As a non-corporate coffee shop owner I always hear how nice it is to have the choice of coming to a small independent shop like mine as opposed to going to Starbucks. The next thing I hear is about how Starbucks coffee just taste burnt. I have long had a theory about why this is and remember it is only a theory, not truth.

My belief is that the reason why Starbucks taste burnt has to do with the quantity of coffee Starbucks requires and the consistency that follows. If you look at the amount of top grade raw coffee beans there are in the World available for speciality coffee businesses like mine, the truth is there is just not enough of that type of coffee for Starbuck's needs and furthermore at the price point they also require. So to ensure consistency at all of the thousands up thousands of Starbuck's locations, they then have to choose lower quality coffee beans. Now I don't think Starbuck's raw beans are the worst coffee beans available, not at all but I do think they are not up to par with most speciality coffee roaster's offerings. 

Now that takes us to the next step, the roasting of this abundance middle grade coffee.