The Starbucks® ROI Experiment

A brilliant engineer I know raised this question “How much business has actually been won or sales resulted from business conducted at Starbucks®?” Wouldn’t it be interesting if we could measure the Return on Investment (ROI) related to those coffees purchased (or chai tea, in my case)?

We define ROI as the areas we spend our time and energy on that actually bring in profitable business. How can you measure it? With something as simple as a spreadsheet or a complex system such as http://www.aprimo.com/ . We could write another whole blog on methods which I won’t get into right now, but perhaps later.

Let’s think about that for a second. Can we start a movement where every time someone meets at a Starbucks or has a meeting with a Starbucks in hand, one records the amount of business resulting from that meeting? In addition to measuring the source – such as a networking event, association, referrals, etc. (as we all should be doing and BrightBlue does!) - let’s measure if Starbucks was somehow involved in closing that business.

My mind is now wandering to thoughts about different Starbucks locations and why hot beverages seem to make social/business interactions smoother. Is it the innate comfort we have of routine and/or familiar surroundings? Or maybe that eating and drinking together promotes a feeling of camaraderie? Does the caffeine and sugar kickstart the creative juices?

Comment on our blog and we’ll treat you to something at Starbucks!

Let the revolution begin: Ready, set, take a sip!