Starbucks Latest to Suffer "Black Guy" Receipt Scandal (UPDATED)

Little is known about the photo at right, other than the fact that it was uploaded to i.imgur.com and then publicized by Buzzfeed.com. So we cover this with the proviso that it could be a hoax, but it's out there — and it's impacting the Starbucks brand.

It comes as mainstream media outlets (we're looking at you, TIME) are making hay this week with a Tumblr site that collects (and doesn't verify) user photos of their Starbucks order with misspelled (or just plain mangled) versions of customer names scrawled on the cup.

If this particular maligned Starbucks cup scrawl is real, it's a sign that Starbucks' internal brand engagement and employee training needs some work — and just the latest incident in a long line of poorly thought out moves by employees. Poorly thought out moves that cause loads of grief for the brands involved.Continue reading...