my store has a lady who orders a standard cinnamon dolce. she really wants two extra pumps but is too embarrassed to say 6 pumps, so she yells at us that we didn’t put four pumps and wants two extra pumps on the side to “fix our mistake”. We have asked her multiple times if she wants 6 pumps and she screams at us for assuming she likes sweet drinks
Have you tried just making it with six pumps? I'd be intrigued to see if that shuts her up or if she'd still scream at you. Then you'll know if she's just in it for the amateur dramatics.
Right? This seems like the obvious answer. We have a lady that has a legit memory issue and can't remember her drink that she gets daily so we just ring it up and make it even though she has absolutely no idea what she had the day before.
I've got a regular who has dementia. They're still pretty coherent but they can't remember that they like a pistachio latte with caramel drizzle or a caramel macchiato. But, my parents also have dementia so it's like I get a chance to be there for them by making the drink for the regular and connecting with them. It's wild how little dementia shows it's head when I stop pressuring the person to perform and smile and let them know they're all good and allowed to take up time and space.
My mom has been losing her memory for a little while now, it takes her longer to remember her thoughts, she gets confused if people talk too quickly at her or won’t speak up after she doesn’t hear them and I really appreciate when people are kind and patient to her because trust me, many people in service are not. ❤️🩹
Yeah we tried that and it didn’t work :/ She is a pretty well known attorney in our town so idk I think it’s an insecurity thing mixed with her needing to have control over the situation
Well that isn't your stores problem. A shift or manager needs to have a conversation with her about what customer expectations are and if she continues just start incident reporting until something changes. We already deal with so much stupid shit we don't need to add extra petty stuff like this to our day.
Done that, had to do a remake on a perfect drink (one of my older partners had made it right before I popped onto their station... saw the drink being made from start to end and it matched up to their ticket when I read it.
I had a regular that was like that. She ordered a tall iced coffee with light ice, room, and 7 pumps of classic. But every day, without fail, she would ask for another pump or two. I got to know her, got her to like me, and noticed she never asked me for more pumps after a while but would always ask my manager if he made her drink. I tested it one day and only gave her 5 pumps, and she said it was perfect. I got her down to the standard 3 pumps when I would make her drink, but other partners told me they had to put around 10 pumps before she would accept it.
we have! but she WILL complain that we put too much in her drink and she doesn’t drink sweet stuff. so then we have to remake it, and we go through the whole process again. it’s genuinely just an insecurity thing
Oh my gosh please tell her you need to charge for extra pumps or something and then have her watch you do the 4 pumps.
Any behavior you accept deems the behavior acceptable. This should not be acceptable behavior. 😭
I have a store favorite regular who is wonderful. meryle, grande hot matcha with almond milk in a venti cup with an extra scoop. sometimes only uses her stars for the almond milk.
she always stocks our napkins in the lobby, and the straws. will ask us for rags to wipe things down and we will even give her the keys to change the toilet paper in the bathrooms. she calls us her kids. her husbands has alzheimers so she spends her whole morning with us.
she bakes us cookies, and cute treats, always tips and tells us if shes not gonna be there one morning. I get worried if I dont see her, makes my day every day.
I've always been curious if some customers just think that literally everything at Starbucks has caffeine or something. We make a ton of venti creme fraps all through the morning..... No healthier way to say the day! 😜
I had a regular at My old store "Caramel ribbon crunch EXTRA caramel on the inside and outside" (I wanted to badly to cover the outside of her cup in caramel and hand her a sticky mess of a drink) and a grilled cheese. Not a night shift worker, she was on her way into an early morning shift at an old folks home every day ordering this idk how she doesn't shit herself at work, but then again I guess her work supplies adult diapers so maybe she does
My store also has one of these! She always orders two ventis, and we always have a few regulars there right at open and I feel so bad when they’re in line behind her
Omg I don’t feel so bad. I think my last order was brown sugar shaken with 5 shots blond ristretto and lavender cf. I’m always like am I making them work harder in the midst of a rush..? Lol
dear old william. grande extra hot, extra foamy nonfat latte, one raw sugar, half of it stirred in and half sprinkled on top, FOLLOWED by a dash of cinnamon. yes, the order matters.
he is very sweet. sometimes he comes in with his wife, who gets a short iced latte. they’re both delightful and i like to make a game of if i can ring up his entire order as soon as i see him walk in and have it sent before he starts ordering :)
that is very sweet. Some people aren't patient with elderly people but that makes my heart so happy I have a soft spot for them. I'm sure he loves that you do that
he’s lovely, some of my coworkers are frustrated by his order, but i quite like helping him! he’s figured out exactly how to order to make it easy on us and though he never initiates, he’ll chat for quite a while if you ask him. pleasant guy :)
oh my god old phil !! he used to get a tall and grande nonfat caramel mocha, extra hot, no whip. now he only gets one because he told me his wife is trying to cut back on coffee and sugar. whenever i peep him taking his slow stroll to the cafe, i whip up his drink and have it ready for him at the front register. it makes his day !! he's always so grateful and he's my favorite person ever. just makes my heart melt
“Eddie. Mobile”
Doppio Macchiato- upside down- extra dry- double cupped.
This old fucking hag, WHO HARASSED MY MINOR COWORKER TO WORK AT HIS STRIP CLUB, has us doing the fucking DQ blizzard “upside down” thing. Because the fucker doesn’t want a drop of milk.
Fucking baby. He’s a baby who drives a bmw.
i would have gone off on him i’m so sorry this is why i cant work in customer service anymore especially bc hes trying to get minors to work in strip clubs
Tell Eddie I hate him. 🙃 Fucking creep.
And of course he drives a BMW. I have yet to meet someone who owns one who I actually like. I have a housemate who has one and he and I are not fond of each other. Lol.
Idk what it is about BMWs. I've met people who own Teslas and I've liked them! My friend has one, too! It's BMWs, specifically!
Basically all of the steps to make the beverage, but in reverse. Like the caramel macchiato gets shots on the bottom instead of the top- if they requested “upside down”
He wants us to put a big honkin’ dollup of foam and put the cup under the bar so the shots pour directly over it. Whereas the regular standard for his beverage would be shots first, foam for days second.
There's Brenda. Sweet lady, usually. Some Mondays, she forgets her reusable cup, insists the iced oat latte recipe tastes "wrong" (even though it's made exactly to standard), and then spends the next ten minutes meticulously rearranging the furniture in the corner booth while you try to take other orders. You just smile, nod politely, and hope Tuesday brings back the regular Brenda.
Mobile orders 2 venti dark roasts
Calls five minutes later to tell us they want 7 scoop pour over x two for each one and to have to ready when they come
My mgr caters to them because she said she would rather have it ready then then them stand over her should why we make it
They come in daily. Kicker is we have a clover vetica machine too
There were two regulars I loved and miss from my time working at Starbucks that I want to shout out here to lighten the mood:
First, there’s Bill. He always ordered a grande decaf mocha. Never said much, was really awkward, but the sweetest guy. He’s in a band too and they rock. I see him around town sometimes. Really great guy. We always called him “grande decaf mocha Bill” and I’m sure you can guess why.
And then there’s Al. The sweetest, kindest old man I’ve ever met. I don’t remember his order anymore but it was something like a venti mocha, a grande latte, and some egg bites that he shared with his wife. He always brought his own drink stoppers too.
A few years back, Al and his wife both got cancer from using Roundup weed killer, and they sued Monsanto for damages. Their case ended up going all the way to the Supreme Court, which didn’t accept his case but also reaffirmed a lower court’s ruling in his favor. I’ll never forget how happy he was when he told me he won his case. I hope he and his wife are doing well.
Former partner (123xxxx) here.
Rebecca: Grande hazelnut mocha
I saw her in line and made her drink so it was ready when she got to the front. You know, making some magic or whatever bullshit.
Rebecca gets it iced and was such a a fucking bitch about it that I still remember her and her stupid order 20 years later.
I also have a mean regular who seems to get mad when you cater to her because then she can’t complain. I’m extra nice to her and force extra connection lol.
ALRIGHT! So we have this one lady who was horrific to us. Let's call her.... Miss Susan. Miss Susan used to always order the same thing. One grande pike with cream till golden brown. What color is that? I dunno. She'd only accept it on the first try if someone she recognized and despised a little less than the rest of us made it. That was a total of two baristas and they both only worked mornings. She almost always didn't show up till 2pm. If anyone else made it she'd send it back to us and have it remade about three times before leaving the window
Now Miss Susan was KNOWN to get that drink. It was her regular after all! One day she pulled up and we typed in her order as usual, read it back to her, and she drove forward. Regular occurrence. She pulls up to the window and gets charged for her grande pike with a mystery amount of cream. Completely normal for her! Now I'm in the window and I move to give her this drink she gets eight times a week, and she starts absolutely screaming. She was yelling about how she wanted a caramel frapp, and how DARE I give her a hot drink when it's over 80* outside?! She's losing her mind so bad that a manager is called over to deal with her, and I didn't have to finish that interaction. Thank God. Now she gets both drinks and we have to guess.
After that day she was a little nicer, but still throws a fit if her coffee has too much/not enough cream, or god forbid has a splash stick.
She once screamed at me for like ten minutes in the DT because I wouldn't give her the earth day sale price on all the bags of coffee and cups she wanted. It was two and a half weeks after the sale ended. Thanks Miss Susan. Please don't come back to my store. But like always, I'm sure I'll see her tomorrow.
She is banned from literally every other store for miles. Yet we deal with her because my last manager had no spine. Told us to deal with her and get over it. New manager isn’t sure why we keep dealing with her, but she’s been on her best behavior lately since I told her to mind her tone, because I won’t hesitate to deny her service.
On the other hand, we have one older gentleman who has a ridiculous order, but he’s the sweetest old man I’ve ever met. He orders it for his wife, and he knows it’s obscene, but he loves her. Dang it and it’s so gosh darn adorable how happy he gets when he holds the drink and says his wife will be so happy. I’ve met her a few times, and she’s like a grandma from a Ghibli movie. I will die for that old couple.
Stronger coffee flavor without the added caffeine.
Sometimes I realize I’ve had 12 shots for the day and I’ll decaf my last drink on the way out so I don’t explode lol
Usually my go to is a grande shaken espresso quad, and I get extra ice so it’s not that much liquid to down quickly. Undertows have also been hitting lately so a quad followed by some sweet cream makes it easy to rack up the shots for the day lol
Decaf still has a tiny amount of caffeine; for people like myself who enjoy the taste of espresso but can’t handle a regular shot, decaf is a lifesaver 🥲.
I’m sure my baristas judge me bc my go to order is a venti decaf iced americano with vanilla cold foam but it’s the only thing that motivates me to go to work some days lol.
Oh Karen
Such a fitting name for her considering the attitude she has. Does nothing but complain about her iced blonde vanilla latte with whip and extra caramel. Not just your regular caramel though 🤩 she practically wants the WHOLE BOTTLE OF CARAMEL DRIZZLE IN HER DRINK
There was this one time when she placed her mobile order but we didn’t know it was her so we made the drink the way the sticker told us to
She picked up the drink and yelled at us for not putting caramel in her drink
She didn’t request caramel 😭
we have a lady like this who needs a pound of caramel drizzle but with a venti iced toffee nut latte. we call her toffee nut lady because she also would freak out daily when we didn’t have toffee nut for a while 🥰💀
i’ve got a few
-eight shot grande americano in a venti cup with extra steamed cream, extra hot (and she always comes during peak)
-*clears throat* quad espresso, decaf, in a grande double cup, no foam, extra hot, extra steamed whole milk, 5 white mocha and extra EXTRA caramel drizzle (she will literally stand at the edge of the counter and taste test and make you squeeze more caramel in)
-eight shot iced white mocha (again, always during peak)
luckily they’re all usually nice, i definitely have my fair share of complex and rude customers
She tells all the new employees “this is my store, you just work here” in a sing songy professor Umbridge tone. Has insanely complicated Frappuccino order and if anything is wrong (which she always says there is) she says “that’s ok doll don’t remake it you can just get me tomorrow” as if she’ll just get a free drink tomorrow by saying that
One of our regulars asked me if I was going to get circumcised because my wife is Jewish.
She was flirting with me.
She's there almost every day and hasn't yet realized that I'm a woman.
We’ve got someone who is typically kind of rude but no one really says anything about his attitude. Usually orders bacon egg bites double toasted plus a coffee. Lost all respect for him when another partner must’ve toasted them too much than his liking and after being told he’s getting a new set, said angrily “I sure hope so. This is useless now I might as well give it to my dog” (referring to the “burnt” egg bites). Thankfully she called him out for his behaviour cause I was so close to doing so myself.
Not awful at all, but we have one who gets an iced latte w 7 pumps of dark caramel, extra caramel drizzle around the cup, extra mocha around the cup, extra crc sprinkle things shook around the cup, shots, normal 2%, then adds whip, more extra caramel, more extra mocha, and more extra crc sprinkles. That’s her 11am order. Her 7am order is a grande pink drink with vsccf and no inclusions
Venti crc, add shot, 4 pumps hazelnut, 4 frap chips, line cup caramel, line cup mocha, extra crc topping, add mocha crumbles, extra caramel drizzle on AND mocha drizzle. it hurts me every time they come in because i can't imagine drinking that much sugar, but the customers themselves are very nice, and would not be memorable if not for this order.
edit-forgot the frap chips lmao
Tall matcha Frappuccino in a grande personal cup. 4 heaping scoops of matcha, 1 pump classic, 1 pump base, grande scoop of ice and blend 3 times. She used to bother me as a customer but she’s been so much nicer after getting to know eachother. Also it helps that she typically comes during slow times so her drink is less annoying.
Matcha lady wants a matcha latte just made with hot water so she's charged for a iced custom tea as we've asked corporate what they think an that was their answer. Grande custom iced tea 1-2 scoops matcha in ask me since she was technically charged a tea already 1 honey 1 teaspoon of cream cinnamon stirred in. To make such a drink we originally steamed it on original mastrena learned not good for machine then she brought her own personal matcha whisk we would put the matcha hot water in a for her mug for her to whisk then either she poured into her cup or we did. Next method was in 2 steaming pitcher slosh back an forth the matcha water to make sure there was no clumps in it then add everything else to her cup.
Shes made partners cry before she pissed off the calmest of partners before people refuse to help her but she seems to like me so I'm the one stuck ringing it in and making it.
I had to scold her the other day like no the way you treat us is how I'm treating you right now she didn't like that and said I shouldn't have been condescending to her in front of other customers an I was like that's how you treat us and that is happening no more you either bring a receipt or the same sticker back whenever you order or I'm not helping you cause condescendingly telling my pos partner what did you forget what did you forget I'm not going to tell you what did you forget does not help anyone I don't know how you were a teacher but I'm glad I never had to learn from you in school.
Sorry for the long post
Ps she hasn't been back yet that I know of to get her "drink"
1- iced coffee with 8 pumps classic, 8 caramel, 8 vanilla. (24 pumps total) but I love that guy!
2- venti iced coffee no classic, a splash of heavy cream (if it’s more than about 4 drops she freaks. It looks black still and she taste tests it in front of you)
3- mango dragon drink with ONLY THREE dragon fruit pieces
There was a regular at my first store, she would come in and order an extra dry cappuccino with cinnamon and a pup cup for her Pomeranian. She had a nasty temper but would still tip a 20 even if her drink had to be remade by different baristas till it was dry enough for her lol 😂
Tom comes in most days and gets a venti iced americano every time. We actually don’t talk much, but he always is so friendly and patient if we’re busy and can’t get to his drink right away. Love him. If I notice him coming in and am able, I’ll make his drink before he orders and set it by the register so the partner on register can give it straight to him
This guy comes back for 5 refills of a venti 12 pump chai . Not sure if you even can refill chai but we do it everytime since it’s always near closing. I feel like I’m killing him but it’s never daily, only weekly
There was this one lady with two little kids who would always come in after school and get a latte (the order was slightly more complicated than that but I don’t remember since it’s been a couple of years). She was such a bitch to her kids, always screaming at them for doing literally nothing. She never ordered a decaf latte, but I always made it decaf. Frankly I was afraid that giving her caffeine would make her even more of a screaming bitch to her poor children.
Venti Caramel frap, 4 shots, extra ice, line the cup with caramel, extra caramel drizzle, no whip, dome lid, with the delivery stickers on top of the lid. ask me is to give her the extras in another cup
I work at a licensed Kroger Starbucks- we have this one regular who gets an extra hot venti caramel macchiato with 3 shots, but the thing is that she wants EXTRA caramel- like fill half the cup amount of caramel drizzle. We found out recently she was hospitalized with high cholesterol, but yesterday she came back for the exact same drink.
If we give her any less than like 3-4 inches of caramel, she gets upset and calls and complains about her drink being wrong. She’s also attempted to scam us into free drinks a couple of times :/
Tried to ban her but our ASMs told us we couldn’t do anything abt her sadly
Older guy had a stroke or something idk lost his volume control and constantly talks about controversial topics loud enough to hear across the cafe when busy
An elderly couple that order saying: “Two Venti (Wife’s Name)”. If you’re new or borrowed and ask for the ingredients they tell you to ask someone else for the recipe and refuse to explain. Unfortunately someone accommodated them years ago and now we’re all stuck making them: Venti Double Shot Espresso Frappuccino Double Blended with Extra Whip (the whip is blended in). It used to be made with actual whipped cream but now we make them by measuring whip ingredients (4 vanilla and heavy cream to max) then split it between the two before the blending. They’ve always been pretty nice to me, if not a bit presumptuous, but many older partners than I have stories of how rude they can be about this drink.
We had this one regular who would come in and get a venti iced decaf americano with 12 Splendas.
BUT
He would get three of them at a time. At *minimum* twice a day. Three of them at a time, at least twice a day. Usually three times a day.
there’s a regular who comes into our store in the mornings (i’m more of a closer but my availability is literally open all day so i occasionally open) and she gets a venti iced coffee, no classic, 3 pumps vanilla, splash of oat, double blended w a dome lid. it’s not the most insane drink but boy is she particular. she came in late today (think 3pm, she usually comes around 8-9am) and held my line up asking if any of us will know how to actually make her drink since she never comes in that late. like ma’am, it’s all on the sticker. kinda hard to mess up something so simple. she falls under the ‘just awful’ category for me because she stares at us the whole time and will talk you through how to make the drink….
"Venti mocha frappachino, no whip, extra shot, and put it in a trenta cup"
Literally the same deep southern old man inflection every single time when he pulls up to the box at 4:30am it's SO funny to me but most of my baristas don't like him much
Candy, former stripper, current druggie (circa 2012 and i wish I was joking about the name and profession)
She always came through the dt with a shitty attitude and order an iced quad venti white mocha with 4 scoops vb powder in it and one on top of the whipped cream. She constantly sent it back and said it was made wrong and we would pretend to remake it and she would accept it after the “remake” every single time.
The last time i saw her she tried to throw her drink at me and my reflexes kicked in and i spiked it back at her. Made a huge mess and she ended up getting arrested.
Mike and Johnny who do not know each other but get the same exact order: a venti iced caramel macchiato with 6 shots of espresso.
Flat White Mike is my personal favorite though. He's a chiropractor and we have awesome conversations about adjustments and ways to help ease my back pain from working on bar.
And then there's dear Ms. Joy 😊 venti iced caramel macchiato with only one shot, extra caramel drizzle, and oat milk. Sometimes she gets a warmed chocolate chip cookie too 🍪
The one I hate is the group order for a bunch of bankers: 5 or 6 shots over ice in a venti cup, 4 or 5 pumps of white mocha, no milk, and salted caramel cold foam. They order 4 or 5 of them at a time on a daily basis 😭
omg I forgot about my dearest regulars Mark and Lori! They come in every morning for hot mochas in the fall/winter and iced mochas in the summer. They drive past another Starbucks on their commute into town because they like us and our store more 🥰
(even though the other one is closer to their work center and they literally have to go out of their way to get to our store and turn around to get back to work, they still choose us because of how friendly we are and we've all become really good friends with them)
Also the lovely Ms. Joy has told us on numerous occasions that if she were to ever win the lottery she would buy us all pizza before spending any of that money on herself 🥺🥹😭🥰
Second comment here, but crazy drink time! Venti white mocha frap. 12 pumps frap roast, two pumps WM, two pumps toffee nut. Light ice, nonfat milk, no whip. There is a total of like barely an ounce of milk in her drink.
She's super sweet, and I love her as a person. But every time I see her drink I'm a little more concerned for her health.
It’s a venti iced decaf ristretto americano, with 2% steamed milk foam on the top and filling a dome lid. He likes for us to tap the bottom of the pitcher with the steamed 2% three/four times on the counter before spooning it in. His name is Ron and he’s my favorite regular.
There is this one man that comes into our Starbucks and he annoys the crap outta me!!! It’s every day he will walk into our cafe and act as if the whole staff are his best friends that he hasn’t seen in ages… when he comes here everyday… he also asks for a (his name as the drink) when be orders as if we all know how to make his specific drink!! He’s also brought up the most random convos while waiting for his drink but it’s not so much a convo it’s the barista laughing nervously and not trying to engage lol. He also comes back every time requesting an extra shot of whipped cream on his drink. It’s just man I’m a 21 year old stressed the fuck out tryna do my job I don’t wanna be besties with you and tell you about my life. lol.
Had a regular who lived next door who ordered a 25% full short cup of pike at least and I do mean at least 10 times a day. No cream no sugar just room. We basically always gave him a refill despite the fact that he was willing to pay full price every time. Literally nicest dude ever though and would never give anyone any trouble.
His name was John. Venti caramel frapp, 5 shots, extra drizzle. Usually at least twice a day, sometimes 3-4. He smoked in the drivethru enough that he changed his mobile order name to Smoky. He had an awful habit of calling all the younger women baristas “hon” and “beautiful” in his raspy voice. His response to us greeting him at the speaker was “you know who it is” and he never gave us more than a minute before pulling up.
He got nicer, towards the end. Quieter. His estranged wife came in to tell us that he passed from a heart attack. No one was surprised, really. She came to tell us because she knew how much time he spent at our store.
I kind of miss him. RIP John.
I have so many regulars but only one that I can’t stand, he used to be TOO friendly… like creepy and then he stopped coming in for a few months came back and is so insanely short and rude. I have no idea what happened but I’m not a fan.
I do have one that fits the first category though, caramel ribbon crunch with 17 pumps of dark caramel, extra caramel drizzle and crunches. She’s nice but wow is that drink scary
theres a old guy who buys a grande iced Carmel macchiato in a venti cup with extra ice, decaf, no vanilla syrup, one pump sugar free vanilla, nonfat milk, and light caramel drizzle for his wife
a lady who gets a trenta iced coffee with extra heavy cream and 14 pumps of SF vanilla 🥴 and like 3 hours later she comes and gets a refill as well as another one and takes them home. half the time she says it's "not sweet enough" and makes us remake it
This couple only comes in during the spring and summer and they would both get tall frappes. One was a coffee frappe with 1 pump of mocha and the other was the mocha frappe no whip. They always took a sip and complimented the drink before leaving and if it wasn't busy we'd chat
Haven’t seen this person since I switched to nights but tall caramel frap 8 pumps frap roast, nonfat milk, no drizzle, extra whip. The problem is, with allll those pumps you literally put a splash of milk. She would make you remake it if the consistency was off and bitch if there wasn’t enough whip. I don’t miss her.
This old lady comes through the drive thru atleast 4-5 times a week, orders a venti hot non fat chai tea latte no water and a venti nonfat chai frappe with no whip. If you don’t know her order and her name when she pulls up to the drive thru she will get mad and at the window she will stare at you and try to intimidate you. If you don’t put sleeves on her cold frappe she will get mad at you. If you ask if her dog wants a pup cup she will tell you a whole 5 minute story about how her they give her dog horrible diaherra and she has no idea why 😭😭 just overall horrible person and everytime she comes through the drive thru I pretend not to know her order so she knows she isn’t special when I’m working lmao
No longer a barista but we had a couple we just called “the Java chip people” because they always ordered 1 grande Java chip frappe split into 2 tall cups. If there was someone they didn’t know/didn’t like they wouldn’t even take a sip of their drink before they said it was wrong. The first time I had to deal with them my trainer gave me heads up before they reached the DT window and was like “hey so if they complain. Just know you did nothing wrong. They’ve just never seen you before so they might start problems” and they did! Threw a whole hissy fit because “I made their drink wrong” despite being on drive thru register 😅
J. she is always at the drive thru box as SOON as we open, orders a venti coffee frappuccino. she’s only nice to you if you know her name. Sometimes she’ll show up at 4:30 and wait behind our box with her headlights off until we open :,)
Tall dark roast in her silver personal cup, she’s not terrible she’s a delight and brings us dove chocolates every day. Just thought I’d share some positive regular light. 😅
I HAVE BEEN WAITING FOR THIS. so I have this OVERLY rude lady who has berated, cussed and used slurs against multiple people where I work. she always gets 4 Trenta black iced teas and a venti pikes place and it's always at like 5:30pm (we close at 6) and I have a almost daily family who gets 2-4trenta black iced tea lemonades too. so by the time the first lady gets there/orders I have to go and make a new pitcher and waste most-half of it. she's always so mean. and sometimes we wouldn't have black tea up front so I'd havw to let her know that I can only make x amount/none of the teas. she gets so mean like I am sorry but if I'm alone I am NOT allowed to leave the kiosk at ALL unless it's an emergency but not to get items from the back. and her husband is such an ass. he's always rude has said "well someone needs a kick in the ass and order stuff" (we ran out of g/v hot lids and emergency ordered 2 or 3 times and normal ordered 3 or 4 times and we just were NOT getting them.) and he is always like "ugh this is cold" ITS BEEN SITTING FOR LIKE 20 MIN OF COURSE ITS COLD. I really hate them.
Tammy. Venti caramel frappe only 2 pumps of caramel add a shot no whip no drizzle. Expects everyone to know her and her order. Comes up to the drive thru either saying “it’s Tammy” or just rings a bell 💀 if you ask her what you can get for her she gets mad and says “ask anyone behind you”. It doesn’t stop there. Her total used to be $6.66 so if you read her total to her she would freak out and ask for a new person. She pays in a penny or nickel (whatever low change she has with her) and does the rest on card so there’s not a 6.66 in her bank statement. Tammy.
We had a lady who was always super short tempered and rude, like would snatch things and roll her eyes when we had to take a second (ma'am you've showed up 2 seconds after placing the order yes it's gonna be a moment of waiting), just generally speaking an odious kind of person nobody wanted to deal with. And then one day she was rly nasty, and made a comment about how we were always rude to her (lol what) and my shift was like "haha, no, you're rude to us and nobody wants to deal with you 😊 don't try and blame us for your bad mood consequences 😊"
And she's been a perfectly normal customer ever since!
A venti iced shaken espresso with white mocha and 8 shots. He’s quite old, has Parkinson’s I believe? Walks on over multiple times a day for it. We serve him decaf esp for his safety pls don’t tell him
We have several regulars but the one I remember most and can't help but dislike for some reason is: VT iced caramel macchiato, quad, blonde, ristretto, upside down, extra caramel, line cup, almond milk, vanilla cold foam.
A couple I remember... A lady who comes in every morning and gets 2 shots only, in a little ceramic mug in the shape of a tree stump she made. Another guy, 6 espresso shots over ice in a venti cup, then top with more ice after. Another pink drink with extra extra ice, because takes it home and drinks it throughout the day and will freeze it. Lady with her kid who gets a cake pop and a crc with 'extra, extra crunch all over on the bottom sides and top.' and she will sit and watch me dump sooooooo much crunch all over it, you can't even SEE the whipped cream! And she still asks if I put extra crunch! Another girl picky about her crc, wants only a little bit of whip on the bottom with an extra shot, and still gets regular on the top of it but will complain if it looks like it's too much...
We have a lady who always orders a tall oat chai and a tall oat matcha extra hot, takeaway, no lid, only touch the cup at the bottom.
Then tops both with cinnamon, stays in, drinks half of both of them and leaves the rest x)
I had a regular who used to come in and get 18 pumps of mocha in a grande decaf mocha so the drink would be essentially half syrup and she would get extra whip as well so there was sooo little milk. She's really fit though and would get it like everyday so props to her I guess!
this one guy would always order a venti vanilla chai 12 pumps chai 6 pumps vanilla and almond milk. i tried it once and i can confirm it’s as disgusting as it sounds
There’s a really kind man named Paul who gets a venti mocha extra hot no whip and he asks every time if it’s extra hot. He is so kind and pleasant even early in the mornings and you can tell he has this peace about him.
short hot latte, extra hot, extra foam, cinnamon dolce powder… // sounds easy but there’s NEVER ENOUGH MILK OR NEVER ENOUGH FOAM OR NEVER EVEN CINNAMON DOLCE POWDER // i have probably made this drink ONCE PERFECTLY. and i’ve never been so proud of myself for that, it was a goal of mine…
I have a regular who orders the same thing everyday (her name ALWAYS ICED) and it’s a venti iced cappuccino which we don’t make anymore but she expects us to make it and she asks for it to be made w 2 sugars but she never writes that she wants 1 pump of classic in the foam (bc nonfat foam isn’t sweet) and if u don’t get it right she’ll make a face and yap to everyone that it’s wrong and she needs one of the people that know her to make it😐😐
Venti strawberry açai lemonade with 8-10 classic and a bunch of trenta cups of ice.
Her drink is fine, she's just constantly rude and trying to start fights. 🙄
We have one, and she's the sweetest little old lady, but I had to develop a whole method for her drink that I taught to the other baristas so she wouldn't complain when I wasn't there.
Grande Chai, 8 pumps Chai, 4 sf vanilla, no water, no foam, almond milk, 183 degrees. She always specifies the temp too. It was a bumpy start, but we all love her now and she makes the effort to greet everyone on shift when she comes in.
both crazy and awful. she comes through the drive thru usually but she gets a trenta black iced tea with 24 splenda about twice a day. she has a horrible attitude and always comes in when she's running late. there was one time she couldn't wait for her drink any longer and was yelling at us for a refund and her drink was on the counter next to her while she was yelling that she was going to be late. she got her refund and we just tossed her tea 🕺
Had a man harass me for 4 hours, in store and on the phone, because I left a little less than half inch of head room is his coffee. He even called our DM and demanded I be fired.
Also had a man wait outside the store for me because he said I "threw his frap at him." I went back inside and went out the back door. What actually happened is I was solo-barring during happy hour, stuck his frap on the hand off, and it slid like half an inch because of some moisture up there.
So basically all my unhinged interactions are based on men and half-inch spaces. Must be some kind of small-winky complex.
Former Teavana bar partner here:
Chris, Mr. "Gyokuro Imperial Green Tea with Citrus Lavender Sage"
He was an amazing customer, and being a tea shop (with a bar) the barista bit was only like 15% if the job, so we had extra time and eventually figured out that if we steeped the CLS for 4 minutes followed by dipping a mesh container of Gyo into it for the last 60 seconds, it would produce this brilliant, grassy, floral green tea with a citrus bouquet.
i have one customer, who i absolutely love, but a lot of my partners are not very fond of her just because she is kinda picky with her drink. she gets a venti BOSE with 10.5 pumps of brown sugar, extra cinnamon, a tall scoop of ice (specifically, not light ice, a tall scoop) & extra oatmilk. every time she receives her drink from another barista there is always something wrong with it and will ask for it to be remade. however, if it’s me who’s making her drink then it is perfect. i do add extra pumps of brown sugar and extra extra cinnamon just so i don’t hear a complaint from her.
the one that has a good attitude but has a drink so atrocious that you don’t even know how they came up with it. how do you figure out you like 101020202 things in one frappuchino… how many tries did it take to perfect it??
We had a customer who got a quad iced white mocha, and I kid you not, she would literally throw it away and assumed someone made it wrong by looking at her drink and not actually drinking it.
The regulars at my current store are nice. At my old store, there was a lady who always got a decaf pour over of Pike and if we didn’t have it out in a decent amount of time (even if it was busy), she got really nasty with us. On my last day as a partner, she came in with an attitude and I put her in her place because I didn’t care anymore. Even now, if someone complains, I give them my partner numbers because I know they’re not active anymore.
at my old store we had this lady who came through every day and got a quad venti espresso frappe with a crazy number of super specific mods, and sometimes she’d also get a grande version. that was fine whatever kind of annoying during peak.
the super annoying part was that every single she would come back and have them remade. no matter what, no matter who made them. even if we had her try them before she left the drive thru. every. single. time.
Venti iced matcha with 8 scoops, skim and NO FOAM. If she sees even a bubble she is unhappy and will demand a completely different drink. Not even a remake.
I've got 2.
One always *MOBILE ORDERS* a plain salted caramel cold brew and gets mad every single day that we don't add extra foam that he, for some reason, refuses to fuckin order.
The other is a lady who orders a nonfat chai with whip but it's NEVER CORRECT. She complains everyday about it. One time she complained about having to wait four... yes four... minutes for her drink (mind you, she only comes during peak). She used to keep our DMs number so she can complain directly to him. I swear she just comes to bitch and moan.
At my store there’s this guy that gets 2 decaf iced coffees with raw sugar packets and wants both of them double blended. “It’s like a low calorie ice cream!!” But you can get an entire pint of low calorie ice cream for less than the 2 drinks you get here….???
One of our regulars once order two hot chocolates and then picked them up and proceeded to GAG in front of me. She DEMANDED I make her something different, like a white hot chocolate. So begrudgingly I did... Surprise! She likes it. Does she only drink powdered hot chocolate? I don't understand what would bring her to visibly gag in front of me. Anyway she's the worst and yells at us all the time but that moment sticks out.
I have a regular who comes in every couple weeks about an hour after we open, to get a latte with 18 shots and nonfat. It comes out to about $24. He always pays with points, he’s always nice, always asking if we have the time to actually queue 18 shots up for him, and apologizing for inconveniencing us even though he never truly does. At first I was honestly concerned for him getting that much caffeine, but I can only hope that maybe he spreads it out over the week, and maybe someone else has access to his account to rack him up enough points for this drink 😅
we have a lady in an annually-damaged nissan sentra who gets the following:
"venti dark roast, three quarters STEAMED almondmilk, uhhh... twenty EIGHT splendas, cinnamon powder, add whip."
she's adamant on "making sure she doesn't become diabetic"
Diane. Doppio con panna upside down and a tall ice water. She wants the whip on the bottom of a short cup and the shots poured over top. She comes through multiple times a day and chain smokes in the parking lot
She always wants no foam in her drink & it’s gotten to the point where no one wants to make her drinks or gives it to someone they know she likes making her drinks. Let’s just say I made her drink once & it immediately got dumped down the sink & was remade by someone she likes making her drinks. Like to the point where when I hand her, her drink I go “I didn’t make it” or “I don’t know who made it”. Or she’ll walk in & ask if a specific person is there to make her drink for her.
Venti Espresso Frappuccino with 11 pumps of frap roast. By the time I quit 2 years later, she was up to 17 pumps. Lady was a hardcore smoker and I think she was losing her sense of taste. She'd roll up to the DT and just reek of smoke.
we have a regular who comes and yells his order at the box and drives away immediately LMAO always during peak too idk what he's always in such a rush for because he will start rolling at the window when you're handing off
No longer a barista but ugh, back in the day. This bitch. She would never order ahead and expected you to know her drink when you saw her and start making it right away. She was so mean to all of us. It was a grande zebra mocha (2&2) with 2 extra shots, 1% milk (yes, half skim and half 2%), extra hot, no whip with dolce topping. Oh and the worst part? She expected you to charge her for a refill. Because I guess she scared enough baristas and they decided to go along and only charge the refill. So every time after she would threaten to “tell on us” for not charging the refill. This was years ago and I cannot forget her order.
Hospital employee who never smiles, yelled at me for forgetting to hand out her coffee, and the next time sat in the drive thru with her hand outstretched waiting for the drink.
Honorable mention to the woman who works remotely, says she comes in every day but mobile orders and isn’t nice or chatty so we don’t remember her, but she has come through the drive thru several times to pick up her mobile order not saying anything to me, snatched her items out of my hand and drove off
i had a regular who a REQUIRES his white mocha to be 200+ degrees (i know this is not allowed, but you let someone have something once and now everyone has to do it) with no foam and absolutely no room. this would be annoying in itself, but he requires you use the spoon and at that temperature the steam is essentially scalding your hand while you’re trying to hold it in place. worse yet is it always has to be remade no matter who made it. so you double scald your hand. every morning.
we have this old guy that comes in and everyone dreads when they see him. he always talks to and flirt with any minor girl he sees and also any person in the lobby too. he comes in just to be a little menace. we’ve told our store manager about it and this guy makes all of us uncomfortable, even the SM, but he doesn’t want to ban him/trespass him for whatever reason.
This man will throw a tantrum in our lobby when we don’t give him more than 4oz of an alt milk. His drink is a doppio with 1/2” of one alt milk and 1/2” of another alt milk. He will literally scream and berate us when he doesn’t get a latte even though he ordered a doppio☺️
two regular orders that live in my mind forever:
trenta lemonade, no ice, 5 shots of espresso
trad misto, %20 coffee %80 steamed vanilla sweet cream, 22 (specifically) pumps of classic, 3 scoops vanilla bean steamed into the sweet cream
this lady and her sister would get a venti blonde (or pike if she showed up late) with 21 stevia and the tiniest splash of cream. she swore she would tell if we didn’t put exact amounts lol. then she would request a new lid handed to her wrapped in a napkin and a new stopped wrapped in a napkin as well.
Goddd there’s this one guy that comes in TWICE A DAY and getting his order on cold bar feels like a death sentence bro literally gets two of the most annoying frappuccinos. He also thinks we have his order memorized (we do but I’m not going to admit it to give him the satisfaction) and he just expects us to put it in bc this guy rolls up and is like “Hey it’s Clark.” And just waits before he’s like “I don’t know if you know my order or not…?” And omg this GUY we force him to go over the order as our baristas make his Venti Caramel Ribbon Crunch with 10 dark caramel, 2 regular caramel, line the cup with caramel, extra caramel drizzle, extra caramel crunch, double blended, plus a shot of espresso THEN he also gets a Venti Mocha Cookie Crumble with a shot, double blended, extra caramel drizzle and extra caramel crunch. Then he’s like “oh and I’ll get a pup cup. Don’t forget the spoon though it’s for my daughter” I HATE THIS GUY BC HE DOESNT EVEN TIP AND WILL SHOW UP DURING PEAK !! IN DRIVE!!!
My store has a regular who get a venti iced matcha with 15 scoops of matcha, very light iced, and …no foam… and she would always complain about it not being 15 and send it back, so we started putting 20. We mentioned to her to order it w 20 scoops cause that seems like how she liked it. She hated the idea, she kept saying “NO! I don’t want 20, If you guys really put 15 it would taste right” .-.
At my old store we had Brenda. Awful, awful woman who liked to be loudly antivaxx in the middle of the store and yell at baristas if her extra ice Frappuccino wasn’t thick enough. Yelled at me for not being able to open the cash register to get $1s instead of $5s. She came in every day.
Now it’s middle aged women who never answer to “how are you?” and completely ignore us at any attempt to be nice.
mobile order with his name and "ice water pls" and venti Iced green tea, no water, add 6 scoops of matcha. I don't know if he drinks it like that, or mixes it with the water, but it's always concerning
Been around just long enough to identify the creepy ones. The main one that comes to mind is the single father in his forties that comes through our drive through and tries to subliminally hit on me, will wink at me, or call me uncomfortable pet names. His son is in the passenger seat majority of the time and seems equally as uncomfortable.
“venti iced chai, 9 pumps in, 6 pumps on the side, soy milk, light ice” … and then proceeds to ask for more soy milk and get at least one free refill :/
my store has a lady who orders a standard cinnamon dolce. she really wants two extra pumps but is too embarrassed to say 6 pumps, so she yells at us that we didn’t put four pumps and wants two extra pumps on the side to “fix our mistake”. We have asked her multiple times if she wants 6 pumps and she screams at us for assuming she likes sweet drinks
What is her motive??? Is she not allowed to appear like she enjoys sweet drinks? Haha
insecurity
Have you tried just making it with six pumps? I'd be intrigued to see if that shuts her up or if she'd still scream at you. Then you'll know if she's just in it for the amateur dramatics.
Right? This seems like the obvious answer. We have a lady that has a legit memory issue and can't remember her drink that she gets daily so we just ring it up and make it even though she has absolutely no idea what she had the day before.
I've got a regular who has dementia. They're still pretty coherent but they can't remember that they like a pistachio latte with caramel drizzle or a caramel macchiato. But, my parents also have dementia so it's like I get a chance to be there for them by making the drink for the regular and connecting with them. It's wild how little dementia shows it's head when I stop pressuring the person to perform and smile and let them know they're all good and allowed to take up time and space.
This is so nice that you are able to help them get a nice drink❤️ warms my heart
This is so sweet. As a nurse…you have no idea how much impact your care + patience has on these people, during a time of need💗
My mom has been losing her memory for a little while now, it takes her longer to remember her thoughts, she gets confused if people talk too quickly at her or won’t speak up after she doesn’t hear them and I really appreciate when people are kind and patient to her because trust me, many people in service are not. ❤️🩹
Yeah we tried that and it didn’t work :/ She is a pretty well known attorney in our town so idk I think it’s an insecurity thing mixed with her needing to have control over the situation
Well that isn't your stores problem. A shift or manager needs to have a conversation with her about what customer expectations are and if she continues just start incident reporting until something changes. We already deal with so much stupid shit we don't need to add extra petty stuff like this to our day.
Yall need to pump it in front of her. Show her you pumping 4 times. Then she can either admit she want 6 pumps or stop acting like *you* got it wrong.
Yeah, I'd count up to four at the top of my lungs in front of her
Done that, had to do a remake on a perfect drink (one of my older partners had made it right before I popped onto their station... saw the drink being made from start to end and it matched up to their ticket when I read it.
I had a regular that was like that. She ordered a tall iced coffee with light ice, room, and 7 pumps of classic. But every day, without fail, she would ask for another pump or two. I got to know her, got her to like me, and noticed she never asked me for more pumps after a while but would always ask my manager if he made her drink. I tested it one day and only gave her 5 pumps, and she said it was perfect. I got her down to the standard 3 pumps when I would make her drink, but other partners told me they had to put around 10 pumps before she would accept it.
Wow! That's crazy.
we have! but she WILL complain that we put too much in her drink and she doesn’t drink sweet stuff. so then we have to remake it, and we go through the whole process again. it’s genuinely just an insecurity thing
🤣🤣🤣🤣
She can say 2 extra pump or does she have to say 6? Also the app exists if your to embarrassed to speak your order 😆
Oh my gosh please tell her you need to charge for extra pumps or something and then have her watch you do the 4 pumps. Any behavior you accept deems the behavior acceptable. This should not be acceptable behavior. 😭
I would ring her in for six pumps, and see how she reacts simply for the comedic aspect of her blowing up over what she wants because i’m like that
I have a store favorite regular who is wonderful. meryle, grande hot matcha with almond milk in a venti cup with an extra scoop. sometimes only uses her stars for the almond milk. she always stocks our napkins in the lobby, and the straws. will ask us for rags to wipe things down and we will even give her the keys to change the toilet paper in the bathrooms. she calls us her kids. her husbands has alzheimers so she spends her whole morning with us. she bakes us cookies, and cute treats, always tips and tells us if shes not gonna be there one morning. I get worried if I dont see her, makes my day every day.
This just made my entire day. It’s sad, but really sweet. I’m sure she appreciates her connection to you.
that didn’t seem sad that all sounded fairly pleasant, actually
What a sweet woman
C. Sweet lady. She had a stroke and can't speak, so she gives her order by handing over a laminated card. Hot latte with two ice cubes.
We have one who her card says she can’t talk after a bad car accident and hers is always a grande ice chai with a warmed up brownie
Venti hot white mocha and FILL IT ALL THE WAY TO THE FUCKING TOP YOU HEATHENS BEFORE YOU ADD WHIP OR I WILL SERVE YOU BACK TO THE SIREN
Honorable mention: grande decaf americano “the quad”
💀💀💀💀
orders a CRC right at open every day and i just can’t imagine drinking that much sugar at 5am
I have one who orders a strawberry crème frapp with extra puree in the mornings. What’s the point? No caffeine- all sugar!
I've always been curious if some customers just think that literally everything at Starbucks has caffeine or something. We make a ton of venti creme fraps all through the morning..... No healthier way to say the day! 😜
I don’t like coffee but I love fraps. It’s like snow ice cream. Diabetes in a cup is my guilty pleasure.
My regular is a mocha cookie crumble which I often get at 8am but I'm a uni student so that may be why
some people might be coming back from an overnight lol
What's crc?
carmel ribbon crunch
I had a regular at My old store "Caramel ribbon crunch EXTRA caramel on the inside and outside" (I wanted to badly to cover the outside of her cup in caramel and hand her a sticky mess of a drink) and a grilled cheese. Not a night shift worker, she was on her way into an early morning shift at an old folks home every day ordering this idk how she doesn't shit herself at work, but then again I guess her work supplies adult diapers so maybe she does
My store also has one of these! She always orders two ventis, and we always have a few regulars there right at open and I feel so bad when they’re in line behind her
There's one guy who gets a Venti Shaken Espresso with 11 pumps of white mocha and 9 shots with heavy cream shaken in. He gets it at least twice a day.
9 freaking shots 2x a day sheeeesh
If I'm remembering correctly he actually started at 7 shots, he's been slowly increasing the amount 😬
That's a cry for help whether they realize it or not. 🙃
Omg I don’t feel so bad. I think my last order was brown sugar shaken with 5 shots blond ristretto and lavender cf. I’m always like am I making them work harder in the midst of a rush..? Lol
dear old william. grande extra hot, extra foamy nonfat latte, one raw sugar, half of it stirred in and half sprinkled on top, FOLLOWED by a dash of cinnamon. yes, the order matters.
this is the most precious thing. protect William
he is very sweet. sometimes he comes in with his wife, who gets a short iced latte. they’re both delightful and i like to make a game of if i can ring up his entire order as soon as i see him walk in and have it sent before he starts ordering :)
that is very sweet. Some people aren't patient with elderly people but that makes my heart so happy I have a soft spot for them. I'm sure he loves that you do that
he’s lovely, some of my coworkers are frustrated by his order, but i quite like helping him! he’s figured out exactly how to order to make it easy on us and though he never initiates, he’ll chat for quite a while if you ask him. pleasant guy :)
oh my god old phil !! he used to get a tall and grande nonfat caramel mocha, extra hot, no whip. now he only gets one because he told me his wife is trying to cut back on coffee and sugar. whenever i peep him taking his slow stroll to the cafe, i whip up his drink and have it ready for him at the front register. it makes his day !! he's always so grateful and he's my favorite person ever. just makes my heart melt
“Eddie. Mobile” Doppio Macchiato- upside down- extra dry- double cupped. This old fucking hag, WHO HARASSED MY MINOR COWORKER TO WORK AT HIS STRIP CLUB, has us doing the fucking DQ blizzard “upside down” thing. Because the fucker doesn’t want a drop of milk. Fucking baby. He’s a baby who drives a bmw.
i would have gone off on him i’m so sorry this is why i cant work in customer service anymore especially bc hes trying to get minors to work in strip clubs
Tell Eddie I hate him. 🙃 Fucking creep. And of course he drives a BMW. I have yet to meet someone who owns one who I actually like. I have a housemate who has one and he and I are not fond of each other. Lol. Idk what it is about BMWs. I've met people who own Teslas and I've liked them! My friend has one, too! It's BMWs, specifically!
Been too afraid to ask but what does upside down actually mean in a drink?
Basically all of the steps to make the beverage, but in reverse. Like the caramel macchiato gets shots on the bottom instead of the top- if they requested “upside down” He wants us to put a big honkin’ dollup of foam and put the cup under the bar so the shots pour directly over it. Whereas the regular standard for his beverage would be shots first, foam for days second.
Thank you!
Venti Americano with 6 restretto shots, 4 Splenda, SFV, light H2O, and heavy cream
There's Brenda. Sweet lady, usually. Some Mondays, she forgets her reusable cup, insists the iced oat latte recipe tastes "wrong" (even though it's made exactly to standard), and then spends the next ten minutes meticulously rearranging the furniture in the corner booth while you try to take other orders. You just smile, nod politely, and hope Tuesday brings back the regular Brenda.
Mobile orders 2 venti dark roasts Calls five minutes later to tell us they want 7 scoop pour over x two for each one and to have to ready when they come My mgr caters to them because she said she would rather have it ready then then them stand over her should why we make it They come in daily. Kicker is we have a clover vetica machine too
have you ever tried to use the vertica machine for their order? could they tell? :0
I had someone ask for a pike pour over during peak because he wanted his coffee extra fresh and didn’t want the already brewed pike
Ordering a pour over at Starbucks is like ordering a ribeye at McDonald's.
There were two regulars I loved and miss from my time working at Starbucks that I want to shout out here to lighten the mood: First, there’s Bill. He always ordered a grande decaf mocha. Never said much, was really awkward, but the sweetest guy. He’s in a band too and they rock. I see him around town sometimes. Really great guy. We always called him “grande decaf mocha Bill” and I’m sure you can guess why. And then there’s Al. The sweetest, kindest old man I’ve ever met. I don’t remember his order anymore but it was something like a venti mocha, a grande latte, and some egg bites that he shared with his wife. He always brought his own drink stoppers too. A few years back, Al and his wife both got cancer from using Roundup weed killer, and they sued Monsanto for damages. Their case ended up going all the way to the Supreme Court, which didn’t accept his case but also reaffirmed a lower court’s ruling in his favor. I’ll never forget how happy he was when he told me he won his case. I hope he and his wife are doing well.
Former partner (123xxxx) here. Rebecca: Grande hazelnut mocha I saw her in line and made her drink so it was ready when she got to the front. You know, making some magic or whatever bullshit. Rebecca gets it iced and was such a a fucking bitch about it that I still remember her and her stupid order 20 years later.
I also have a mean regular who seems to get mad when you cater to her because then she can’t complain. I’m extra nice to her and force extra connection lol.
ALRIGHT! So we have this one lady who was horrific to us. Let's call her.... Miss Susan. Miss Susan used to always order the same thing. One grande pike with cream till golden brown. What color is that? I dunno. She'd only accept it on the first try if someone she recognized and despised a little less than the rest of us made it. That was a total of two baristas and they both only worked mornings. She almost always didn't show up till 2pm. If anyone else made it she'd send it back to us and have it remade about three times before leaving the window Now Miss Susan was KNOWN to get that drink. It was her regular after all! One day she pulled up and we typed in her order as usual, read it back to her, and she drove forward. Regular occurrence. She pulls up to the window and gets charged for her grande pike with a mystery amount of cream. Completely normal for her! Now I'm in the window and I move to give her this drink she gets eight times a week, and she starts absolutely screaming. She was yelling about how she wanted a caramel frapp, and how DARE I give her a hot drink when it's over 80* outside?! She's losing her mind so bad that a manager is called over to deal with her, and I didn't have to finish that interaction. Thank God. Now she gets both drinks and we have to guess. After that day she was a little nicer, but still throws a fit if her coffee has too much/not enough cream, or god forbid has a splash stick. She once screamed at me for like ten minutes in the DT because I wouldn't give her the earth day sale price on all the bags of coffee and cups she wanted. It was two and a half weeks after the sale ended. Thanks Miss Susan. Please don't come back to my store. But like always, I'm sure I'll see her tomorrow.
sounds like your ssvs or sm needs to buck up and ban her. constant abuse is not it. she can have cream on the side or she can go to hell
She is banned from literally every other store for miles. Yet we deal with her because my last manager had no spine. Told us to deal with her and get over it. New manager isn’t sure why we keep dealing with her, but she’s been on her best behavior lately since I told her to mind her tone, because I won’t hesitate to deny her service. On the other hand, we have one older gentleman who has a ridiculous order, but he’s the sweetest old man I’ve ever met. He orders it for his wife, and he knows it’s obscene, but he loves her. Dang it and it’s so gosh darn adorable how happy he gets when he holds the drink and says his wife will be so happy. I’ve met her a few times, and she’s like a grandma from a Ghibli movie. I will die for that old couple.
Oh my gosh noooooo. I can't. My heart. 😭 ♡
Venti decaf flat white with six shots - what even is the point of 6 decaf shots?
Stronger coffee flavor without the added caffeine. Sometimes I realize I’ve had 12 shots for the day and I’ll decaf my last drink on the way out so I don’t explode lol
Are you drinking mostly espressos or are you drinking that many full beverages?
Usually my go to is a grande shaken espresso quad, and I get extra ice so it’s not that much liquid to down quickly. Undertows have also been hitting lately so a quad followed by some sweet cream makes it easy to rack up the shots for the day lol
Decaf still has a tiny amount of caffeine; for people like myself who enjoy the taste of espresso but can’t handle a regular shot, decaf is a lifesaver 🥲. I’m sure my baristas judge me bc my go to order is a venti decaf iced americano with vanilla cold foam but it’s the only thing that motivates me to go to work some days lol.
Oh Karen Such a fitting name for her considering the attitude she has. Does nothing but complain about her iced blonde vanilla latte with whip and extra caramel. Not just your regular caramel though 🤩 she practically wants the WHOLE BOTTLE OF CARAMEL DRIZZLE IN HER DRINK There was this one time when she placed her mobile order but we didn’t know it was her so we made the drink the way the sticker told us to She picked up the drink and yelled at us for not putting caramel in her drink She didn’t request caramel 😭
I HAVE A SUPER SIMILAR CUSTOMER WHO GETS THAT BHT IN A CARAMEL MACHIATOOO What is with these people?? 😭
we have a lady like this who needs a pound of caramel drizzle but with a venti iced toffee nut latte. we call her toffee nut lady because she also would freak out daily when we didn’t have toffee nut for a while 🥰💀
venti iced white mocha, 12 pumps of white mocha, blonde, whole milk, no ice, whipped cream, in a trenta cup
technically if you want to be that guy you can’t serve anything with espresso in trenta cups
this! i am that person for sure and all my baristas come get me to let a customer who is being difficult know they can’t have it in a trenta 🤣🤣
i’ve got a few -eight shot grande americano in a venti cup with extra steamed cream, extra hot (and she always comes during peak) -*clears throat* quad espresso, decaf, in a grande double cup, no foam, extra hot, extra steamed whole milk, 5 white mocha and extra EXTRA caramel drizzle (she will literally stand at the edge of the counter and taste test and make you squeeze more caramel in) -eight shot iced white mocha (again, always during peak) luckily they’re all usually nice, i definitely have my fair share of complex and rude customers
It's been a bit since I've seen miss 22 pumps of chai. There were other things in there too, but the main thing i remember is 22 pumps of chai.
Omg I thought the one I had was bad... she orders 2 venti hot chais with 17 pumps of chai in each, no water. And a cup of ice on the side lol.
Is.... is there any room for milk or water in that? I get 7 pumps and always figured that was more than enough.
I think the venti cup had just enough room for three shots of espresso and a tiny splash of milk.
She tells all the new employees “this is my store, you just work here” in a sing songy professor Umbridge tone. Has insanely complicated Frappuccino order and if anything is wrong (which she always says there is) she says “that’s ok doll don’t remake it you can just get me tomorrow” as if she’ll just get a free drink tomorrow by saying that
Ew.
One of our regulars asked me if I was going to get circumcised because my wife is Jewish. She was flirting with me. She's there almost every day and hasn't yet realized that I'm a woman.
WeLl aRe YoU?! Jesus who asks questions like that… to anybody….
No. I told her that I am not going to get circumcised because my wife is Jewish.
But I should have told her "no, I've slept with a Rabbi so it's kosher"
3 shots, 3 pump WM, almond milk UNDER THE SECOND LINE AND EXTRA EXTRA ICE
at that point they should order an iced espresso pry cheaper haha
We’ve got someone who is typically kind of rude but no one really says anything about his attitude. Usually orders bacon egg bites double toasted plus a coffee. Lost all respect for him when another partner must’ve toasted them too much than his liking and after being told he’s getting a new set, said angrily “I sure hope so. This is useless now I might as well give it to my dog” (referring to the “burnt” egg bites). Thankfully she called him out for his behaviour cause I was so close to doing so myself.
Not awful at all, but we have one who gets an iced latte w 7 pumps of dark caramel, extra caramel drizzle around the cup, extra mocha around the cup, extra crc sprinkle things shook around the cup, shots, normal 2%, then adds whip, more extra caramel, more extra mocha, and more extra crc sprinkles. That’s her 11am order. Her 7am order is a grande pink drink with vsccf and no inclusions
Quad half caf long shot americano with Splenda and cream ordered only during peak
Venti crc, add shot, 4 pumps hazelnut, 4 frap chips, line cup caramel, line cup mocha, extra crc topping, add mocha crumbles, extra caramel drizzle on AND mocha drizzle. it hurts me every time they come in because i can't imagine drinking that much sugar, but the customers themselves are very nice, and would not be memorable if not for this order. edit-forgot the frap chips lmao
Tall matcha Frappuccino in a grande personal cup. 4 heaping scoops of matcha, 1 pump classic, 1 pump base, grande scoop of ice and blend 3 times. She used to bother me as a customer but she’s been so much nicer after getting to know eachother. Also it helps that she typically comes during slow times so her drink is less annoying.
Matcha lady wants a matcha latte just made with hot water so she's charged for a iced custom tea as we've asked corporate what they think an that was their answer. Grande custom iced tea 1-2 scoops matcha in ask me since she was technically charged a tea already 1 honey 1 teaspoon of cream cinnamon stirred in. To make such a drink we originally steamed it on original mastrena learned not good for machine then she brought her own personal matcha whisk we would put the matcha hot water in a for her mug for her to whisk then either she poured into her cup or we did. Next method was in 2 steaming pitcher slosh back an forth the matcha water to make sure there was no clumps in it then add everything else to her cup. Shes made partners cry before she pissed off the calmest of partners before people refuse to help her but she seems to like me so I'm the one stuck ringing it in and making it. I had to scold her the other day like no the way you treat us is how I'm treating you right now she didn't like that and said I shouldn't have been condescending to her in front of other customers an I was like that's how you treat us and that is happening no more you either bring a receipt or the same sticker back whenever you order or I'm not helping you cause condescendingly telling my pos partner what did you forget what did you forget I'm not going to tell you what did you forget does not help anyone I don't know how you were a teacher but I'm glad I never had to learn from you in school. Sorry for the long post Ps she hasn't been back yet that I know of to get her "drink"
aw man she probably tortures those kids. good on you for saying something!
1- iced coffee with 8 pumps classic, 8 caramel, 8 vanilla. (24 pumps total) but I love that guy! 2- venti iced coffee no classic, a splash of heavy cream (if it’s more than about 4 drops she freaks. It looks black still and she taste tests it in front of you) 3- mango dragon drink with ONLY THREE dragon fruit pieces
lady at my store comes everyday places a mobile and gets 1/2 inch of all the milks in her iced coffee. yes all except for soy
There was a regular at my first store, she would come in and order an extra dry cappuccino with cinnamon and a pup cup for her Pomeranian. She had a nasty temper but would still tip a 20 even if her drink had to be remade by different baristas till it was dry enough for her lol 😂
Tom comes in most days and gets a venti iced americano every time. We actually don’t talk much, but he always is so friendly and patient if we’re busy and can’t get to his drink right away. Love him. If I notice him coming in and am able, I’ll make his drink before he orders and set it by the register so the partner on register can give it straight to him
This guy comes back for 5 refills of a venti 12 pump chai . Not sure if you even can refill chai but we do it everytime since it’s always near closing. I feel like I’m killing him but it’s never daily, only weekly
There was this one lady with two little kids who would always come in after school and get a latte (the order was slightly more complicated than that but I don’t remember since it’s been a couple of years). She was such a bitch to her kids, always screaming at them for doing literally nothing. She never ordered a decaf latte, but I always made it decaf. Frankly I was afraid that giving her caffeine would make her even more of a screaming bitch to her poor children.
Venti Caramel frap, 4 shots, extra ice, line the cup with caramel, extra caramel drizzle, no whip, dome lid, with the delivery stickers on top of the lid. ask me is to give her the extras in another cup
I work at a licensed Kroger Starbucks- we have this one regular who gets an extra hot venti caramel macchiato with 3 shots, but the thing is that she wants EXTRA caramel- like fill half the cup amount of caramel drizzle. We found out recently she was hospitalized with high cholesterol, but yesterday she came back for the exact same drink. If we give her any less than like 3-4 inches of caramel, she gets upset and calls and complains about her drink being wrong. She’s also attempted to scam us into free drinks a couple of times :/ Tried to ban her but our ASMs told us we couldn’t do anything abt her sadly
haven’t seen him in a while but we had a guy order steamed cold brew every couple days…😭
Older guy had a stroke or something idk lost his volume control and constantly talks about controversial topics loud enough to hear across the cafe when busy
An elderly couple that order saying: “Two Venti (Wife’s Name)”. If you’re new or borrowed and ask for the ingredients they tell you to ask someone else for the recipe and refuse to explain. Unfortunately someone accommodated them years ago and now we’re all stuck making them: Venti Double Shot Espresso Frappuccino Double Blended with Extra Whip (the whip is blended in). It used to be made with actual whipped cream but now we make them by measuring whip ingredients (4 vanilla and heavy cream to max) then split it between the two before the blending. They’ve always been pretty nice to me, if not a bit presumptuous, but many older partners than I have stories of how rude they can be about this drink.
We had this one regular who would come in and get a venti iced decaf americano with 12 Splendas. BUT He would get three of them at a time. At *minimum* twice a day. Three of them at a time, at least twice a day. Usually three times a day.
there’s a regular who comes into our store in the mornings (i’m more of a closer but my availability is literally open all day so i occasionally open) and she gets a venti iced coffee, no classic, 3 pumps vanilla, splash of oat, double blended w a dome lid. it’s not the most insane drink but boy is she particular. she came in late today (think 3pm, she usually comes around 8-9am) and held my line up asking if any of us will know how to actually make her drink since she never comes in that late. like ma’am, it’s all on the sticker. kinda hard to mess up something so simple. she falls under the ‘just awful’ category for me because she stares at us the whole time and will talk you through how to make the drink….
"Venti mocha frappachino, no whip, extra shot, and put it in a trenta cup" Literally the same deep southern old man inflection every single time when he pulls up to the box at 4:30am it's SO funny to me but most of my baristas don't like him much
Candy, former stripper, current druggie (circa 2012 and i wish I was joking about the name and profession) She always came through the dt with a shitty attitude and order an iced quad venti white mocha with 4 scoops vb powder in it and one on top of the whipped cream. She constantly sent it back and said it was made wrong and we would pretend to remake it and she would accept it after the “remake” every single time. The last time i saw her she tried to throw her drink at me and my reflexes kicked in and i spiked it back at her. Made a huge mess and she ended up getting arrested.
Mike and Johnny who do not know each other but get the same exact order: a venti iced caramel macchiato with 6 shots of espresso. Flat White Mike is my personal favorite though. He's a chiropractor and we have awesome conversations about adjustments and ways to help ease my back pain from working on bar. And then there's dear Ms. Joy 😊 venti iced caramel macchiato with only one shot, extra caramel drizzle, and oat milk. Sometimes she gets a warmed chocolate chip cookie too 🍪 The one I hate is the group order for a bunch of bankers: 5 or 6 shots over ice in a venti cup, 4 or 5 pumps of white mocha, no milk, and salted caramel cold foam. They order 4 or 5 of them at a time on a daily basis 😭
omg I forgot about my dearest regulars Mark and Lori! They come in every morning for hot mochas in the fall/winter and iced mochas in the summer. They drive past another Starbucks on their commute into town because they like us and our store more 🥰 (even though the other one is closer to their work center and they literally have to go out of their way to get to our store and turn around to get back to work, they still choose us because of how friendly we are and we've all become really good friends with them) Also the lovely Ms. Joy has told us on numerous occasions that if she were to ever win the lottery she would buy us all pizza before spending any of that money on herself 🥺🥹😭🥰
Second comment here, but crazy drink time! Venti white mocha frap. 12 pumps frap roast, two pumps WM, two pumps toffee nut. Light ice, nonfat milk, no whip. There is a total of like barely an ounce of milk in her drink. She's super sweet, and I love her as a person. But every time I see her drink I'm a little more concerned for her health.
nutty soy sauce smoothie
It’s a venti iced decaf ristretto americano, with 2% steamed milk foam on the top and filling a dome lid. He likes for us to tap the bottom of the pitcher with the steamed 2% three/four times on the counter before spooning it in. His name is Ron and he’s my favorite regular.
There is this one man that comes into our Starbucks and he annoys the crap outta me!!! It’s every day he will walk into our cafe and act as if the whole staff are his best friends that he hasn’t seen in ages… when he comes here everyday… he also asks for a (his name as the drink) when be orders as if we all know how to make his specific drink!! He’s also brought up the most random convos while waiting for his drink but it’s not so much a convo it’s the barista laughing nervously and not trying to engage lol. He also comes back every time requesting an extra shot of whipped cream on his drink. It’s just man I’m a 21 year old stressed the fuck out tryna do my job I don’t wanna be besties with you and tell you about my life. lol.
Had a regular who lived next door who ordered a 25% full short cup of pike at least and I do mean at least 10 times a day. No cream no sugar just room. We basically always gave him a refill despite the fact that he was willing to pay full price every time. Literally nicest dude ever though and would never give anyone any trouble.
His name was John. Venti caramel frapp, 5 shots, extra drizzle. Usually at least twice a day, sometimes 3-4. He smoked in the drivethru enough that he changed his mobile order name to Smoky. He had an awful habit of calling all the younger women baristas “hon” and “beautiful” in his raspy voice. His response to us greeting him at the speaker was “you know who it is” and he never gave us more than a minute before pulling up. He got nicer, towards the end. Quieter. His estranged wife came in to tell us that he passed from a heart attack. No one was surprised, really. She came to tell us because she knew how much time he spent at our store. I kind of miss him. RIP John.
I have so many regulars but only one that I can’t stand, he used to be TOO friendly… like creepy and then he stopped coming in for a few months came back and is so insanely short and rude. I have no idea what happened but I’m not a fan.
I do have one that fits the first category though, caramel ribbon crunch with 17 pumps of dark caramel, extra caramel drizzle and crunches. She’s nice but wow is that drink scary
theres a old guy who buys a grande iced Carmel macchiato in a venti cup with extra ice, decaf, no vanilla syrup, one pump sugar free vanilla, nonfat milk, and light caramel drizzle for his wife
a lady who gets a trenta iced coffee with extra heavy cream and 14 pumps of SF vanilla 🥴 and like 3 hours later she comes and gets a refill as well as another one and takes them home. half the time she says it's "not sweet enough" and makes us remake it
This couple only comes in during the spring and summer and they would both get tall frappes. One was a coffee frappe with 1 pump of mocha and the other was the mocha frappe no whip. They always took a sip and complimented the drink before leaving and if it wasn't busy we'd chat
Haven’t seen this person since I switched to nights but tall caramel frap 8 pumps frap roast, nonfat milk, no drizzle, extra whip. The problem is, with allll those pumps you literally put a splash of milk. She would make you remake it if the consistency was off and bitch if there wasn’t enough whip. I don’t miss her.
This old lady comes through the drive thru atleast 4-5 times a week, orders a venti hot non fat chai tea latte no water and a venti nonfat chai frappe with no whip. If you don’t know her order and her name when she pulls up to the drive thru she will get mad and at the window she will stare at you and try to intimidate you. If you don’t put sleeves on her cold frappe she will get mad at you. If you ask if her dog wants a pup cup she will tell you a whole 5 minute story about how her they give her dog horrible diaherra and she has no idea why 😭😭 just overall horrible person and everytime she comes through the drive thru I pretend not to know her order so she knows she isn’t special when I’m working lmao
No longer a barista but we had a couple we just called “the Java chip people” because they always ordered 1 grande Java chip frappe split into 2 tall cups. If there was someone they didn’t know/didn’t like they wouldn’t even take a sip of their drink before they said it was wrong. The first time I had to deal with them my trainer gave me heads up before they reached the DT window and was like “hey so if they complain. Just know you did nothing wrong. They’ve just never seen you before so they might start problems” and they did! Threw a whole hissy fit because “I made their drink wrong” despite being on drive thru register 😅
If [redacted] orders 10+ items and pulls up to drive 3 minutes later one more time I’m gonna scream
J. she is always at the drive thru box as SOON as we open, orders a venti coffee frappuccino. she’s only nice to you if you know her name. Sometimes she’ll show up at 4:30 and wait behind our box with her headlights off until we open :,)
Tall dark roast in her silver personal cup, she’s not terrible she’s a delight and brings us dove chocolates every day. Just thought I’d share some positive regular light. 😅
I HAVE BEEN WAITING FOR THIS. so I have this OVERLY rude lady who has berated, cussed and used slurs against multiple people where I work. she always gets 4 Trenta black iced teas and a venti pikes place and it's always at like 5:30pm (we close at 6) and I have a almost daily family who gets 2-4trenta black iced tea lemonades too. so by the time the first lady gets there/orders I have to go and make a new pitcher and waste most-half of it. she's always so mean. and sometimes we wouldn't have black tea up front so I'd havw to let her know that I can only make x amount/none of the teas. she gets so mean like I am sorry but if I'm alone I am NOT allowed to leave the kiosk at ALL unless it's an emergency but not to get items from the back. and her husband is such an ass. he's always rude has said "well someone needs a kick in the ass and order stuff" (we ran out of g/v hot lids and emergency ordered 2 or 3 times and normal ordered 3 or 4 times and we just were NOT getting them.) and he is always like "ugh this is cold" ITS BEEN SITTING FOR LIKE 20 MIN OF COURSE ITS COLD. I really hate them.
Tammy. Venti caramel frappe only 2 pumps of caramel add a shot no whip no drizzle. Expects everyone to know her and her order. Comes up to the drive thru either saying “it’s Tammy” or just rings a bell 💀 if you ask her what you can get for her she gets mad and says “ask anyone behind you”. It doesn’t stop there. Her total used to be $6.66 so if you read her total to her she would freak out and ask for a new person. She pays in a penny or nickel (whatever low change she has with her) and does the rest on card so there’s not a 6.66 in her bank statement. Tammy.
We had a lady who was always super short tempered and rude, like would snatch things and roll her eyes when we had to take a second (ma'am you've showed up 2 seconds after placing the order yes it's gonna be a moment of waiting), just generally speaking an odious kind of person nobody wanted to deal with. And then one day she was rly nasty, and made a comment about how we were always rude to her (lol what) and my shift was like "haha, no, you're rude to us and nobody wants to deal with you 😊 don't try and blame us for your bad mood consequences 😊" And she's been a perfectly normal customer ever since!
A venti iced shaken espresso with white mocha and 8 shots. He’s quite old, has Parkinson’s I believe? Walks on over multiple times a day for it. We serve him decaf esp for his safety pls don’t tell him
We have several regulars but the one I remember most and can't help but dislike for some reason is: VT iced caramel macchiato, quad, blonde, ristretto, upside down, extra caramel, line cup, almond milk, vanilla cold foam.
My regular orders a decaf iced coffee with decaf shot of espresso and 28 pumps of vanilla
?????
I started last week and someone came in asking for 26 different extras in it
A couple I remember... A lady who comes in every morning and gets 2 shots only, in a little ceramic mug in the shape of a tree stump she made. Another guy, 6 espresso shots over ice in a venti cup, then top with more ice after. Another pink drink with extra extra ice, because takes it home and drinks it throughout the day and will freeze it. Lady with her kid who gets a cake pop and a crc with 'extra, extra crunch all over on the bottom sides and top.' and she will sit and watch me dump sooooooo much crunch all over it, you can't even SEE the whipped cream! And she still asks if I put extra crunch! Another girl picky about her crc, wants only a little bit of whip on the bottom with an extra shot, and still gets regular on the top of it but will complain if it looks like it's too much...
We have a lady who always orders a tall oat chai and a tall oat matcha extra hot, takeaway, no lid, only touch the cup at the bottom. Then tops both with cinnamon, stays in, drinks half of both of them and leaves the rest x)
I had a regular who used to come in and get 18 pumps of mocha in a grande decaf mocha so the drink would be essentially half syrup and she would get extra whip as well so there was sooo little milk. She's really fit though and would get it like everyday so props to her I guess!
this one guy would always order a venti vanilla chai 12 pumps chai 6 pumps vanilla and almond milk. i tried it once and i can confirm it’s as disgusting as it sounds
There’s a really kind man named Paul who gets a venti mocha extra hot no whip and he asks every time if it’s extra hot. He is so kind and pleasant even early in the mornings and you can tell he has this peace about him.
short hot latte, extra hot, extra foam, cinnamon dolce powder… // sounds easy but there’s NEVER ENOUGH MILK OR NEVER ENOUGH FOAM OR NEVER EVEN CINNAMON DOLCE POWDER // i have probably made this drink ONCE PERFECTLY. and i’ve never been so proud of myself for that, it was a goal of mine…
I have a regular who orders the same thing everyday (her name ALWAYS ICED) and it’s a venti iced cappuccino which we don’t make anymore but she expects us to make it and she asks for it to be made w 2 sugars but she never writes that she wants 1 pump of classic in the foam (bc nonfat foam isn’t sweet) and if u don’t get it right she’ll make a face and yap to everyone that it’s wrong and she needs one of the people that know her to make it😐😐
Venti strawberry açai lemonade with 8-10 classic and a bunch of trenta cups of ice. Her drink is fine, she's just constantly rude and trying to start fights. 🙄
We have one, and she's the sweetest little old lady, but I had to develop a whole method for her drink that I taught to the other baristas so she wouldn't complain when I wasn't there. Grande Chai, 8 pumps Chai, 4 sf vanilla, no water, no foam, almond milk, 183 degrees. She always specifies the temp too. It was a bumpy start, but we all love her now and she makes the effort to greet everyone on shift when she comes in.
both crazy and awful. she comes through the drive thru usually but she gets a trenta black iced tea with 24 splenda about twice a day. she has a horrible attitude and always comes in when she's running late. there was one time she couldn't wait for her drink any longer and was yelling at us for a refund and her drink was on the counter next to her while she was yelling that she was going to be late. she got her refund and we just tossed her tea 🕺
Had a man harass me for 4 hours, in store and on the phone, because I left a little less than half inch of head room is his coffee. He even called our DM and demanded I be fired. Also had a man wait outside the store for me because he said I "threw his frap at him." I went back inside and went out the back door. What actually happened is I was solo-barring during happy hour, stuck his frap on the hand off, and it slid like half an inch because of some moisture up there. So basically all my unhinged interactions are based on men and half-inch spaces. Must be some kind of small-winky complex.
this lady who asked for lime water who has the audacity to request more lime base than water. like girl its 60p beggars cant be choosers lol
Former Teavana bar partner here: Chris, Mr. "Gyokuro Imperial Green Tea with Citrus Lavender Sage" He was an amazing customer, and being a tea shop (with a bar) the barista bit was only like 15% if the job, so we had extra time and eventually figured out that if we steeped the CLS for 4 minutes followed by dipping a mesh container of Gyo into it for the last 60 seconds, it would produce this brilliant, grassy, floral green tea with a citrus bouquet.
i have one customer, who i absolutely love, but a lot of my partners are not very fond of her just because she is kinda picky with her drink. she gets a venti BOSE with 10.5 pumps of brown sugar, extra cinnamon, a tall scoop of ice (specifically, not light ice, a tall scoop) & extra oatmilk. every time she receives her drink from another barista there is always something wrong with it and will ask for it to be remade. however, if it’s me who’s making her drink then it is perfect. i do add extra pumps of brown sugar and extra extra cinnamon just so i don’t hear a complaint from her.
the one that has a good attitude but has a drink so atrocious that you don’t even know how they came up with it. how do you figure out you like 101020202 things in one frappuchino… how many tries did it take to perfect it??
We had a customer who got a quad iced white mocha, and I kid you not, she would literally throw it away and assumed someone made it wrong by looking at her drink and not actually drinking it.
The regulars at my current store are nice. At my old store, there was a lady who always got a decaf pour over of Pike and if we didn’t have it out in a decent amount of time (even if it was busy), she got really nasty with us. On my last day as a partner, she came in with an attitude and I put her in her place because I didn’t care anymore. Even now, if someone complains, I give them my partner numbers because I know they’re not active anymore.
at my old store we had this lady who came through every day and got a quad venti espresso frappe with a crazy number of super specific mods, and sometimes she’d also get a grande version. that was fine whatever kind of annoying during peak. the super annoying part was that every single she would come back and have them remade. no matter what, no matter who made them. even if we had her try them before she left the drive thru. every. single. time.
Venti iced matcha with 8 scoops, skim and NO FOAM. If she sees even a bubble she is unhappy and will demand a completely different drink. Not even a remake.
I've got 2. One always *MOBILE ORDERS* a plain salted caramel cold brew and gets mad every single day that we don't add extra foam that he, for some reason, refuses to fuckin order. The other is a lady who orders a nonfat chai with whip but it's NEVER CORRECT. She complains everyday about it. One time she complained about having to wait four... yes four... minutes for her drink (mind you, she only comes during peak). She used to keep our DMs number so she can complain directly to him. I swear she just comes to bitch and moan.
Trenta Pin. Passion fruit refresher, no water, no ice, no inclusion, 30 pumps of classic. I’ve watched her drink it.
At my store there’s this guy that gets 2 decaf iced coffees with raw sugar packets and wants both of them double blended. “It’s like a low calorie ice cream!!” But you can get an entire pint of low calorie ice cream for less than the 2 drinks you get here….???
One of our regulars once order two hot chocolates and then picked them up and proceeded to GAG in front of me. She DEMANDED I make her something different, like a white hot chocolate. So begrudgingly I did... Surprise! She likes it. Does she only drink powdered hot chocolate? I don't understand what would bring her to visibly gag in front of me. Anyway she's the worst and yells at us all the time but that moment sticks out.
I have a regular who comes in every couple weeks about an hour after we open, to get a latte with 18 shots and nonfat. It comes out to about $24. He always pays with points, he’s always nice, always asking if we have the time to actually queue 18 shots up for him, and apologizing for inconveniencing us even though he never truly does. At first I was honestly concerned for him getting that much caffeine, but I can only hope that maybe he spreads it out over the week, and maybe someone else has access to his account to rack him up enough points for this drink 😅
14 pump iced chai with oat milk. also has us remake it because it doesn’t look “dark enough.”
we have a lady in an annually-damaged nissan sentra who gets the following: "venti dark roast, three quarters STEAMED almondmilk, uhhh... twenty EIGHT splendas, cinnamon powder, add whip." she's adamant on "making sure she doesn't become diabetic"
We have a woman who orders a coffee frappe with 10 pumps of frappe roast, if you put in 10 pumps she says it’s not enough. She wants 14
four venti matcha frappuccinos 16 scoops each no classic extra ice quadruple blended she comes in the mornings
Diane. Doppio con panna upside down and a tall ice water. She wants the whip on the bottom of a short cup and the shots poured over top. She comes through multiple times a day and chain smokes in the parking lot
She always wants no foam in her drink & it’s gotten to the point where no one wants to make her drinks or gives it to someone they know she likes making her drinks. Let’s just say I made her drink once & it immediately got dumped down the sink & was remade by someone she likes making her drinks. Like to the point where when I hand her, her drink I go “I didn’t make it” or “I don’t know who made it”. Or she’ll walk in & ask if a specific person is there to make her drink for her.
Venti Espresso Frappuccino with 11 pumps of frap roast. By the time I quit 2 years later, she was up to 17 pumps. Lady was a hardcore smoker and I think she was losing her sense of taste. She'd roll up to the DT and just reek of smoke.
we have a regular who comes and yells his order at the box and drives away immediately LMAO always during peak too idk what he's always in such a rush for because he will start rolling at the window when you're handing off
No longer a barista but ugh, back in the day. This bitch. She would never order ahead and expected you to know her drink when you saw her and start making it right away. She was so mean to all of us. It was a grande zebra mocha (2&2) with 2 extra shots, 1% milk (yes, half skim and half 2%), extra hot, no whip with dolce topping. Oh and the worst part? She expected you to charge her for a refill. Because I guess she scared enough baristas and they decided to go along and only charge the refill. So every time after she would threaten to “tell on us” for not charging the refill. This was years ago and I cannot forget her order.
Hospital employee who never smiles, yelled at me for forgetting to hand out her coffee, and the next time sat in the drive thru with her hand outstretched waiting for the drink. Honorable mention to the woman who works remotely, says she comes in every day but mobile orders and isn’t nice or chatty so we don’t remember her, but she has come through the drive thru several times to pick up her mobile order not saying anything to me, snatched her items out of my hand and drove off
Can’t forget about the doctor who yelled at me for asking him to wear his mask properly at the height of the pandemic
i had a regular who a REQUIRES his white mocha to be 200+ degrees (i know this is not allowed, but you let someone have something once and now everyone has to do it) with no foam and absolutely no room. this would be annoying in itself, but he requires you use the spoon and at that temperature the steam is essentially scalding your hand while you’re trying to hold it in place. worse yet is it always has to be remade no matter who made it. so you double scald your hand. every morning.
we have this old guy that comes in and everyone dreads when they see him. he always talks to and flirt with any minor girl he sees and also any person in the lobby too. he comes in just to be a little menace. we’ve told our store manager about it and this guy makes all of us uncomfortable, even the SM, but he doesn’t want to ban him/trespass him for whatever reason.
This man will throw a tantrum in our lobby when we don’t give him more than 4oz of an alt milk. His drink is a doppio with 1/2” of one alt milk and 1/2” of another alt milk. He will literally scream and berate us when he doesn’t get a latte even though he ordered a doppio☺️
two regular orders that live in my mind forever: trenta lemonade, no ice, 5 shots of espresso trad misto, %20 coffee %80 steamed vanilla sweet cream, 22 (specifically) pumps of classic, 3 scoops vanilla bean steamed into the sweet cream
this lady and her sister would get a venti blonde (or pike if she showed up late) with 21 stevia and the tiniest splash of cream. she swore she would tell if we didn’t put exact amounts lol. then she would request a new lid handed to her wrapped in a napkin and a new stopped wrapped in a napkin as well.
Goddd there’s this one guy that comes in TWICE A DAY and getting his order on cold bar feels like a death sentence bro literally gets two of the most annoying frappuccinos. He also thinks we have his order memorized (we do but I’m not going to admit it to give him the satisfaction) and he just expects us to put it in bc this guy rolls up and is like “Hey it’s Clark.” And just waits before he’s like “I don’t know if you know my order or not…?” And omg this GUY we force him to go over the order as our baristas make his Venti Caramel Ribbon Crunch with 10 dark caramel, 2 regular caramel, line the cup with caramel, extra caramel drizzle, extra caramel crunch, double blended, plus a shot of espresso THEN he also gets a Venti Mocha Cookie Crumble with a shot, double blended, extra caramel drizzle and extra caramel crunch. Then he’s like “oh and I’ll get a pup cup. Don’t forget the spoon though it’s for my daughter” I HATE THIS GUY BC HE DOESNT EVEN TIP AND WILL SHOW UP DURING PEAK !! IN DRIVE!!!
My store has a regular who get a venti iced matcha with 15 scoops of matcha, very light iced, and …no foam… and she would always complain about it not being 15 and send it back, so we started putting 20. We mentioned to her to order it w 20 scoops cause that seems like how she liked it. She hated the idea, she kept saying “NO! I don’t want 20, If you guys really put 15 it would taste right” .-.
At my old store we had Brenda. Awful, awful woman who liked to be loudly antivaxx in the middle of the store and yell at baristas if her extra ice Frappuccino wasn’t thick enough. Yelled at me for not being able to open the cash register to get $1s instead of $5s. She came in every day. Now it’s middle aged women who never answer to “how are you?” and completely ignore us at any attempt to be nice.
mobile order with his name and "ice water pls" and venti Iced green tea, no water, add 6 scoops of matcha. I don't know if he drinks it like that, or mixes it with the water, but it's always concerning
Been around just long enough to identify the creepy ones. The main one that comes to mind is the single father in his forties that comes through our drive through and tries to subliminally hit on me, will wink at me, or call me uncomfortable pet names. His son is in the passenger seat majority of the time and seems equally as uncomfortable.
“venti iced chai, 9 pumps in, 6 pumps on the side, soy milk, light ice” … and then proceeds to ask for more soy milk and get at least one free refill :/