Starbucks in Austria: A Lament

Yes, there are Starbucks here in Vienna. No surprise really, here's a map showing just how many there were around the world back in '03. Austria had a little dot then too.

When you find a Starbucks here, the first thing that strikes you is that the word "find" is very appropriate for what you've just done. Starbucks doesn't haunt you a like friendly caffeinated ghost here. They don't show up three per block - in a city of 2 million, there are 9 according to Google maps (which, granted, is still a pretty big number, but to contrast, there are about 40 McDonald's).

Since it's October, I was on my yearly pilgrimage to drink the first Pumpkin Spice Latte of the season. There are really very few other reasons to pay slightly higher than average Starbucks prices - in Euro - when you could get delicious local stuff instead (coffee capital of the world! or so they say). So, I found one. And it was nice. There were tables with umbrellas outside, a floor to ceiling window in front of the couches and comfy chairs, and a big indoor seating area where the local college crowd seemed to be gathered.



In the land of the metric system, I was happy to see that the standard Tall, Grande, and Venti cup-sizing system is still nominally in place, though no one seems to use it. I kept hearing "klein" and "gross" and "mittelgross," and it made me a little sad that our pretentious, unnecessary Starbucks-specific sizes are being grossly thrown by the wayside (pun intended after the fact).

The names of the drinks are in English, if not the descriptions, and they've got Black Currant Tea, and some other fun non-American drinks.

But.

After careful searching, and allowing at least three people to pass me by as I searched and searched again, there was no Pumpkin Spice Latte. I almost walked out, but there was a tempting comfy chair pulled up to a table close to me, so I went ahead and ordered "ein Iced Vanilla Chai Tea Latte, klein." The guy at the counter thanked me in English.

Why, O Starbucks, why, in your move across the sea did you forget to bring one of your greatest creations here to Vienna? Apparently, Pumpkin Spice Lattes are just one more thing to add to the ever-growing list of things the rest of the world just isn't ready for, like Poptarts and delivery pizza. And here, they'd probably want to see you juice the actual pumpkin and pour that into their drink before they'd drink it.


The Starbucks promise in German. Yes, there is something wrong with my drink. It's October, and it doesn't taste like pumpkin!

Unrelated: Anyone else feel uneasy about thawing things out all day on the counter? Yeah. Try arguing with an Austrian that there are things called bacteria that might grow on chicken left at room temperature for 6 hours. Oh, Europeans.