how startbucks destroys other busnesses.

I have lived in inner SE Portland for nearly 30 years and your history is full of shit. If you want to provide facts your argument would be valid, but it is bullshit and meaningless.

The only places that might have been called "coffee shops" before Starbucks opened in Pioneer Square were greasy spoon diners like the Hot Cake House, Tom's on 39th and Division, Space Age on Hawthorne, and Ruthie's on Division. Guess what? They are all still thriving but Ruthie's and they all still serve the same brown water crap coffee they always have. If any chain coffee shop killed Ruthie's, it was the nearby Stumptown, and that is not likely, they had vastly different types of customers.

No Logo by Naomi Klein fully articulates how Starbucks operates. Please look there first if you wish to learn about these types of things.

Starbucks is STILL trying to drive Sambucks out of business. A multi-million dollar transnational corporation beating up a small, local business in smalltown USA (Astoria).

the dude (resident), is right about one point...portland had only the vaguest idea about what good coffee was until the appearance of starbucks...but that seems to be a hefty price to pay for what they are doing to the character of local neighborhoods globally.

Moon, please tell us what this neighborhood damage is that is being done on a global scale. Unlike Wal*Mart, McDonald's, etc, which behave like 1,000 pound gorillas, Starbucks seems to be much more willing and able to assess an area and design a store that blends in gracefully. This seems to be a large part of their success. I am a world traveler and have seen Starbucks in Europe, Asia, and the US. They are always clearly Starbucks, but they also assume a local character that attracts and retains a loyal clientele.

There was no neighborhood coffee shop phenomena before Starbucks, not in Portland, not since the beatnik era of the 50's. Starbucks created the present neighborhood coffee shop era. They broke the ground that now fosters as much growth for their competitors as it does them. Take a walk around downtown and you will see 5 or 6 alternatives for every Starbucks and they are all doing quite well. It is common business sense that success begets success. A cluster of "competitors" will individually do better than a solitary business. Consider shoe shops as an example. Most customers will make a trip to a mall where they can shop several shoe stores. They don't as often go to a solitary shoe store where they can't compare prices and options. This success spills over to other unrelated businesses and they get more customers than they would in isolation. The likely success of 7 corners Starbucks and New Seasons will create a better business climate for all the other nearby businesses, including Red and Black, People's, and Mirador. Big business does not always kill little business. (There are exceptions, like Wal*Mart.) Smart entrepreneurs see opportunity in the shadows of their bigger cousins. You would instinctively assume a major grocery store would kill a nearby mom and pop grocery. The opposite is true. 7-11 stores figured this out decades ago and deliberately opened a store where ever Safeway did. They had less to choose from and higher prices, yet achieved enormous success.

If there is a reason to avoid buying from Starbucks, it would be their use of coffee grown by underpaid workers. This is an issue to complain about. Most of the other issues about Starbucks are red herrings, easily seen through, and diminishing of the cause they pretend to support. Stick to facts and avoid flaming rhetoric and you might find a more supportive audience in the community.

Boycott them and all the other multinational coorportions. Buy loacal or not at all.

There's a brand-new Safeway "superstore" on the east end of Astoria with a flashy Starbucks with a leather Costco couch and a fireplace in it. Come on over and see how gracefully multinational corporations blend in to communities, smothering us with crap from China made by slave workers for a dollar a day. Cruise through town and check out all the junk stores and pawn shops and empty buildings. Gawk at the rich people on the condo ship docked at the burned-out port of Astoria, and fall all over your neighbors trying to sell them trinkets so you can pay your rent, which is getting higher and higher since this is a "tourist town" now. Drive down a little further and see the shiny new Holiday Inn with the cheap vinyl siding smack up against the bridge blocking everyone's access to the Columbia River. And on your way out, you might want to stop in for a coffee at Sambucks, because if you wait, you won't have another chance. Starbucks a mile away will surely kill her off now.

Portland grown coffee? Local or not at all might work on a tropical paradise island, but anywhere else you are going to eat mostly from shipped in food.

Coffee People was once a locally-owned coffee outlet. Others existed, too, before Starbucks. Whatever is desirable about Starbucks can be provided just as well as, if not better than, Starbucks by a locally-owned, worker-owned, community-financed company. Instead of investing our money in corporate wealth suckers, we can invest in funds for local start-ups that serve whatever healthy desires too many neighbors now think only big corporate outlets can provide.

The answer to the question, why is Starbucks unhealthy, can be found by observing where most of the money goes. Giving a little bit to local non-profits is merely PR masking the power of the vacuum sucking most of it right out of our pockets, our community, the region, and the local ecology.

Of course, coffee sucks, anyway. Anyone who cares about the environment (i.e., ending deforestation and songbird depopulation) and economic justice will stop drinking it and instead advocate for ways that people in commodity-growing regions can stop living as slaves to exportation in order to finance IMF structural adjustment programs (SAPs!). Coffee plantation slaves could instead grow their own crops and plant-based materials, so that they can become self-reliant through their own carbohydrate economies. See Michael Shuman's book, Going Local, for more information on the comparative advantages of local commerce.

SmallTown and on a island with wonderful coffee houses and here comes starfucks and all there money. Boycott them all!!!

The Starbucks in the new Safeway is tiny. It only has a partial menu. And there was already a Starbucks in the Fred Meyer in Warrenton, which lots of Astorians shop at. This Safeway Starbucks isn't going to do anything to anyone.

I work there, and lots of customers have told me the coffee is too expensive, and that they're going downtown for some "real coffee". Plenty of people around that won't spend $2.50 on coffee.

And there's no leather couch anywhere in the store.

First let me respond to resident "you're full of shit". For starters you indicate that there wasn't good coffee before Starbucks. I have several friends who are in fact Starbuck's team members, but that doesn't mean their coffee is good. Every time I have been into a Starbuck's and bought their coffee I was dissappointed, and I remember each time why it's been several months since I drank a cup of Starbucks. First of all it's mass produced crap produced by near-to-slave labor. There is no care given to quality of bean selection, and even less care given in their roasting process. It always, without exception, tastes burnt. Besides the fact that it shouldn't be bought due to the labor practices used to produce the beans, it's no better than a burnt pot of gas station coffee. In apology to the gas stations out there, I have purchased more than a few excellent cups of coffee through the years at random gas stations. The only product that Starbuck's offers that is well made and tastes good is their expresso drinks such as cappuccinos and mochas, which, by the way, is/can be done by a machine. The reason for this is the flavor of those types of drinks are more based on things that are combined with the expresso beans than the bean itself. When it comes to an excellent cup of coffee there are factors that Starbucks lacks severely. First is the altitude and climate in which the beans are grown. Next is the love and energy that is put into the production of the bean (no doubt that free trade coffee blows away the competition in this one area vs slave coffee). Then there is the care taken in the selection process of the beans to be distributed in the given coffee co's shops. From there, next is care in the roasting process to bring the best qualities of the chosen bean. From this point it comes down to the grinding and brewing process in the given coffee shop. A coffee company who takes care in all these areas produces a cup of coffee that is vastly superior to Starbucks or any other low end coffee out there. Until today(12-02-05), I occasionally would indulge in a Starbuck's expresso-based drink such as a mocha or cappuccino. After I heard the Judge's decision in the Starbuck's-Sambuck's case today I will never spend another penny at a Starbuck's anywhere in the world. I will also work to convince my friends who have been working there for years to find another job, every time I see them. Starbuck's behavior in this case is disgusting. 4,666 stores and they're going after someone who owns one coffee store named after herself, because they want to open a coffee shop in her area. I urge others to also boycott Starbuck's, and look around your town and find that great cup of coffee made with love. If you're ever in Colorado and you want a REAL cup of extraordinary coffee check out Peaberry's(I don't work for them by the way). The owner of this company has created a niche (at least in Colorado) for themselves by executing every stage of the process I described above flawlessly while one-upping most Starbuck's locations in the customer service area as well. I urge other coffee-loving entrepreneurs to do the same in your state or area. I have had many varieties of coffee at Peaberry's that had incredibly rich and wonderful taste without even the addition of sugar or creamer. You can't say that for any cup of Starbucks or other mass bought coffees out there. I am 100% sure there are other entities that produce a fabulous cup of coffee, through care in each step of the process start to finish, like Peaberry's. There are a lot of coffee-drinkers like me who really appreciate a great cup of coffee and also are concerned with whether it was produced with a conscience. I would love to hear about some other companies who produce an incredible cup of coffee so that I can sample them when I travel to your area. Who are they?