As a symbol of American culture, Starbucks rapidly went global after Howard Schultz took over, opening 17,600 stores in 61 countries. However, when Starbucks entered countries with deep cultural traditions such as China, India, and France, it frequently encountered cultural resistance and controversy. From being forced to withdraw from its Forbidden City store, to the long wait in the Indian market, to the French people's steadfast defense of their traditional cafés, Starbucks, while exporting American coffee culture, has also had to face the stubborn resistance of local cultures. This article will walk you through Starbucks' path of cultural conflict and integration around the world, and explore the balance between commercial expansion and cultural respect.
Starbucks coffee has long been an iconic symbol of American culture, known to virtually everyone. This coffee bean and spice specialty store, originally founded by three young people, was transformed after marketing expert Howard Schultz raised funds to acquire it, becoming a chain coffee brand that combines a sense of fashion with a petit-bourgeois flair. It not only successfully listed on Nasdaq but also expanded its reach across the globe. Today, Starbucks has opened 17,600 stores in 61 countries, sparing no effort to penetrate countries around the world and spread American culture. But when it comes to each individual country, the situation is vastly different.
China: The Smoke of Historical and Cultural Conflict
Chinese culture has an extremely tenacious character. Chinese people tend to protect their own traditions, hold a conservative attitude toward new things, and sometimes even harbor a sense of rejection. Wherever Chinese people go, they retain their own customs and habits and do not readily integrate into the local culture. Conversely, they also strive to influence the people around them. For example, Chinese cuisine has long become a widely popular cuisine in the United States, and even white people are keen to learn Chinese kung fu. Wherever Chinese people are, whether conditions allow or not, they will find ways to celebrate their own festivals and sustain Chinese culture. I once saw a small town with only ten Chinese people, and when Spring Festival came, they still celebrated it in the town's only Chinese restaurant. Even though it was not a holiday in the United States that day, they were willing to take leave rather than skip this most important Chinese festival. This is precisely a manifestation of the tenacious vitality of Chinese culture.
However, China's younger generation is very open-minded and willing to embrace new things, and the target group Starbucks has locked onto is precisely urban white-collar workers who yearn for a petit-bourgeois lifestyle and successful businesspeople who admire Western culture. Therefore, after entering China in 1999, Starbucks expanded rapidly, taking root and blossoming in many major cities, quickly surpassing one hundred stores, and today has grown to about 600 stores.
However, the store opened in the Forbidden City sparked fierce controversy. The New York Times once reported: Starbucks' entry into the Forbidden City is an extreme case of globalization, in which American coffee culture, which takes a mass-market approach, has actually penetrated the most sacred historical relic in all of China. At the time, the Starbucks in the Forbidden City had already aroused widespread discussion among Chinese people. Many believed that the Forbidden City is a treasure of Chinese culture and that foreign brands should not be allowed to enter; protecting cultural heritage should take precedence over everything else, and no for-profit activities should be involved. In 2009, Starbucks, after operating for seven years in the Forbidden City's Jiuqing Duty Room, quietly withdrew amid the controversy.
Many Chinese people regard Starbucks as "a carrier and symbol of America's not-so-refined food culture," and consider its opening a store in the Forbidden City to be a form of "cultural invasion" that erodes traditional Chinese culture. Although Jim Donald, then global president of Starbucks, responded by saying, "Starbucks' opening a branch in the Forbidden City is done with respect and a high degree of sensitivity toward the cultural and historical traditions of the Forbidden City," in the public consciousness, Starbucks' cultural tone and the Forbidden City's cultural atmosphere still remain incompatible. Tourists in search of a sense of cultural history would only find Starbucks' signage jarring.
Coincidentally, not long ago there was news that Starbucks had moved into Lingyin Temple, and the media and public were in an uproar, with Starbucks once again raising concerns about "cultural invasion." Starbucks represents typical American coffee culture, while Lingyin Temple carries China's thousand-year Buddhist culture; the two are utterly incompatible, and the public could not accept it. Later it turned out to be a false alarm—it was not that Starbucks was really going to move into Lingyin Temple, but rather that it was opening a store near the Lingyin scenic area. There were already many businesses nearby, so what harm would one more do? Why was it specifically the American Starbucks that was reprimanded?
Some people believe that China has numerous cultural relics, and their elegance, refinement, and breadth may perhaps be incompatible with foreign shops like Starbucks, but there is no need to view it as "invading traditional Chinese culture." If traditional Chinese culture were so fragile, then it would not be worth much. Other European countries such as France are almost all tea-drinking nations. If we say Starbucks is "American food culture invading traditional Chinese culture," then without a doubt, tea is a symbol of Chinese food culture, and our food culture has long since invaded the whole world. "The world is flat," and the circulation of people, products, trade, and culture will only become faster and will inevitably impact and influence one another; we must be psychologically prepared. For many foreign things, perhaps we should view them the same way. Whether it is "tea and sympathy" or "coffee and sympathy," what is needed first is a heart of tolerance and understanding.
Some also believe that we should create our own cultural brands while protecting traditional culture. A restless nation without cultural depth cannot properly protect its own culture either.
Therefore, there is no need to make such a fuss over this matter; doing your own part well is what matters most.
However, for Starbucks itself, perhaps it should learn a lesson from China: being too ambitious will only backfire. While developing its business, it would be most ideal to also respect traditional Chinese culture, organically combine the two different cultures, and achieve a win-win situation.
India: Resistance from Traditional Culture
In India, where the coffee market is growing rapidly, Starbucks has gone through many twists and turns.
Indian culture is similar to Chinese culture; its own culture is also very conservative, unwilling to be assimilated by other countries, and not very receptive to foreign cultures. However, many in the new generation of Indians have been educated in Western countries such as Europe and the United States, and they are relatively more accepting of Western culture. Perhaps the older generation still likes drinking Indian masala chai, but the new generation of Indians likes drinking coffee, and no small number of them identify with American culture.
In Silicon Valley, America's famous high-tech hub, there are many engineers from India. On the one hand, they still maintain their own cultural characteristics, wear their country's traditional clothing, and celebrate their country's festivals. In Silicon Valley, Indian restaurants and Indian supermarkets are everywhere. Some say that in Silicon Valley, Chinese and Indians each hold half the world. One of my Indian colleagues was born in Kuwait, grew up in Singapore, and later came to the United States. She has hardly lived in India for even a single day, but her parents insisted on teaching her Hindi and Indian culture. Her English is excellent, yet in the United States she still celebrates every traditional Indian festival, even some lesser-known ones. This strong sense of identification with one's own culture makes it very difficult for dining businesses representing Western culture to enter India. Just as McDonald's has vegetarian burgers in India but no beef, because Hinduism regards cows as sacred and they must not be killed.
As early as 2005, Starbucks and the Indian local company Future Group planned to establish a joint venture, preparing to expand Starbucks chain stores into India's domestic market. Unexpectedly, because problems kept arising with the agreement, the plan was shelved. Starbucks publicly criticized India's regulatory environment as full of bureaucracy and completely lacking transparency, stating that it would not consider entering the Indian market again for some time.
With the rise of the middle class and young consumer groups, India's annual coffee retail sales reached 150 million US dollars and were growing at an average annual expansion rate of 30 percent. By 2007, Starbucks wanted to enter the Indian market again. It took a detour by testing the waters through a large local Indian cinema network, with minimal effect. At the end of 2010, Starbucks announced the restart of its plan to expand into the Indian market. By this time, although India's tea culture was still "the mainstream in power," the middle class, Western businesspeople, and young trendsetters had quietly changed: they accepted and loved coffee culture, and even before Starbucks came in, they already had their own cafés locally. At this point, entering India was timely.
On October 19, 2012, Starbucks opened its first branch in India. In the following ten days, outside an old colonial-era building in downtown Mumbai, people waiting to enter Starbucks queued up sweating, with as many as 50 people at the most, while security guards strictly enforced a "one in, one out" policy. One young Indian person among them said: "Everyone is excited. We have our own coffee brands in India, but this one (Starbucks) has been promoted so heavily." Will Starbucks succeed this time? It is still too early to draw a conclusion. However, given time, perhaps Starbucks coffee will be widely accepted as it has been in China—as long as they do not open inside the Taj Mahal scenic area.
France: A Stubborn Culture War
Coffee was introduced to Europe in the 17th century. For most Europeans, cafés are not only places to drink coffee but also refuges from life's dullness. Every café has its own regular patrons, who usually come at fixed times with newspapers to sip a cup and while away a few hours. In Europe, most people are very stubborn, and many cities have banned Starbucks chain stores from opening branches within the city. Moreover, compared with many independent coffee shops that have both history and character, Starbucks has little appeal to Europeans in terms of either taste or price. And the invasion of American coffee culture undoubtedly poses a challenge to local coffee traditions.
Europeans' stubbornness is reflected in many aspects. For example, when tomatoes were first introduced to Europe from the Americas, Europeans did not eat them, believing they were poisonous. It is said that one person did not believe the thing was poisonous, wrote a will, and then tried eating one, and as it turned out, nothing happened, so tomatoes became popular in Europe as food. When potatoes arrived in Europe, they encountered the same thing. Arrogant Europeans thought potatoes were ugly and were the food of inferior people like Indians, so they did not eat them. For a long time, potatoes were grown in royal gardens as ornamental plants. If Ireland had not later suffered a famine and used potatoes to solve the problem, perhaps no one in Europe would still be eating potatoes today! In addition, after hamburgers entered France, French restaurants used fine beef to make hamburgers and made hamburger set meals the way they would make exquisite French cuisine, and as a result they actually sold premium hamburgers for more than forty US dollars each, leaving cheap American hamburger chains utterly humiliated.
With such a historical background, one can imagine how difficult it is for Starbucks to enter Europe. In Europe, Starbucks is usually regarded by Europeans as a symbol of horrifying "Americanization." In Paris, Starbucks is almost nowhere to be seen, and the few that exist do only ordinary business. Meanwhile, several distinctive coffee shops in the city center are packed all day long and have become must-visit places for foreign tourists.
When Starbucks finally broke through layer after layer of resistance and appeared on the Boulevard de la Bastille, although the French media scoffed at it, French young people were very excited, because they could finally go to a café like the one in their favorite American TV series Friends. On the Champs-Élysées stood a Starbucks billboard: "Starbucks—Rich Coffee." In fact, for young people, this was a rare exotic flavor, far more exciting than ordinary French cafés. Starbucks' Bill O'Shea said: "I think whenever we enter a new market, we study the local coffee culture with great respect and deep interest. We acknowledge that the cafés here have a long history, and we are confident that we will like, enhance, and integrate into this passion." Some French young people also said: "I really like Starbucks' caramel coffee, it's really good. I like that it opened in Paris. I think French people will definitely like Starbucks. I like French cafés, but Starbucks is so popular in the United States, it is part of American culture, and now it has come to France, which is great."
However, Starbucks was only partly right. For quite a number of French people, this coffee, brewed according to the same formula in all 7,000 Starbucks coffee shops around the world, even if they call it handcrafted, can never replace the corner café or the small cup of coffee unique to Paris. For other French people, this large American coffee chain can appear on French streets, but it absolutely cannot crush the traditional family-run small cafés, because they need those small cafés with their own national cultural characteristics to continue to survive.
Starbucks strives to actively absorb the beverage characteristics of other countries and reduce cultural rejection as much as possible. It allows people of all ethnicities, age groups, professions, and cultural backgrounds to find drinks suited to their own tastes here. Trying many approaches, diversifying operations, and using this gentle way to communicate with cultures around the world may help Starbucks emerge from its trough earlier and usher in another peak of development. But as more and more food and tea beverages are added, and the consumer base continues to expand, will this also dilute Starbucks' brand culture, wear away the individuality it relies on for survival, and ultimately leave it looking like neither fish nor fowl, thereby making it fade into the crowd?
The above content is compiled by CoffeeHunters, a coffee news website.
