The Creeping Evil of Starbucks

Yesterday was a tragic day for those who treasure the wonder of the Magic Kingdom at Walt Disney World.  The Main Street Bakery, long a fixture on Main Street USA, closed it's doors for the final time.  This thriving business which produced so many of the wonderful smells associated with that great walk down Main Street is a victim of corporate synergy and greed.  The Main Street Bakery is being replaced with a Starbucks.  It's the end of Walt Disney World as we know it...

I am not a Starbucks fan, but then again I am not much of a coffee drinker.  I am not opposed to progress, nor am I someone who always thinks the past was better than the future.  But I do have major problems with this particular change. They are putting Starbucks all over WDW, and to be honest putting them anywhere else in the parks doesn't bother me too much.  Main Street USA is one of the signature locations in all of WDW.  When you walk in through the tunnel and reach the MK, you are transported back to a much simpler era of American history.  The quaint barber shop, complete with barber shop quartet.  The old movie theater. The candy store.  And the incredible treats and aromas of the bakery.  Main Street sets the mood for the entire park with its theme and it ambiance. And now the bakery is gone, to be replaced by a Starbucks.  Starbucks may be a fixture in our modern world, but it is totally and completely out of place on Main Street. We are promised they will continue to serve some of he goodies from the bakery, but that is really beside the point.  I never ate there very often anyway.  The point is that there will be a Starbucks on Main Street USA, and that is just not right. It doesn't fit.  And I am very unhappy. Giant corporations are now doing to the wonderful make-believe world of Disney what they have already done to our real world- displacing small businesses and mom & pop shops with their one size fits all monopolies.  It just feels wrong.

As I lamented this occasion yesterday, I was reminded that this is not the first time Starbucks has done this to me.  In the 1990s I took youth groups to New York City nearly every year, and we stayed at the Milford Plaza Hotel on 45th and 8th.  Up half a block and across 45th was a little place called Oh-La-La (see picture). They had muffins, bagels and scones, as well as a variety of coffees.  But none of that really mattered, for Oh-La-La had the best hot chocolate in the history of the world!  Every morning I would arise before the group and go get a large hot chocolate. And every morning I would go back with the group and get another one!  It was simply amazing. So imagine my dismay in 2003 when I arrived in NYC only to discover that Oh-La-La has become a Starbucks.  I was devastated. I went in once- just to ask if perhaps Oh-La-La had moved, but it had simply been bought out.  The creeping evil of Starbucks had invaded the Broadway district. And now it has come to Walt Disney World...

My problem is not really with Starbucks.  It is that we are losing far too many people, places and things in our world that are unique. That have their own personalities and offer something different.  And in my humble opinion, we need to hold on to the uniqueness. A walk down Main Street USA is supposed to be a stroll through early 20th century America.  I am just not sure how I can maintain that illusion with a grande skinny mocha non-fat latte from 21st century Seattle.  I am sure I (and millions of others) will adjust. I am just not certain that I want to.  For today, just let me be a grumpy old man.