Why do people like to drink coffee and why is Starbucks coffee so popular?

Question

As I mentioned above, I was wondering why do people love to drink coffee and mostly importantly why people love to drink coffee in Starbucks. All over the world... The Coffee in Starbucks is more tasty? I drink a lot Starbucks Coffee, but nothing very special compared with other coffee...

Answer

not only this, but also other products like Hershey chocolate, turkey, white meat vs. dark, homogenized vs. UHT milk, jelly, etc ... plenty of local shinny stars which would not even get the least traveled globetrotter to put his shades on.

it's trendy, hip, expensive, very well marketed and designed for mass consumption, but not world good taste.
so you said it, "nothing very special compared with other coffee ... All over the world".

see how starbucks fares in other countries and even continents, with either no growth or no profit at all.

Answer

The situation is changing as free wifi becomes more available everywhere, but Starbucks offers free wifi everywhere, and when traveling, that means a lot.

Answer

I love coffee. Asking why people love coffee is sort of like asking why people love chocolate. 
We usually hit Starbucks when we are away from home because it is consistent and easy to find. I have tried a number of the local coffee places and had really mixed results. Coffee that tastes like water served by someone so stoned they could barely assemble a latte. Rude staff and nasty coffee. Weak coffee overloaded with syrup. These are some of the things I have run into at local coffee places where I live. So Starbucks is a serious improvement. I have had decent coffee at non chain places when we have traveled but where I live, most of the indie places are horrible.

Answer

Why do people love to drink coffee? Poets have been writing about that for hundreds of years. Flavor, aroma, warmth, the companionability of the coffee house, and...the caffeine. I do not ordinarily drink caffeinated tea or coffee, for health reasons, and when I do, man, can I tell the difference. It makes me feel as if all my broken-up parts are coming together and getting re-glued into one integrated structure.

Answer

I love coffee too. Sometimes the smell of it is enough to energize me. I know this probably ain't good as it's a kind of addiction, but yet i just love it.

Answer

Note: I posted this originally in coffeegeek to answer the question: "what is coffee supposed to taste like?" But I now realize I was actually closer to answering the question: "why?"

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Although the following description is just my personal experience, I'm betting it applies to more than a few of my fellow coffee drinkers out there. I will therefore don the mantle of absolute certainty and loudly proclaim:

THIS IS WHAT WE CRAVE WHEN WE DRINK COFFEE:

Prior to brewing, coffee taste cravings influence our nervous system and cannot be eliminated from the final mix post-tasting. At this stage, flavors and tactile sensations are particularly indistinguishable from other situational criteria, much as a dog smells locational data, seeing with its nose as if scents were visible. The coffee tastes of breakfast predominate in the morning, whereas in the evening there are generally post-meal resolution tastes, yet both share elements of sweetness, robustness, and satisfying richness or clarity, depending on your leaning. For the morning drinker, these recalled sensations are magnified by caffeine addiction to include chocolate addiction, the acute absence of caramel and roasted richness impelling the drinker to engage the grinding mechanism and begin the brew cycle lest they die alone and unloved. The sound of the grinder triggers an increasing awareness of roasted nutty flavors wafting from newly crushed beans. The onset of hot, steaming water (concentrating on darker roasts now) elicits sympathetic taste sensations of dark, rich cocoa-laden goodness now competing with nutty roasty smells until first actual tasting is accomplished. With the sensory expectations now maxed-out, the first sip often disappoints this sea of anticipation; but the agile brain quickly recalibrates, whereupon the second sip announces complexity in the form of dark chocolatey roasted bass notes surrounding fruity honey-like/wine-like/baked fruit pie sour/sweet flakey piecrust liquid dreams until the final sips accentuate the dark intensity but maxing out the richness (we're obviously leaving the paper-filtered camp behind on this one), and the sight of the empty cup will leave one with a satisfying memory of that richness until the next morning, when the absence of same begins the cycle anew.

Answer

I don't think it's that Starbucks' coffee is better. It's that Starbucks is everywhere, so wherever you are you will have a consistent experience. Most people prefer consistency. There is always a risk to going to a one-of-a-kind place. Besides, it is just a matter of available seats. Because Starbucks has the most locations, they have the most seats. If everybody started looking for a coffee place which was not Starbucks, there wouldn't be any seats.

I like to find one-of-a-kind coffee shops myself, but sometimes they don't pass. It's a risk, but a small one.

Answer

I like to drink coffee because sometimes it's too early for whisky or cognac.

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Why do people like to drink coffee and why is Starbucks coffee so popular?

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