Critique
Starbucks' innovations have kept the company relevant and a leader in the food service industry. Starbucks offers high-quality products and services, and it has used technology as a means to achieve that status. Starbucks' most significant technology is its mobile order and pay app, starbucks.athome.com, the DPM for baristas.
Mobile order apps allow companies to connect personally and often with their customers (Nathaly, 2020, p. 2). The more a company can take up the free space in a customer's mind, the more likely they will become loyal (Power, 2019). Starbucks' mobile ordering app exceeds that benchmark. The Starbucks app sends notifications at least once daily about deals and fun challenges tailored to different customers. Starbucks' ability to hyper-personalize the content within its app creates a more loyal customer than its competitors (Nathaly, 2020, p.2). For instance, simply allowing customers to put their names into the app and having baristas call them out constructs a greater feeling of elegance and personalization Nathaly, 2020, p.3). According to Taylor, when customers place orders, they don't have their names called out; instead, McDonald's mobile app uses order numbers (Taylor, 2018, p. 12).
McDonald's does have Starbucks beat on time, though; according to Taylor, McDonald's generally takes five minutes "even speedier than Starbucks," but McDonald's app does make customers place their orders once they have arrived at the store and not before (Taylor, 2018, p. 10).
Comparing the two apps between McDonald's and Starbucks, Starbucks is losing when it comes to the speed at which a customer's order is ready. Starbucks mobile ordering is falling behind McDonald's mobile app, and modifications are at fault. McDonald's app has rules and expectations, but Starbucks has given its customers too much freedom, and the baristas are now paying the price.
Sang Lee and Don Lee have spotted a new customer service strategy based on technology and the want for no customer interaction; they have named it "Untact" (Lee & Lee, 2019, p. 1). Lee's idea of Untact is that a specific subset of customers don't want to have any human interaction with employees; instead, they place their order online, then pick it up and leave. The Untact market segment would be new for Starbucks to enter but directly goes against the idea of the "Third Place" Starbucks positions itself to have. And as Morgan has stated, the reliance on mobile order technology has pushed Starbucks away from its "Third Place" model and, therefore, Starbucks could consider entering this Untact market segment (Smith & Doe, 2022).
Starbucks' "Third Place" model and Untact methods don't have to be mutually exclusive. As Lee points out, a DIY model is a new service companies can offer (Lee & Lee, 2019, p. 2). For instance, Starbucks has athome.starbucks.com, which also allows users to take a coffee quiz and find, based on their tastes, which coffee would be best for them and recipes they can make using Starbucks products and casual at-home dishes. This way, customers who don't want to go to a physical Starbucks store can make their own at home with Starbucks products they bought at the grocery store. Implementing this website is a great way to reach consumers who don't want to go to a physical store and new customers who want to try and make a more intricate cup of coffee at home.
When it comes to the ability to provide an authentic cafe experience, Starbucks is still the place to go. Dunkin' Donuts and McDonald's are trying to renovate their stores to give a more classy experience but are still behind compared to Starbucks.
Starbucks is at the top in many categories. Still, it cannot get comfortable as its competitors are reverse engineering the innovations Starbucks is known for and, at times, doing them better. This technology is constantly evolving, and companies were unprepared for the exponential growth of mobile and online ordering due to COVID-19 (Smith & Doe, 2022). So, all the businesses discussed will have high and low benchmarks. A low for Starbucks is the lack of training for baristas on its mobile ordering app (Smith & Doe, 2022).
Morgan mentioned that customers would call the store or ask baristas in the drive-thru why their app isn't working. The baristas don't know why and can only recommend the customer call corporate, which is not what customers want to hear (Smith & Doe, 2022). Starbucks should implement a training program for interested baristas to learn more about the mobile app, so they can answer low-level questions customers may have about the app (Smith & Doe, 2022). Or update the AI in the app to incorporate a chatbot that could answer questions or point the customer in the right direction. Often, the baristas on the floor have to explain to a frustrated customer that they don't know how to fix their problem, leaving neither party satisfied (Smith & Doe, 2022).
First, and for most, Starbucks must find a way to fix the consistent issues its mobile order and pay app is causing its customers and baristas. Not doing so will lead to losing loyal customers and hard-working baristas exhausted from mitigating their company's missteps and failure to react promptly (Smith & Doe, 2022)
McDonald's and Dunkin' Donuts are closely watching what Starbucks does well and poorly and taking notes (Brizek, 2018, p.9). Both companies do well in their metrics and have loyal customers.
Starbucks needs to focus on not losing the casual Starbucks customer. The customers that won't wait fifteen minutes in the drive-thru because someone put a mobile order in at the ordering box, and now the baristas on the bar have to pull it through only to find that it's five complex drinks (Smith & Doe, 2022). These are real issues that Starbucks must deal with or risk losing value for its customers (Smith & Doe, 2022).