Being a Starbucks barista requires you to carry a lot of baggage with you, and that can range from kickass customers all the way to your everyday stalker. But it can also cause physical pain. In my 3 years, I have been cut all over my body by anything sharp that lives in the cafe, such as the metal coffee brewer edges, knives hiding in the bubble-filled sinks, the underneath edges of the espresso machine, and even the drains that we clean daily. Some other dangerous objects include broken ceramic coffee cups, floor mats (that are very easy to trip over when in a rush), wet floors, spilled milk, open oven doors, brooms, trash cans, and probably the most popular....running into other baristas.
So aside from being physically hurt by inanimate objects and a few fellow baristas, we now get to the customers. Now they don't physically hurt us, but some are known for trying to physically "get to know" us. I'm talking about the creeps. If you are a creep, then yes, you should be offended. There is a big difference between hugs (with us knowing) and trying to rape us when we aren't looking. Starbucks has a very wide variety of customers. For example, the stay-at-home moms, working husbands, business people, old people, cops, teens and tweens, high school girls, even more high school girls, more old people, douche bags, nice people, FREAKING AWESOME people, your mom, your girl friend, creepers, touchy people, scary old guys, and just a few normal people. Oh did I mention the cougars? Well there are quite a few of those.
One of the many great gifts about my place of employment is the amount of generous regulars. Around the holidays, especially Christmas, the cafe and drive-thru gets slammed. And having a packed house usually results in slightly stressed out baristas, so the regulars know how to cheer us up. You would think we would be cool with getting just a smile and a "Hello!", but today, these kids are all about the money. So please tip us! Regulars are generally really cool about doing this. They are also cool about bringing us cookies or some kind of candy and we always appreciate it. But then again, one of our customers gave us a bag of candy right after Easter. We were all excited until we took a bite and realized it must have been "Dollar Store" candy.....it tasted like crap. Thanks a lot Pastor Tony. But we still love you.
Speaking of tips, I guess you could include this in our lists of barista deaths. These days, it seems like everyone is underpaid and for a barista it feels especially so. Being a barista can be a high-stress, fast-paced job. I'm not complaining but it's not the place you want to work if you plan on sitting around being lazy, because it won't happen. So, as opposed to license Starbucks stores (the Starbucks that are in a grocery store or Barnes & Noble), we're allowed to accept tips. If you ever wake up one morning and ask yourself "How can I really piss someone off today?", just walk into a Starbucks and attempt to take money out of our tip jars so that you don't have to break a dollar. Oh yeah, your arm will be cut off on the spot and probably fed to some sort of rodent...NO MERCY! We WILL kill you. It's interesting, because the majority of people who try to take change out of our jars so that they don't have to break a dollar are usually higher class customers, you know, the ones driving the Mercedes parked out front. I have witnessed a few girls I work with literally flip out when someone tries to touch our jars. My favorite part about it all is when the customer then tries to argue with us. They say "But it's only 45 cents!". Yeah, we understand that, but it's not your money! At my old store, this giant wank actually argued with me and my fellow barista for ten minutes...and we still didn't cave. Just go home sir.
My Starbucks is located in a tiny strip mall, connected to a Sprint store, a Fedex Kinkos, and on the other end, a Game Stop. In the last 6 months, that Game Stop has been held up and robbed twice. The scary part is, seeing that their store opens after us and closes before us, I was in the same building while the robbery happened. At the end of it, the employees weren't harmed and were fine. The other day, one of the employees came into my cafe to get a "Crappy Hour" Frappuccino for half the price, and while she was waiting for her drink, she was telling us all about the robbery and to her luck, she was in the store both times. It brought back a memory of a few months ago when I got home after a close and came upstairs to my mom watching a crime show about Starbucks baristas who were robbed and killed while closing the store. I swear if that happens to me, I'll be pissed. I later thanked my mom for watching such a ridiculous show and giving me nightmares that will scar my life.
Now to lighten the mood, I will share a few fun facts that have occurred over the last few months.
1. A clown came through my drive-thru.
2. A fellow barista of mine argued with a guy at 6AM that we could, in fact, NOT make him an Iced coffee HOT. She offered him a hot brewed coffee and he refused and continued to say he wanted a iced coffee HOT. After slamming the window on him and having somebody else help him, they figured out that he wanted an iced coffee with no ice in it...
3. If you and your lover are in my cafe, on my couch, making out in front of many many customers, I will ask you to take your business elsewhere.
4. "The customers is always right", unless I'm right...then you're shit out of luck.
5. If you ask me to blend up your medicine in your Frappuccino, I will refuse.
6. Sir, I am not being racist when I say black coffee.
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