U Street 1250 U Street NW - Oct 30, 2005

The U Street Starbucks is truly an Urban Coffee Opportunity. Unlike its Logan Circle sibling, this is a neighborhood still in transition, but it's coming along beautifully. Ben's Chili Bowl, a D.C. landmark, is across the street and still going strong, while new shops, restaurants and the Ellington Apartments have revitalized the area.

This a very small Starbucks, with barely three tables inside. There is outside seating, however. The crowd is diverse. Jacinda tried a Pumpkin Spice Latte for the first time, and she thought it was surprisingly good. Good enough to make Starbucks's profits soar last quarter.

We'd like to take this opportunity to welcome all the new readers who've found us after a number of gracious bloggers linked to us. The response to our little project has been largely positive and we appreciate all the encouragement. But we'd also like to take a moment to address all the haters.

Some of the commenters on DCist may have missed the point of what we're trying to do, which is have a little fun doing something we do anyway--drink Starbucks coffee. It also gives us the opportunity to do something we wouldn't have done, and that is explore some of the unique neighborhoods in D.C. Sadly, for some reason, when Starbucks is involved, some folks can't look beyond their bleeding hearts. How humorless do you have to be to suggest that we should instead be touring every independent coffee shop in town? But as Louis Armstrong said, "There are some people that if they don't know, you can't tell them."

The meme seems to be that Starbucks has homogenized coffeehouse culture. However, we're not sure that there ever was such a culture in the U.S. before Starbucks came along and popularized this European concept. Some say that in fact the independents have benefited from the millions Starbucks has invested in marketing high-end coffee culture. Whatever the case, Starbucks didn't force homogenization on anyone. They offered it and people took it because they wanted it. Nothing wrong with that.

Consumed: A tall pumpkin spice latte (Jacinda); a doppio espresso (Jerry).

What do you have to say about this Starbucks?