The Food Scout

Starbucks Coffee Company just launched www.mystarbucksidea.com, and I have to admit that when I first saw it, I said to myself, “Oh, brother.” The fact that they printed little cards that could be picked up in-store, which read “Have an idea for us?” on one side, and listed the website on the other, made me think the company must be really desperate for ideas to have to go this far.

But then you go to the site and you see that it’s really a brilliant method of connecting with their passionate brand advocates and calming their detractors. Here, people can sign up (hello, database building!) to post comments and ideas, and even vote on other people’s ideas. Any company could do this (and most likely has), of course. But Starbucks has designated some development and HR people to monitor the site and respond to the posts like an editor in “letters to the editor.” Even better, these idea-masters follow up on the ideas that fall in line with the ideas Starbucks was already working on.

Let’s face it, it’s probably pretty rare that a consumer’s going to come up with something viable that Starbucks development people haven’t already thought of, tested and prototyped. But by giving people an outlet to compliment or complain, and to make them feel heard, is a real brilliant publicity stroke. It feels more like a psychologist, or a girlfriend, who makes you feel better just by listening to them, whether their problem get’s fixed or not. In contrast, some other food companies have hung up a sign in the past year or so (Kraft, for instance) that just sound like a company that’s run out of ideas or is tired of fielding complaints.

Clearly, Howard Schultz has come back not just to make Wall Street happy, but to green-light and fast-track a mountain of buzzworthy brand-building initiatives that probably would have taken many more months and approval steps to move forward without his involvement. Pike Place Blend caught the news this month, but mystarbucksidea.com is the seed that was planted this month to re-enlist the original 12 million disciples and turn the Sauls into Pauls.