Message in your coffee

ONE OF THE THINGS I enjoyed on my last trip to the States was the advertising around the hot cup collars of coffees--now Starbucks has taken that a step further. Instead of using the cardboard cup clings as  hand-sized billboards, Starbucks is printing messages on the sides of cups. The one in this image is from film critic Roger Ebert: "A movie is not about what it is about. It is about how it is about it."

Comments on cups would be an interesting adjunct to the political scene in Ireland--comments from the opinion pages, electoral canvassing and front pages of papers making it onto the sides of coffee cups. The idea has received mixed reviews in the States.

Starbucks calls its campaign "The Way I See It" and it involves quotes from thinkers, authors, athletes and entertainers on the side of your morning latte. The goal, according to the company, is to foster philosophical debate in its 9,000-plus coffeehouses.

The quotes aren't all that inflammatory, though several mirror Starbucks' hallmark tall-grande-venti pretentiousness.

As I discovered with the coffee cup collars, you don't have to read the text to enjoy your cuppa. The cups are designed so they pour out of the side opposite the line of text which means you can have your coffee without text.

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Jay Cridlin -- "Coffee with steam"

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