Starbucks Coffee — Restaurant in Sheffield

I have been going to this (and other) Starbucks coffee shops in Sheffield for 7 years. I had a few issues with the service in the past (wrong milk on occasion, which is not great when one has food intolerance), but the stuff was mostly friendly and I never wrote a review. My last visit was with my husband on the 8th of Sep 2022 at about 8.50 am at Starbucks Ecclesall Road. There were two young ladies working there, did not check their names. When I ordered drinks, I mention that I would like to have them in, which usually means that you will get a cup. When my drink was ready, I got it in a paper cup. As I am trying to avoid using paper cups whereever possible (to reduce waste and also the inside layer in the cup has some toxicity), I asked the lady that I would like to have my coffee in a cup. She then said that the dishwasher was broken. I said that nobody mentioned that to me earlier, she then said I was shouting at her and I was rude. I was not shouting at all. She also said that she remembers that I was rude with her colleague at Costa coffee shop and this was my general attitude! Wait a second! What? First of all, even if I was rude with someone in the past in a completely different place (which I cannot recall), it would be unprofessional to mention that while working for another company. This lady mentioned that she was working for Starbucks for 4 years. Would she really remember what I said more than 4 years ago in a different palce? The second, asking for a coffee in a nomal cup at the coffee shop is not rude, this is nomal. So here we have a PREJUDGED attitude and generalization that I am generally rude! Wow! Then the lady who made a coffee said that it was not her, who took my order. I approached her colleague, saying that I was not told that the dishwasher was broken and I could not have a cup, which she should have done. The answer was, that I should not tell her how to do her job! And I must have heard her talking to another client about the broken dishwasher. Wow! We should all be listening what other clients are told, so they do not need to repeat twice!? There was no appology and the second lady also copies the attitude from the first, saying I am rude.

My husband was completely shocked with this type of service. I asked for a refund, which I am expecting back on my card shortly. Before leaving I said that I would never come again to this Starbucks or any other of their coffee shops again. The ladies were very happy about that, smiling. Cannot recall what they said, but clearly very satisfied not to see me again.

I am sure I spent a lot of money at this place and in Starbucks in general. Well, lots of other...

The world's largest coffeehouse chain was founded in 1971. With it's head office in Seattle USA (bizarrely so is Microsoft), it has apparently 36,000 outlets in 84 countries. Income before costs is about £30 Billion a year... that's nearly £1M per coffeehouse each year.... or about £2,000 per day in each café!

Wow, so Starbucks is huge, but biggest isn't necessarily best and unfortunately this coffee house didn't exceed expectations. Historically someone named the chain 'Charbucks', as the coffee was apparently on the bitter side and last time we checked (elsewhere) it certainly was. This time we were pleasantly surprised, so the suits have been listening to the word on the street, which is good news.

Service was rather mechanical and not too smiley, but the black Americano coffee we tested was much better than expected, and really quite smooth and punchy. The place lacked atmosphere and given it was lunchtime, and not the end of the day, that was surprising. It also looked like it could do with a clean and sweep up, especially the one restroom we checked.

So we scored 3* overall, coffee 4, service 3 but as Google doesn't ask for a rating on cleanliness, we downgraded service to 2. Atmosphere came in with just 2.

In summary there is something of a service station feel to Starbucks and particularly this outlet. There is better competition on Ecclesall Road, if you want to meet friends and feel appreciated in a...

The service on the afternoon of 4th September 2018 was appalling. My son and I stood waiting, there was no que and the one member of staff working saw us and just carried on fiddling around behind the counter... she did not even acknowledge us. Finally after 7 or 8 minutes she came to the counter and didn’t speak... my son requested a medium size drink (there were 3 sizes on the price list) she did not speak or discuss sizing just took the note from my son and gave him the change... still no conversation! She had charged him for the largest size drink not the medium. As she started making the drink I politely said that my son wanted the middle size drink. She looked at me in disgust and said Grande is medium, I said you’ve charged us for the largest... she did not reply and I decided not to query this any further as she was very unapproachable... So we asked for the middle size drink, got charged for the largest and told this was medium.... when it arrived it was in a relatively small plastic cup (not the largest cup) Bless him, my son had chosen to go there as a treat...She spoiled it. We have been to loads of Starbucks in the US and UK and never had such...