I was just watching the NBC nightly news in a malaise preparing to clean floors and prepare for the big Siphon brewer event tomorrow. I saw Lester start into some Starbucks piece with clip shots and cliche use of coffee terms to describe the situation. Then up pops Jon Cates of Broadway Cafe out in Missouri about his business growth while competing directly against Starbucks.
Small world but it reminded me I owe that guy some coffees. When I was moaning about the Yirg situation, this guy just sends me some Yirg, a Kenya, and some Espresso to play with. The gesture was appreciated and I will surely send some coffee in response when I get settled, maybe as a congratulations for the recent press in the NY Times and on NBC!
It's a small community, don't you think?
As for Starbucks, I can think of few things less relevant to elite coffees so we will hardly ever chat about them here.