Sue me, but I like Starbucks. Despite having an espresso machine at home, the first thing I head for when I wake up, there's something easier about wandering into Starbucks and having a coffee in your hand 3 minutes later. 2 weeks ago Starbucks finally made it into Henley; it's bad. There were, this morning, 6 people working behind the counter. 4 people taking orders and 2 people making them; which results in an obscene queue which seems to permanently shock the staff, the "replace filter" buzzer goes off for 3 minutes without anyone attending to it and best of all there's the fear. They're confused by the Starbucks "lingo" and have to expand "Venti triple shot mocha, no whip" into "That's a venti mocha with an extra espresso shot and no whipped cream" (the first week they were writing it out in full instead of ticking the boxes). Lets not even talk about the customers who also take 3-5 minutes to choose. Maybe I was spoilt by the speed of London and US stores in delivering my caffeine.

Still at least they have the comfy sofas, which they appear to be removing from some London stores.