July 2008

According to The Age, Starbucks are closing 61 out of their 85 Australian stores. It seems they have all but given up on the Australian market.

I’m not surprised they’re struggling here. Unlike the United States, Australia has a long-running coffee culture. Before the arrival of Starbucks, there were already thousands of independent coffee shops, to the point where they comprised 1/3 of retail outlets in some suburbs (or so it seemed). Some of these focussed more on food than they did coffee, but there were plenty of others that served a decent brew. Australia has heaps of coffee snobs as a result.

Not everyone is a coffee snob, of course, so Starbucks might still have made inroads into the market had they moved a bit faster. Unfortunately for them, they spent several years taking over the US first, and while they did so, some enterprising souls noticed how profitable they were, and set about replicating that success here. Soon, Australian shopping centres were filled with Starbucks clones. The most successful of these, Gloria Jeans, now has a huge fanbase that won’t go anywhere else.

As a result, the entry of  Starbucks into the Australian market was met with a collective “meh” from the local population.

They might still have gotten somewhere had their coffee tasted good, but in my humble opinion, they are beaten not only by the independents but most (if not all) the other chains.

The lesson for business owners? If you are successful in one market, make sure to conquer the others quickly, or someone else will beat you to it.

Have you heard of Muzz Buzz? It’s a drive-through coffee outlet that’s been operating in Western Australia - and now, it’s arrived in Melbourne. This is their outlet at DFO Cheltenham:

Muzz Buzz has a large variety of menu items, from iced drinks to flavoured coffee to food, ice-creams and energy drinks. Their coffee flavourings are at no extra cost, which is unusual.

I’m not a huge fan of drive-through coffee outlets, but I thought I’d give it a go. Here’s what their coffee looks like - note the straw. Who drinks coffee through a straw?

Unfortunately the coffee was close to lukewarm and a little weak (I ordered strong). My girlfriend Marjorie ordered a flavoured coffee, which was definitely nicer.

They got at least one satisfied customer that day:

Recommended for: Drivers who like the convenience of drinking coffee through a straw. Flavoured coffee lovers.

Not recommended for: People who like coffee that tastes like coffee.

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Later the same day, I got to try Nespresso.

Nespresso is a novel attempt by Nescafe to market themselves as the high end of the coffee market, although perhaps not high enough for coffee snobs. Basically, the system consists of a very easy to use coffee machine that uses Nespresso coffee pods - and nothing else. There are, I think, a dozen varieties of the pods available. Others have criticised the system for using stale coffee in the pods, plus the proprietary nature of the pods will be a concern for some. What concerns me, as always, is how the coffee tastes.

At their kiosk in Myer, I had a chance to find out. After enduring their marketing spiel, I had a latte using a ‘Ristretto’ pod (the strongest pod available).  So how did it taste? Not bad at all really. The latte was creamy, with little bitterness I thought. The flavour was a bit lacking compared to a good cafe, but still beats a lot of mediocre cafes and about 90% of home setups.

Recommended for: A take-away or similar business looking to sell quick and easy espresso on the side, without serving watery weak swill. Or, someone wanting a semi-sophisticated setup at home, without spending four figures.

Not recommended for: Coffee snobs. Get a better machine, and fresher beans.

Hi all. I’m that busy with planning my birthday party at the moment that I don’t have much time for blogging, so just imagine you are up at 3am watching Rage and this clip comes on. This is something else. I once read a band interview when they discussed making a video clip. They did a take-off of a horror film but it didn’t make it on TV because, wouldn’t you know, “you can’t kill people on video clips”.

Obviously noone told Magic Dirt. Here is their clip Shovel (RSS readers click through to the post if you can’t see the clip.)

Admittedly this is a little crappy, but here it is - Australian Rare Coins Online, a site for those collecting Australian rare coins. It’s a work in progress.