The first time my mother took me into a Starbucks she was mad. How was she supposed to know which size to order if the sizes weren’t small, medium, large? Why weren’t the names at least somewhat indicative of what size the drink was?
My mom ordered a tall drink, only to find that the “tall” was the smallest size on the menu! Why? I guess we’ll never know. But really, that’s the Venti Footprint.
According to Reader’s Digest, the original CEO of Starbucks chose to use exotic size names to make people feel like they were drinking something more interesting than a regular coffee drink. Starbucks has never been one to follow norms, so their drink sizes are no surprise.
But, this past summer, controversy arose over the price and the size of Starbucks drinks. Everyone knows that the cost of a regular cup of coffee at Starbucks is relatively larger than most other coffee chain locations. The cost of iced drinks is no different. As summer rolled in, and iced drinks rose in their popularity once again, videos surfaced throughout social media questioning the value of iced drinks. Instagram uses shared that an iced venti, Starbucks’s largest cup size, had an equivalent amount of liquid as a grande without any ice. This sparked outroar. If Starbucks was already overpriced, why were we paying so much money for less than anticipated?
And that was the birth of the light ice movement. Rather than ordering a grande drink without ice, Starbucks drinkers decided to buy venti drinks with “light ice.”
All this means is ordering a drink that has less ice than normal. So, for the same price, they are getting less ice in their drinks and, theoretically, more of the liquid. Unfortunately, Starbucks baristas fill cups with the same amount of liquid each time, no matter how much ice someone gets in their drink. Unless you like a room temperature drink, it seems like this option doesn’t mean much for you.
A shining example of people’s frustration with the amount of liquid in each drink came when a Chicago woman filed a lawsuit again Starbucks, according to Spoon University. She claimed that the amount of coffee in her iced coffee drink was not the amount advertised. The author of the post on Spoon University put this woman’s claim to the test, and she found that Starbucks did advertise a greater amount of fluid ounces in their drinks than was actually there. This is disappointing, to say the least, because people are already paying a staggering amount for coffee, let alone paying for less than previously anticipated.
That is why Starbucks announced a “Trenta Cold” size for people who wanted a larger drink with a reasonable amount of ice according to Eater. Of course, the larger cup size comes at a higher price. But, if this blog shows you nothing else, it is that people will spend the money on Starbucks no matter the funky sizes and questionable amounts of liquids.