Reuters
Starbucks has some work to do if it wants to recapture the trust of customers.
The coffee giant dropped to its lowest consumer-perception level since November 2015, according to a YouGov BrandIndex score released Wednesday. YouGov examined the daily consumer perception “buzz score” before and after two black men were forcibly removed from a Starbucks store in Philadelphia last week.
A video of the two men being handcuffed and removed by at least six police officers from a Philadelphia Starbucks went viral. They were reportedly waiting for a business associate. It sparked outrage on social media, with many people pointing out that Starbucks outlets are often full of people tapping away on their MacBooks with and without a Starbucks coffee next to them.
In November 2015, Starbucks received backlash on Facebook and Twitter when it replaced its annual “symbols of the season” Christmas cup design with a simple two-tone red cup. (In May 2015, a diversity-awareness campaign in which baristas were encouraged to write “race together” on every single coffee cup also backfired.)
YouGov asked, “If you’ve heard anything about the brand in the last two weeks, through advertising, news or word of mouth, was it positive or negative?” A score can range from -100 to 100 with a zero score equaling a neutral position. For example: A score of 35 means that 35% more people said they heard more positive than negative buzz about the brand.
Since last Friday, Starbucks’ “buzz score” fell from 13 to -8 on Tuesday, a drop of 21 points in four days. When the 2015 Christmas cup incident occurred, Starbucks fell from a “buzz score” of 11 to -9 in four days too, eventually hitting a bottom of -13 the next day. After a second video surfaced of an African-American man being denied bathroom access at a Starbucks in California, more movement in Starbucks’ consumer perception is likely.
• Purchase consideration: On Friday, 28% of consumers said they would consider making a purchase at Starbucks the next time they went to buy food or drink. On Tuesday, that fell to 25%.
• Reputation (”Would you be proud or embarrassed to work for this brand?”): Using the same -100 to 100 scale, Starbucks dropped from 14 on Friday to 4 on Tuesday.
YouGov measures public perception of brands, called “buzz scores,” from -100 to +100, then measures how the scores change. YouGov BrandIndex is a daily consumer perception research service of brands that interviews 4,800 people each weekday from a nationally representative sample. It conducts more than 1.5 million interviews per year.
Of the latest incident, Starbucks Executive Chairman Howard Schultz told “CBS This Morning” Wednesday : “I’m embarrassed, ashamed. I think what occurred was reprehensible at every single level. I think I take it very personally as everyone in our company does, and we’re committed to making it right.”
Starbucks said it will close 8,000 U.S. stores for the afternoon on May 29 for racial-bias training.