Starbucks Bord'eau Village — Restaurant in Bordeaux

Passive Agressive Service - Bad Vibes !!!

Went for a tea - as a tea drinker I’m used to being shown the selection available if no menu available. I love the complexity and range of tea and herbal infusions and as such appreciate the blends. Any tea drinker knows ‘green tea’ is rarely just ‘green’ tea - often infused with other ingredients but not always. Chai is not ‘just’ chai, sometimes the base is black tea, sometimes green tea or sometimes 100% herbal. I was avoiding any type of black tea today.

So I asked if I could ‘see’ the teas myself (in a display shelf behind the server just slightly too far for me to read the packets) ensuring the detail of information I required to make my choice, tranquille. Fairly normal request I thought, less work for everyone - I can read the descriptions on the tea bags (all written in English my native language) ensuring I had ALL the information I needed to make my choice. They could even serve the person behind me while I made my decision, in peace. Additionally I thought it would also save the server having to explain every single choice available, which could be a time consuming exercise. Considering there’s about 10 different choices of tea blends and I’m clearly not French, it makes sense.

It was apparently not possible to physically show me the tea selection, I didn’t - and still don’t understand why not, but ok. So now she’s treating me like I’m a fussy customer which was confirmed by her very FAKE ‘nice’ tone of voice. She proceeded to tell me (impatiently) they had green, infusions, early grey or chai on offer. Um ok I thought this is going to be painful….she was not giving me the level detail I needed to make my decision. What type of green ? What type of chai ? What type of infusions? Blended with what? Base of what - herbs, black or green or other? Tea is complex.

I insisted I would like to ‘look’ at the packets. I want to know precisely the flavour and base of the tea I am about to order and to be able to read the packet myself would have been the easiest solution. Especially if the servers are not capable of relaying the information in a kind and patient manner. Again it was not possible for me to look at the selection but no explanation why, just pass me the packets or display rack ! So I had to start asking questions for more details, I asked what type of chai ? To which she responded in a condescending tone it’s ‘spiced’….hmmmm um yes I know that and that response is not very helpful…what I wanted to know is what is the ‘base’ of the chai tea eg) black, green, or other. Again I didn’t want to drink black tea today. She reluctantly handed me one packet of ‘chai’ to read myself. As I suspected it was a base of black tea, not always the case, glad I asked.

Needless to say I was an unhappy customer and treated as ‘high maintenance’. When I paid I told her I thought the service was not good. She was defensive and immediately accused me of being disagreeable maintaining her service was ‘aimable’…well I’d describe the service as passive aggressive and so far from ethos of this American chain.

Moral of the story: don’t ask to ‘see’ the tea selection yourself, doing so risks to annoy the server. Don’t comment on the lack of good service. Instead listen up real good for vague descriptions of what you are about to drink. Especially non French speakers, concentrate as she speaks fast, and be prepared to memorise the options available. Finally if you’ve got the courage you’ll need to ask multiple questions to find out what’s actually in the you tea are buying. Oh and don’t mind the queue of people behind you…

Not representative at all of the global Starbucks customer service standard. Shame. They...

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