Categories
It Happened to Me Toronto (a.k.a. Accordion City)

Starbucks I Have Known

In an article titled Maximum Starbucks Density, Jason Kottke points to a blog entry by Justin Blanton, who used the Starbucks locator web page

and discovered that there are 43 Starbucks branches within a 5-mile

radius of his apartment. He challenged readers to beat that. I can, with 51 branches. The record — a whopping 170 Starbucks — belongs to an area “around Broadway in NYC”.

While looking at some of the locations on the map of the Starbucks near

my house, I got the urge to annotate the map (classifying things

qualifies as a recreational activity in the nerd world). Here’s what I

put together — click the map below for a larger version:

19 replies on “Starbucks I Have Known”

United States

The nearest Retail Stores in your area are listed below.

[Sorry, no listings]

YEAH! I F-ing RULE!

Opening it up to 10 miles gets me 4… I get to 40 with a 50 mile search…

That’s ok, starbucks… move along.. nothing to see here…

Yep, I also get 51 Starbucks, I think I live less than 5 miles from you because I get mostly the same ones, just in a different order (the closest to my apartment first).

It’s refreshing to see someone post their street address in their blog. It takes a lot of the effort out of stalking.

— Lara

I actually was thinking the same thing. I had a description of my building in a couple of posts, but I later deleted it. But if you really want to find me, you can figure it out from some of my entries. This is way too revealing, though.

My resume’s been online for years, and th eonly people who have ever stalked me were Human Resources departments and headhunters (er, I mean “Professional Job Placement Specialists”).

Within 50 miles of my home…NONE! I went to the largest town in the area (about 60 miles away) and did a 50 mile search from it. Also none.

Although I do know the Barnes and Noble there serves Starbucks coffee. Gee, all of a sudden I feel like a real hick.

That map doesn’t have the Starbucks at Wellington and John, either, coffee of choice for many a Mother Corp. drone.

As an official Queer who skims your blog, I would say the Second Cup Steps are no longer. Only street kids hang out there now. If you want the culture, go down the block to the Timothy’s at Alexander and Church, more commonly known as “The Bear Store” because of the hirsuit men who hang out on the corner.

The more you know… bling!!

–Dead Robot

As someone who lives in the hood and just walked by there… not even the street kids hang out there anymore (not as many anyway). Intelligarde has been hired to patrol and move along the riff-raff, and the Second Cup has added an extension to the steps area to further restrict as well. This happened shortly after Lettieri’s opened on the s/e corner in the fall. Competition is good – monopoly bad. Starbucks burnt-coffee must die.

The Vampire Sex Bar is a Starbucks now? Bwaa haa ha. That strikes me as very funny for some reason.

And kind of poetic, too.

And actually sort of sad.

Maybe it’s all this rum I’ve been drinking.

I’ve got an even 60. 12 are in a 2-mile radius, and 10 are in easy walking distance. *shudder*

Erica

Joey —

Thanks for the shoutout, but I must correct your info. I didn’t work at the Yonge-and-College Starbucks – though I did help our pal Iain Deans (who published his first book of poetry last year and is also an award-winning ad copywriter, while we’re celebrating the successes of ex-baristas) get his job at that outlet.

I worked at the first Yorkville Starbucks, the hole in the wall right next to the Four Seasons hotel on Yorkville Ave. It used the existing air-con when it moved into the space, which was inadequate with the espresso machine running at full tilt, which meant that the thermometer hovered around 85 F or so for most of the summer. I can thus report that the only thing worse than a lousy minimum-wage service industry job is a lousy minimum-wage service industry job in which you sweat profusely for the entirety of your shift.

Also, because it was next to the Four Seasons, it was Celebrity Ground Zero in T.O. I thus served coffee to (among others) Rob Lowe, Martin Sheen, Sarah Maclachlan, Lloyd Robertson, Dave Foley, Jennifer Tilly, Dennis Miller, the guy who plays Paul on The Young and the Restless, and three of the four original members of Kiss. All of them were shorter than you’d think.

The funniest moment of my tenure, though, was the day that the MAC cosmetics convention next door let out for its coffee break. A hundred people all in a row, all dressed in identical black outfits with chunky silver pseudo-goth jewelry, the women all emaciated and the men all flaming, and every coffee order was more elaborate than the last. It was like that scene in LA Story where everyone wants the half-caff espresso with a twist of lemon, only drawn out into a full-length feature all its own. The coffee break as Warhol film, only funnier. I was working the cash that day, and I lost it halfway through and had to go to the backroom to giggle my ass off.

Good times.

— Turner

Looking at the map, it seems to be missing Starbucks locations in hospitals? There are Starbucks in Sick Kids and Toronto General, that are not on the map. (Nr 3 MIGHT be the Sick Kids one, but I don’t think so, because it’s on the wrong side of the building, and that makes it a whole block off)

Leave a Reply