A global empire is coming crashing down amidst an unjust war. As coffee roasters one would think keeping your mouth shut and political and religious opinions to yourself would be best for business.
Starbucks Learned The Hard Way
Starbucks learned the hard way by boldly professing, “I Stand With Israel.”
The problem with this is that the world is waking up to the atrocities being committed in the region.
While they’ve been going on for more than 75 years since, even prior, but we can clearly date it back to the first Nakba of 1948 standing for occupation and genocide is not a good look. To be clear Palestine has been dealing with Israeli bullying prior to 1948 and this whole time before October 7th. That was not a random attack. What happened on October 7th was retaliatory after decades of oppression, murder and abuse at the hands of Israel.
Starbucks representatives who thought it would be a good idea to publicly take sides learned a big lesson.
We just want our coffee Starbucks. Maybe we really don’t want to know who’s side you’re on.
While Gazan children have been dodging tanks on their way to school for decades, the difference this time is the heavy hand social media has played in sharing the truth.
Starbucks Crumbles
Shaun King an independent journalist with about a million followers at the start of this single handedly changed the narrative. He is very much at the forefront of the world wide protests because it was his footage from journalists inside Palestine that got out and made it to the world. He now has over 5 million followers.
Starbucks apparently glossed over his account, but they did rely heavily on NY Times, CNN and the propaganda coming out of the White House.
Starbucks stock has plummeted and while it’s too early to tell if the Starbucks boycott will last and be a lasting catastrophe there’s definitely a dent there and the baron Starbucks everywhere are evidence.
For the ultimate good at times like this especially as executives of multi billion dollar public franchises like Starbucks we have to have our pulse on the world, not the White House. We have to see what the world is feeling and we have to use intuitive prowess to relate to humanity with our eyes, ears and hearts. We have to see what our customers are feeling.
