30 Hours to Social Networking Hero or Zero: The Starbucks Test

Tuesday, June 14, 2011

A Starbucks Follow-up (posted June 29th 2011)

Posted on a blog June 13th 2011 was a letter from a horrified mother who witnessed an incident of homophobia at a Centereach, Long Island Starbucks. Within hours, Starbucks had a potential public relations nightmare on their hands thanks to social media.

Only thirty hours after the blog post, the outpouring of shock and dismay from Starbucks loyal customers is heartfelt, deserved, and overwhelming. It is moments like this where a Brand’s true colors will show and so far, Starbucks appears to be handling the situation well.

The short of the incident is that, according to the mother, she and her young daughter were patroning a Starbucks and had the misfortune to witness a staff meeting where a manager-level woman was berating a gay employee and using a lot of hypocritical, homophobic, and abusive language. You can read the full account here.

The Wrong:
Homophobic or not, no individual in a position of power in an organization has any business dressing down an employee in a public venue. Holding a staff meeting in the dining area of the Starbucks was a really bad move and I have to wonder what sort of training Starbucks managers get before they’re turned loose. There isn’t sufficient information at this point to know the offending management person’s rank, but I think we do get a grasp of her relative intelligence—or minimally her lack of common sense.

The encouragement of the other employees to openly bash gays even after the employee had left was another error in judgment on the part of the staff and their ring-leader.

So that was the set-up. Starbucks employees blatantly violating Starbucks policy, offending customers, and generally giving the Brand a black eye.

The Starbucks Corporate Response:
So far so good. Within minutes of the blog post going viral, Starbucks not only initiated an investigation, but began publicly responding to Tweets and Facebook comments. Their tone was apologetic and professional and merely stated—repeatedly—that they were looking into the allegations and would respond appropriately.

They contacted the blog’s author and arranged phone calls to collect details. We know this because the blog’s author has publicly commented that they contacted her on the Starbuck’s Facebook page so all 23 million fans can see.

At 3:45pm on June 14th—30 hours after the blog post was made—Starbucks Corporate posted this statement on their own blog: Our Dedication to Embrace Diversity. See the screenshot of the proof that within 2 minutes of distributing this press release to social media, they had 432 “Likes” and 33 comments on Facebook alone. In 15 minutes, they had 1,567 “Likes” and 214 comments—the comments ranged from “I’ll believe it when I see you fire someone,” to “good job for acting so quickly.” On Twitter, they’re promising to be “as transparent as [they] legally can be.”

We’ll have to see, but I don’t think Starbucks Corporate will disappoint. Personally, while I’m sorry the mother and her child had to witness the incident, I’m glad the manager was so careless, otherwise that poor employee might have had to bear the pain in silence with no justice.

Takeaways:

• A Brand cannot afford to ignore social media. Had Starbucks not been social, this incident could have spiraled out of control before they even knew about it.
• A Brand must be publicly responsive to socially expressed concerns. Had Starbucks attempted to quietly resolve this incident, the resulting silence would have been just as catastrophic as not knowing about it at all.
• A personal touch on social networking can help mitigate damage. When you tweet @starbucks, you get a response from Brad at Starbucks in Seattle, WA. Brands need a personal touch when handling customer service and large Brands need an individual who is personable and dedicated to managing the Brand’s image.
• Individuals beware: You may have the right to free speech, but you ought to be aware that everyone else has the right to hold you accountable for what you say and there are laws against discrimination in the workplace.