabs on TransFair too.

American Apparel, casual sex, and omnipotence

2005-10-21T21:04:00.000-07:00

What I, a girl who likes to consider herself a sexuallly open feminist, hate being called: A prude.

This hasn't actually happened yet.

Still, I've felt a bit like a prude, since writing that I won't shop at American Apparel (Those unfamiliar with the sexual harrassment suits filed against American Apparel and Dov Charney, the CEO, read these past posts, here and here).

And these feelings have gotten more intense of late. Claudine Ko of JANE, who interviewed Dov through 8 masturbation sessions (his, not hers) and at least one blow job from one of his assistants a few years back -- is back with a second Dov interview (JANE, Oct. 2005 -- not avaliable online, yet). She writes:

"I'm also pissed that people keep miscontruing my story and using it to feed a flawed cliche were men are evil and omnipotent while women are mute victims lacking free will. Who was really exploited? We both were -- American Apparel got press, I got one hell of a story, and we both had fun. And that's it."

Ok, no. Men are not omnipotent. But the American Apparel question has split passionately sweatshop-free women into two camps -- Those who are disgusted by Dov, and those who find his sexually open work style liberating.

After all, many of us have happily fucked a coworker at one time or another. Why not do it in an environment that encourages that sort of thing, that doesn't require us to hide our sex affairs? Wouldn't it be nice to get laid on a mattress of organic, sweatshop-free tanktops, with no fear of getting fired?

And to be fair to Dov, his ex-girlfriends still work at American Apparel -- A testament of sorts to Dov's ability to separate sex with coworkers from work with coworkers, even if he's having sex during work with coworkers.

In fact, American Apparel, in its best PR moments, comes across as a refreshingly sexually liberated haven. "It's about being free," Dov says. "It's about telling the boss, 'F--k you'" (JANE's edit, not mine). And Dov's girlfriend, Thida, is quoted as saying: "I'm not like other girls. People were like, 'Be careful, he's a walking erection.' I wanted to know what a 'walking erection' is."

It's almost enough to make a girl consider dropping outta grad school to troll the hallways of American Apparel for sexy, adventurous boys who're always up. For whatever.

Of course, since the first JANE article, Dov's had some probs -- In addition to the sexual harrasment suits, Dov says he's been rejected by at least one landlord. "I'm a sensitive individual," he says in JANE, complaining to Ko that he "didn't want to be written about like this -- masturbating."

Note to CEOs: If you don't want your masturbatory habits to become news, don't jack off in front of journalists.

My point? I'm biased here, because I've never had a boss I wanted to fuck. Also, I don't work any more, so maybe I just don't "get" all of what's going on in corporate culture these days. Still, as a grad student, I've been really grossed out by the verified stories about some of my professors, who've not only carried on long affairs with some of their students -- which were consensual, and thus not problematic -- but also heavily hit on many other students -- much to their discomfort -- before finding one who would accept their advances.

Meaning that if I happened to be into my boss, it would be fucking cool if he wanted to fuck me too. But if I was hoping for a "regular" boss-employee relationship that was job-performance based, I'd be really pissed -- and really uncomfortable -- if my boss suggested a blow job performance.

True, I could say: No, I don't feel like blowing you at this time. And from what Dov says, that would be just fine at his company -- no retribution to the employee, or any other sexualy coercive business practices.

Ok, you won't fire me. Cool, I'll get my due raises. And hey, thanks for saying I'm still up for promotions.

But you know, if anyone could bring out my inner prude, it's Dov. And even after all those reassurances, I still don't think I'd wanna work there.

Fair trade failure in Bev Hills adjacent

2005-10-20T19:04:00.000-07:00

I thought this store would give Starbucks' PR department something to frame up on their walls. After all, it's the store where my non-sexual-crush barista works. I walked in with confidence, stepped up, and asked for my fair trade coffee.

Barista: Uh, I think [some blend on brew] is fair trade. (to barista 2) Hey -- Where does [said blend] come from?

This guy obviously had no idea what fair trade means. Fair trade coffee can come from Vietnam or Mexico or Guatemala. Fair labor standards are not country-specific. Another barista, hard at work on some iced drink, yelled over his shoulder that no, [said blend] is NOT a certified fair trade blend.

Barista: (pointing at the list of brewing coffees) Sorry. That's what we have brewing right now.

Me: Oh. Well, can I get a cup of fair trade coffee?

Barista: We'd have to brew a whole new blend. Those (pointing again) are what we have brewing right now.

Me: Oh. Um, can you French-press a cup of fair trade coffee for me?

Barista: We don't French-press coffees here.

Oh, never mind, I said, and walked out.

OK, I understand that baristas sometimes don't receive the best training. I even get that, when things are busy, baristas -- as any other human being trying to preserve one's sanity -- may try to dissuade customers from French-pressing a specific cup.

But this was at 6 p.m. on a lazy Thursday evening. No one was behind me in line. The barista could've easily asked another barista -- if new or unfamiliar with Starbucks policies -- what he should do in such a situation as the one I was creating. I gave him SEVERAL chances to offer a French-pressed cup. I even asked SPECIFICALLY for a French-pressed fair trade cup. And through it all, I was quite friendly, and I was clearly ready to wait to get what I wanted.

To no avail.

I'm SOOO pissed right now. This barista's really messin' with the wrong gal. While I realize this oversight isn't personal, I'm still, personally, very angry.

I can only hope that this is one of the few non-Starbucks operated franchises that don't have to follow corporate policy. Doubtful, because they were brewing Starbucks' corporately mandated Coffee of the Week.

After this post, I'll be emailing Cindy, and I'm also gonna try and find out who the district manager for this store is. Yes, I could go through the "usual" channels. Cindy's kindly given me Starbucks' corporate customer service contact info; you can call 800.23.LATTE, email info@starbucks.com, or send in a comment card. But as a consumer, I have to say I've found these avenues extremely unsatisfying. You can read about my email experiences here; when I called the LATTE number, the sweet and very polite rep told me that fair trade blends would be brewing all October and that a fair trade blend will be brewed on the 20th of each month -- both untrue, as I found out through Cindy.

Luckily, I've given up on the cutting-back-on-drinking thing and have started keeping a steady supply of organic wines on hand...

USC to get a taste of fair trade

2005-10-20T18:23:00.000-07:00

(Photo by Audrey J, Fairtrade coffee @ FT Carnival in Melbourne, Australia, on World FT day, 5/14/05)

It's official -- We're gonna have a Starbucks fair trade coffee tasting at USC on November 11 -- An auspicious day, in my view, cuz 11's my fave number.

I wrote back in September that Lore of USC's Hospitality Services said we'd start getting plans for a tasting of Starbucks' fair trade offerings together mid-October (Most of USC's coffee is Starbucks'). So last week, I called Lore -- who was still swamped with Doheny Tea House stuff and suggested pushing things back til November.

"Um, maybe I could help organize it?" I said. "I have some Starbucks contacts, and they said they'd be happy to arrange a tasting on campus..."

Which actually did the trick! I have to say our Hospitality Services has been super honest and helpful. When they say they're happy to look into fair trade, they really are. And when they say they're busy, they really are -- Lore was only too happy to give me her Starbucks rep's number and ask me to set things up.

So I called Lore's contact John, who referred me to Jonathan, one of John's underlings. We came up with some dates. I called Lore with them, and she got in touch with Carlos, the manager for Trojan Grounds, where we plan to hold the tasting. The 11th worked best for all.

Lore's taking over from here -- My only task now is to galvanize the Oxfam-USC kids to hopefully get a letter to the editor in the Daily Trojan, preferably from an undergrad, and to do what we can to publicize the event. I'll also round up some kids to volunteer at the tasting table, though I'm guessing Starbucks will say they can handle it.

And according to Lore, the tasting's simply to find out which blend of fair trade students prefer. "Oh, I thought it was to find out if students wanted fair trade," I said. To which she replied, "Oh, no -- there's no question about that. Students want fair trade."

Chris Martin's doin' his job really, really well --

Art, wine, and public transportation in LA

2005-10-19T21:41:00.000-07:00

Tried to meet my friend Christian in Pasadena today via bus. Where there's a will, there's a way -- unless you're trying to take public transportation to an LA suburb. I typed in the addresses into MTA’s handy Trip Planner, and got this message:

TripMaster found NO trip(s) leaving from [my place] to [his place]. Try changing walking DISTANCE or travel TIME or MODE. Make sure the locations are correct.

Sometimes, LA sucks.

So I took the 10 to the 110 and we carpooled to the Norton Simon Museum, which both of us hadn’t been to in a coupla years. I remember a high school field trip there. Our teacher, in front of “Woman with a Book,” asked: What do you think Picasso found interesting about her? A friend: “Red-hot nipples.”

Devoid of painting talent myself, I took pictures – which you’re allowed to do in the permanent collection, provided you don’t use flash. Above: Picasso's "Woman with a Book," seen through an aperture in Barbara Hepworth's abstract sculpture "Assembly of Sea Forms." This aperture was an "eye" of the "sea king." Right: Picasso's "Women of Algiers," seen through an aperture in Isamu Noguchi's abstract sculpture "The White Gunas."

For a small, suburban museum, the Norton Simon has a damn good collection -- especially an extensive collection of Degas' paintings and sculptures. Best of all, admission's free for students, and on your way out, you get a free, high-quality print of an artwork. We got Degas' "The Laundress."

And on the way back – what I believe was construction had closed off the 110 near Pasadena. I had to take the 134 to the 5 to the 110 to the 10.

Trying to relax now with an organic Louis Jadot Beaujolais-Villages –

Little Miss Puffet

2005-10-18T18:41:00.000-07:00

ParadiseO has me cooking more, but anyone who knows me knows half my meals are cereal and soy milk. One of my faves: Puffins.

If you haven't tried these, you're really, really missing out. Crunchy, not too sweet, bite-sized yummy squares you can eat dry as a snack. Sadly, the cereal's not organic, though many Barbara's Bakery cereals are.

Still, Puffins cereals are pretty healthy. And the name isn't just logo branding -- Barbara's Bakery is a regular contributor to Audubon's Project Puffin conservation effort.

I've been in love with these birdies since I saw them at the zoo a couple years ago. They can dive and swim underwater at shocking speeds!

So far, they've adopted 8 puffins, proudly pictured here. The cutest, in my opinion, is Chip (right).

Best of all, cereal lovers can help -- by eating cereal! At first I was gonna try and adopt my very own, real live puffin, but then I did some calculations: I'd need to collect 250 box tops, and even at my average rate of 1 box o' Puffins a week, that would take like 5 years (I'd be over 30! AAAHHH!).

But for 2 box tops and $6.95, you can get a 6" beanie puffin. So, as usual, I emailed:

Hello -- I'm interested in getting a beanie puffin, but was wondering what materials the beanie puffins are made out of, and if they are sweatshop free. Just wanna make sure the toy's environmentally and socailly kind :) Looking forward to hearing back from you! I'm a big fan of the peanut butter flavor :) Siel

Susan of Barb's Bakery wrote back:

The plant we are contracted with in China is family-owned and our vendor visits every year. He assures us that the workers are treated and paid fairly. As for the materials, they are new polyester fiber. We hope this information assists you in making your decision and that you continue to enjoy our products in excellent health!

And 3 weeks later, Puffet arrived. Here she is, atop a half-knit scarf --

And I haven't given up on the real-live puffin adoption. After all, I'll still be over 30 one day, whether or not I eat 250 boxes of Puffins cereal --

Green wine adventures

2005-10-17T16:53:00.000-07:00

Talk about local. Through Treehugger, I found out LA has its very own winery -- in Bel Air, no less. And apparantly, it's super green!

So I immediately started digging through Moraga's website to see how I might drink this gem -- but couldn't find any info. Thus, I emailed:

"I was wondering -- How can one buy a bottle of Moraga red wine? I'm guessing you're not a HUGE winery -- being located in Bel Air and all -- but do you have a store or some outlet that would allow laypeople like myself to try a bottle or two?"

Less than a day later, I got this back:

Siel, Thank you for inquiring on our Moraga wines. We are a pretty small vineyard 16 acre property with 9 acres of vines.

You may purchase the wine at Wally's located in Westwood, CA they have several of our vintages both in Red and White Wine. - Wally's # is 310-475-0606.

Kindest Regards,
Moraga Vineyards

Sweet, eh? So I went to the Wally's Wine site -- to discover the cheapest Moraga red costs $125. The most expensive? A cool $500. Ouch. More than a lil out of my price range. They do have a white for $34.99, but if I'm gonna pay that much for wine, I want red.

My Moraga wine hopes will have to wait till money starts growing on trees, but I decided it was high time I visited a local wine shop. So my friend Marci and I took the #7 Big Blue Bus to Wally's for their weekly wine tasting last Saturday. We tried a dozen or so wines, for just $10 -- and people from the wineries were there to tell us about them in detail. Plus, we had some of the yummiest cheese I've ever tasted. (Marci, right)

Then I went a lil crazy shopping -- a kinda dangerous activity when you're tipsy. With the help of a very knowlegeable Wally's guy, I got a couple organic French wines, including this 2000 Château de Caraguilhes Corbieres for $14.99 (left) --

-- which I'm currently drinking. Need a pick me up on this rainy day -- I slipped and fell on the stairs on my way to get the mail :(

At least I didn't have to drive today -- Careful out there, Angelenos --

Why care about Starbucks?: Fair trade opinions

2005-10-16T15:46:00.000-07:00

Everyone has something to say about Starbucks. Even within the fair-trade-friendly community, opinions are split.

Thom of Monkey & Son -- a local 100% organic and fair trade certified coffee company -- has some misgivings about Starbucks' business practices, but says it's great that Starbucks has gotten people to demand better-tasting, quality coffee.

Ric of Groundwork agrees. According to Ric, the real problem is companies like Folgers, say, who make gross coffee. He tends toward the quality argument -- if the coffee's yummy, it'll help mitigate the coffee crisis.

Others don't feel so warm towards Starbucks. Take Larry's Beans, for example: "We left TransFair in 2004 because we did not want to be confused with companies like Starbucks that only offer a small selection of Fair Trade coffee."

Why these differences in opinion? An AFP article describes the split: "Within the fair trade community, activists distinguish between a "reformist" approach and an "alternative" one. Both seek to improve the lot of small-scale producers of commodities, but each has very different ideas about how to do so."

Larry's Beans would fall under the "alternative" camp -- whose "far more ambitious — and radical — aim is to create parallel structures that bypass profit-driven market structures altogether." Committed to fair trade issues, it irks Larry's Beans that TransFair certifies companies like Starbucks that are not wholly committed to fair trade ideals.

In fact, why even bother with the Starbucks Challenge? Most readers of this blog would prefer to get their coffee from local roasters whose businesses are based on fair trade principles. Who cares if Starbucks serves fair trade or not?

The "reformist" camp cares. These fair trade activits are more willing to work with big companies, to get into the supermarkets, to reach a larger number of consumers.

The reformists have sometimes come under attack for this. Oxfam, for example -- known by many for its anti-globalization messages -- defended its work with huge, multinational companies on campaigns such as Make Trade Fair: "We understand that you can't ignore the power that corporates wield in the fight against poverty," said Oxfam's spokesman in an article from The Guardian. "We'd be failing the people we're trying to help if we weren't trying to find new and innovative ways of working with companies and harnessing their potential to be real players in helping us achieve our goals."

The fact is, when Starbucks makes changes, those changes have HUGE impacts. Yes, fair trade beans only make up 1% of Starbucks' purchases. But that 1% is about a quarter of ALL fair trade beans that come into the US.

Getting Starbucks to up their fair trade purchases to 2%, or even to the TransFair recommended 5% minimum, would drastically change the fair trade landscape.

Of course, green LA girl still buys most of her coffee from Monkey & Son...

Starbucks admits "break down in customer service"

2005-10-15T16:20:00.000-07:00

What your participation in the Starbucks Challenge has done so far: Starbucks has admitted that there IS a problem. A fairly speedy admission, considering that the challenge has been going on less than two weeks.

According to Cindy, Starbucks has a “brewed coffee press upon request” policy. At your request, baristas should immediately say they can French press a specific coffee -- whether fair trade or another blend -- without rattling off the list of currently brewing blends. You should then be able to buy the coffee in the size you requested, paying specifically for that size, in about 4 minutes.

This hasn't been happening in many stores -- and, in a very un-Nestle-like manner, Starbucks has admitted their shortcomings, and taken action. The following "reminder" email was sent out to all company operated stores in the US and Canada this week:
______

Not all store partners may be familiar with how to “just say yes” when a customer requests a brewed coffee other than those being offered as Coffee of the Week (COW). This may be especially true for customers looking to enjoy a freshly brewed Fair Trade Certified or Organic Starbucks coffee.

Action Required

If, at any time, a customer would like a cup of brewed coffee other than those offered as COW, please offer that customer their choice brewed in a coffee press.

· Explain to the customer it will take four minutes to brew the coffee in a press.

· The customer may select any cup size for their coffee. Charge the customer only for the cup size they select, not for the entire press.

· Pour the customer's coffee for them into a "to go" or "for here" cup appropriate to the size they have ordered.

· Sample the remaining coffee press to other customers.

· Use an opened 5 lb. bullet of the selected coffee to prepare the press. If you do not have an opened 5 lb. bullet, open a 1 lb. FlavorLock™ bag to prepare the press.
________

Cindy says she's been following up with the less fair trade-friendly stores named in the challenge (Please always provide cross streets or addresses, she requests). In fact, she says she may even join the blogosphere herself, dropping in to comment! I just hope this isn't only to repeat what Starbucks tells me in pretty much every single communication I get from them: that Starbucks' purchases make up about 25% of the fair trade coffee that comes into the US, making it the largest purchaser of fair trade coffee in North America.

Yeah, we get it. You're huge. We just think that if Starbucks really responded to customer demand, fair trade purchases would make up more than the measly 1% of Starbucks' current purchases.

But in any case, one step at a time. Cindy of Starbucks: "In regards to feedback from our customers, I think it is important to note that it is not a break down in our commitment to Fair Trade or our mission. It happens to be a break down in customer service."

I just got home from a wine tasting, and am feeling pretty optimistic -- I'm taking Cindy and Starbucks at their word while continuing this challenge.

Bloggers -- Challenge on -- and expect better service.

All's fair in love and coffee?

2005-10-14T15:54:00.000-07:00

So my partner-in-crime City Hippy, the UK branch of the Starbucks Challenge, asked if Starbucks' claim that ALL their coffee is "fairly traded" should be "allowed." I responded in what I think is my longest blog comment ever, but still wanna dig deeper into it here.

Yes, Starbucks insists all their coffee is "fairly traded" -- a rather misleading claim, because consumers are apt to think that the coffee was bought at prices set by fair trade certification rules, which is at least $1.26/lb.

Most of Starbucks' coffee is bought for less.

To their credit, Starbucks does pay higher than average prices for coffee -- an average of $1.20/lb, according to their website. This is, at times, more than double the going price for some coffee -- but then that's not saying much, considering the bulk of this coffee is the gross tasting stuff bought by the real meanies like Nestle and P&G at slave labor prices.

So you might feel like telling Starbucks not to water down fair trade with these "fairly traded" claims.

But here's where the phrase gets a new twist. There are actually quite a few coffee companies out there who've gone above and beyond the fair trade certification regulations -- but have chosen NOT to get certified.

Now these are coffee companies that are just as concerned about social and economic justice and environmental concerns as the bottom line. Many wouldn't even be in the coffee biz if it didn't mean they were making the world better through their enterprise. These companies buy ALL their coffee at, or more often, well above, $1.26/lb. They work within the producer countries. They make all their financial documents avaliable online, so that, if you wanted, you could do your own personal audit to know that they're walking the walk as well as talking the talk.

Now no one really can deny that Larry's Beans' coffee, for example, is fairly traded, certification or not.

Why do they not get certified? Well, some coffee can't get certified, period. For coffee, the fair trade sticker's only avaliable for small co-ops, meainng neither individual farms nor larger estates can get certified (Why not? Find out here.).

There are other issues too. Some coffee companies feel that the certification process needs to include quality in their criterion. While I disagree with this, there does seem to be a glut of sub-gourmet-level beans compared to the amount of yummy beans in the fair trade certified market right now -- A real problem, if you consider that most fair trade certified coffee is bought by bougie coffee-lovin' people -- who have green hearts, but have tastebuds too.

Others feel the cost of certification -- between 5 to 10 cents a pound -- isn't worth it -- especially when that extra money could go back to the farmers.

And the real farmer advocates -- like Dean's Beans -- are ticked that companies like Starbucks that seem to care more about the bottom line than about equity and justice can get the same sticker as they can. Like the anti-chain coffee drinkers that shun all Starbucks coffees on principle, Larry's Beans and others don't want their coffees wearing any sticker Starbucks -- or even worse, Nestle -- is wearing.

Now I'm still all for the sticker -- and I don't agree with all the above arguments (I've talked about quality issues before; I'll talk about certification cost and sticker sharing later). But some of these non-certified companies -- who, by the way, will use the phrase "fairly traded" or even "fair trade" (sans "certified") to describe their coffee beans -- really are trading fairly and making the world a better place.

Which sorta brings me to an impasse about the use of the phrase "fairly traded." The problem is, the phrase can be used by anyone, to mean pretty much anything. And some who use it are saintly (Larry's Beans), others, quite evil (Nestle)...

This and more to be addressed over the weekend and beyond -- armed with an interview with Thom of the all-organic, all-fair-trade-certified Monkey & Son, and a detailed email from Cindy of Starbucks with the real skinny on what the company manuals say regarding fair trade coffee.

How to make $6.50 off of your old laptop

2005-10-13T21:34:00.000-07:00

(Photo by Scott Robinson, Clearly Ambiguous)

The Toshiba laptop I bought in 1999 sat unused the last couple years. The last time I turned it on, I couldn't coax the cursor out of its cozy nook in the top right corner of the screen.

Still, I felt a lil bad about just recycling the whole thing, cuz cursor aside, the laptop worked. I looked into a few programs that refurbished computers -- but many were very far away, and required a $10 fee in addition to shipping -- which I didn't think would be worth it for a computer that might turn out to be worthless.

On a whim, I checked out Toshiba's website and found the Toshiba Trade-In Center. The program, run by Dealtree, buys back your old computers, iPods, cell phones, and other electronics -- which don't even have to be Toshiba brand stuff -- for refurbishing and resale. Best of all, they'll send you some money for it!

So I clicked through and got an estimate, printed out the free pre-paid UPS form, and mailed the laptop to Dealtree.

Then I actually read the site. Apparantly, the program's a rebate type thing. I was supposed to mail my laptop in a receipt of a new Toshiba notebook purchase. Oopsie.

Luckily for me, Toshiba didn't check up on this either. A couple weeks later, I got a check for a whopping $6.50 in the mail.

I only hope my old Toshiba's been fixed and prettied up and in the hands of someone who'll use it more than I did --

Chicken or the egg? Consumer demand, corporate response

2005-10-12T15:36:00.000-07:00

Ah -- for a decaf soy fair trade latte. Even in the fair trade friendlier UK, you can't get a fair trade espresso drink at Starbucks, as Adventures in Ethical Consumerism found out. The fair trade Cafe Estima blend is not an espresso blend -- though Cindy of Starbucks says Cafe Estima is darker than the previous Fair Trade Blend, and could be used to make espresso drinks at home "if you had to."

But what would it take for Starbucks to offer an espresso blend? Cindy said that customer demand for fair trade is low at the moment, and that making fair trade more readily avaliable -- with more options, blends, etc. -- is simply a matter of building customer demand.

OK. I get that people have to ask for fair trade for Starbucks to offer it. But as I read more and more of these Starbucks Challenge accounts, I get the feeling that often, Starbucks really doesn't want us to ask.

How's customer demand for fair trade coffee suppressed? Read on:

I don't wanna be an asshole: Some bloggers have said that by making customers ask for a French pressed cup -- when the barista's already busy and a caffeine deprived line's developing -- is enough to keep people from asking for fair trade coffee. in over your head sums it up nicely: "no one wants to be that asshole who makes the minimum wage labour monkey do that extra work - those people are already getting too much hassle for their hourly rate." (I'll point out here that I think most Starbucks baristas are paid a few bucks above the minimum wage rate and given progressive health benefits and stock options)

A good point, but it's tough to prove that there's enough demand for fair trade coffee to keep it brewing all the time -- Starbucks can claim -- and may be correct in claiming -- that keeping the stuff brewing all the time for the once-in-a-blue-moon fair trade customer would not be financially sound.

That said, customers who buck the trend and request fair trade are still often met with resistance. As I and many other bloggers have noted before, many baristas are trained to respond to a request for fair trade coffee by rattling off a list of coffees that are currently brewing (read accounts here, here, here, and here -- there are others). To the customer, that often translates as a big NO for their fair trade coffee request.

To get the cup, the customer then has to ignore that rattled-off list and specifically ask for a French-pressed cup, often feeling like an asshole while doing it. Many decide to forego the request for fair trade the next time around.

I don't wanna waste coffee: If you just want a tall cup of coffee, you better learn to be satisfied with more. Unless your specific barista likes you enough to ignore store policy or doesn't know the policy well enough to follow the rules, you have to get a venti if you request a French pressed cup. thanks for not being a zombie has more on that.

I can't afford it: So you got a venti sized coffee, regardless of what size you actually wanted. Well -- you'll need to pay venti prices for that big coffee too.

I don't have that much time: Getting a French-pressed cup takes around 10 minutes. And Samuel in Marina del Rey reports being told to wait until the barista got through the line of 8-10 people.

I don't handle stress very well: Because so many of the Starbucks are unclear about the corporate fair trade policy, a request usually ends up getting a bunch of Starbucks employees involved. And, like thanks for not being a zombie points out, "it's going to be uncomfortable any time you get all four people involved in order to get a cup of coffee."

Which is to say that yes, customer demand is necessary -- but an honest picture of what the customer demand looks like isn't going to emerge if those demands are often nipped at the bud.

I would argue that the lack of publicity about the avaliability of fair trade coffee -- as well as small yet effective resistances against providing it -- is part of the reason for the "low customer demand."

Filed in: starbuckschallenge tea trade UK USA business cityhippy coffee corporate csr drink fair fair-trade fairtrade LA London losangeles responsibility social starbucks

Starbucks Challenge Update: False press-releasing?

2005-10-11T22:12:00.000-07:00

A personal record: 3 Starbucks in one day. Basically, I'm trying to find out if my many, many "local" Starbucks are brewing the press-release-mandated fair trade blend as the "Coffee of the Week" this week.

The answer? Yes, they are. The stores I visited: The one near USC (Jefferson & Hoover), the one near my apartment (Pico and Robertson), and the one my new green-minded friend Kim and I checked out earlier this evening (202 Beverly Drive, Beverly Hills) -- before we headed off for local, organic, fairly traded (but not certified -- more on this later) decaf coffee at Urth Caffe.

Of the three, the Beverly Hills Starbucks was the only shop that actually pointed out that the Cafe Estima blend is fair trade certified (pic right).

Well -- I have mixed feelings about Starbucks' rebranding efforts. Christine of Starbucks told me that the Cafe Estima blend was made to replace the fomer Fair Trade Blend because Starbucks is planning to introduce additional fair trade blends. But no one can give me dates on when this'll actually start happening.

Yes, according to its press release, "Starbucks offers five different offerings of Fair Trade Certified coffee to its Foodservice customers, such as college campuses, restaurants and hotels." But I found out, via Cindy of Starbucks, that even for those accounts, "five different offerings" only means five different SKUs -- which are like ISBNs for coffees. Basically, all that's being offered is the Cafe Estima blend and a decaf fair trade blend -- five different "offerings," means different types (whole bean vs. ground) and sizes (1 lb. vs. 5 lb., for ex). And the decaf isn't even gonna be offered at regular Starbucks stores -- only at the colleges and other places where, according to Cindy, "we've had the highest demand for fair trade."

Sad news for me, because I only drink decaf after 6 pm. My shrink mandated this after I complained one too many times about my insomnia problems.

Of couse, I'm an SC Trojan, and could get my decaf fair trade Starbucks fix on campus. That too isn't so easy -- After reading the press release, I thought Starbucks was gonna immediately switch all their college offerings to fair trade. Evidently, Starbucks only meant that they'd do so if our dining & hospitality services specifically requested it.

Not a daunting task for green LA girl, since I already have plans with USC's hospitality services to schedule a Starbucks fair trade tasting on campus to convince students the switch is necessary. But damn -- Starbucks is really, really skilled at making statements that seem pretty fucking fair trade progressive to the lay reader -- statements that are never technically false, but, to any who care to do additional research, ring somewhat hollow...

**Update, 10/12/05: And for the bookworms who were psyched about this statement in the press release -- "Additionally, U.S. Barnes & Noble cafes serving Starbucks coffee will serve Cafe Estima Blend on a daily basis as one of several featured coffees." -- don't expect fair trade at your Westwood or Santa Monica B&N anytime soon. That offer only applies to the B&Ns located on college campuses.

**Update, 10/24/05: Starbucks put out a new, revised release! Check it out --

Starbucks Challenge update: 1st chat with Starbucks

2005-10-10T20:31:00.000-07:00

Cindy's sweet. At the end of our chat today, we started talking about ourselves. She's a theatre major who once "wanted to change the world through art." Now she's older and money-wiser, and works within a different medium -- Starbucks' Corporate Social Responsibility department.

Of course, I know Cindy's paid to sound green (though I did find her likable -- I'm going for full disclosure here -- no false pretenses at journalistic "neutrality"). I got a lot -- A LOT -- of "I agree"s and "I hear where you're coming from"s. Flattering, but I have to say my convo with Ric of Groundwork -- during which we disagreed quite frequently -- was really more informative, engaging, and heartfelt.

That said, things are going to be different if you're speaking to the enviro-conscious COO of a local coffee roaster, versus a cog in the great big international wheel that is Starbucks.

"I honestly think it's cool," Cindy said about the Starbucks Challenge. And she said that, once we finish tabulating the results and stuff, she'd love to follow up with us (I pointed her to the frequently updated del.icio.us link that does that for us. She was a self-described blog novice).

From our half-hour or so conversation, I personally am convinced that Cindy, as an individual, does support fair trade practices. Cindy sounded concerned that not all the Starbucks stores seemed to be aware of the fair-trade-on-demand policy. And she made a personal promise to follow up with all the district managers, store managers, etc. for the stores where customers couldn't get fair trade coffee during the Starbucks Challenge, "to see where the message is getting lost." Cindy readily admitted there may be flaws in the Starbucks communication system that'll require fixing.

I'm not quite as sure about what changes Cindy can actually effect, however.

Cindy sounded somewhat removed from the actual practices (versus the written statements) that take place in Starbucks stores, despite the fact that she started out at Starbucks as a barista. She didn't, for example, know whether or not Starbucks' policies mandated that baristas resist customer requests for fair trade coffee by saying "We're brewing (something else) today."

From the reports we've gotten so far from challengers, it's very, VERY clear that many baristas are trained not to make fair trade coffee until specifically asked for a French-pressed cup (read accounts here, here, here, and here -- there are others). The question now is whether this practice is one mandated by the official training programs (manuals, etc.), or one that's being more informally instituted by individual managers, etc. Certainly a contentious issue either way, but interesting to find out more about --

Cindy will check on that and get back to me, and she said she agrees that the tactic is uncool: "It puts the customer in a bad spot," she said.

What I'm really happy about is that Cindy did clear up a lot of questions for me. For example, the Starbucks' policy that mandated that stores brew fair trade coffee on the 20th of each month has been phased out, due to the new "Coffee of the Week" policy (I let her know that the phone reps are unaware of this change in policy). I also found out that Cafe Estima, the new fair trade blend, will be featured as the "Coffee of the Week" every two months (You can be sure City Hippy and I will be checking up on that). I also let Cindy know that Newnan, Georgia is completely unaware that Cafe Estima should be the Coffee of the Week this week -- something else she said she'd look into.

My major personal internal conflicts regarding Starbucks: I wanna be sensitive to the fact that in a company with 7,302 stores in North America alone, communication isn't gonna be perfect -- It would, in my opinion, be a lil anal to demand error-free trickle-down of corporate policies, from CEO to barista.

That said, at what point can a blogger say, "Hey, you're not doing what you said you would!"?

According to them, "Starbucks and the Fair Trade movement share common goals" (PDF here), but in actual practice -- beyond press releases, PDFs made avaliable on Starbucks' CSR website, and Cindy's kind word of mouth -- why is it that so few customers even know fair trade coffee is avaliable on request, and why is it that -- even for the people who do -- we still have to jump through hoops to get one lousy cup of socio-responsible coffee?

With Starbucks being as huge as it is, I feel that the CSR reps like Cindy are far, FAR removed from the reality of the situation in actual Starbucks stores. She can honestly be a fair trade advocate, with a greener heart than green LA girl. But will she, can she, make fair trade coffee more accessible for customers?

Well -- We're here to find out, on a more or less hourly basis, between City Hippy and me.

And as always, please let us know what you think, what you're curious about in terms of this challenge (Transmogrified -- I'm totally on top of your Qs -- They're getting their own post -- This one's already too long.) I vow -- and I'm sure City Hippy would too -- to respond to your concerns.

Stats update: Of my last 100 hits, 62 are from Starbucks (sbuxhost101.starbucks.com). Someone's working late. Maybe I shouldn't report these numbers, or readers will start using third-party ISPs -- but I've developed an odd fascination with these stats --

**Update, 10/15/05: In its 2nd communication, Starbucks admits it has a "break down in customer service."

Starbucks Challenge Update: This week's Estima week

2005-10-10T15:30:00.000-07:00

3:30 pm here, and I haven't heard from Cindy of Starbucks yet, but perhaps she's been busy writing this press release:

"To support Fair Trade Month 2005 and raise awareness of its new Fair Trade Certified coffee, Starbucks Coffee Company will feature new Cafe Estima Blend as "Coffee of the Week" this week in thousands of Company-operated stores across the United States and Canada."

This must've been in the works long before the Starbucks Challenge kicked off -- which actually bodes well for the challenge, I think. For ex, we already know that Cafe Estima isn't brewing at G Zombie's Starbucks in Newnan, Georgia today.

But perhaps it's happening elsewhere in North America? I just got back into LA and haven't had a chance to drop by a Starbucks yet. For those out there too estranged from Starbucks to actually go into a store and take the challenge -- Perhaps you might just peek in the window of your local Starbucks for us and let us know if Cafe Estima Blend is written up on the "Now Brewing" chalkboard --

Sacramento Starbucks: Ask twice, and you shall receive

2005-10-09T17:30:00.000-07:00

After a rum-doused dinner at Celestin's last night, I talked my Sacramento friends Scott and Amber into taking the Starbucks Challenge. Or more accurately, I talked them into watching me take the challenge.

The store -- at the corner of J and 19th -- was still quite crowded at 10 pm.

Me: Hello -- Could I get a cup of fair trade coffee here?
Barista: We're brewing (something else) tonight --

I forget what blend this was, because, to be honest, I wasn't listening -- I knew that's what he would say.

Me: Would you be able to French press a cup of fair trade for me?
Barista: Sure!

About 10 minutes later, the barista came out from behind the counter to find me and hand me a venti cup of fair trade coffee -- I'd only paid for a tall.

Gotta love tha customer service. But I wonder why it is that Starbucks tells baristas to first tell the customer what's brewing, when obviously that's not what the customer wants if she has specifically requested fair trade. To me, that seems like a policy aimed at discouraging customers from ordering fair trade coffee. And this discouragement usually works, especially if there are other Starbucks customers waiting behind you for their shot of java.

Just one of the things I plan to ask Cindy of Starbucks about tomorrow --

**Update, 10/10/05: 1st chat with Cindy of Starbucks.