Okay, okay, there is merit in having the discussion about whether or not we should be shelling out $4 for a cup of coffee. And another valid point is the need to be discerning of information put out there on the internet. However, one recent Twitter post from the United Kingdom (UK) had the world in an uproar.
The Tweet
One Twitter user in the UK posted a photograph of a Starbucks sign saying that they were going cashless as of October 2022. This was a surefire way to enrage the Twitter-verse. Soon, the hashtag #BoycotStarbucks was trending on the internet.
Thankfully Starbucks issued its own swift response stating that the company works with licensed business partners in the UK and has no plans to generally go cashless across the board.
Fake News
Many users of Snopes.com, an online platform that is used to check out whether information on the internet is real or “fake news” even reported that, “An apparently small minority of Starbucks stores in the U.K. displayed signs indicating they would be going cashless. The company said that these select stores were ‘operated alongside various licensee business partners.’ However, the company also told us that it had “no plans” to establish a universal policy that would make all of its U.K., U.S., and Canadian stores cashless.”
Good News
This is good news for advocates of payment choice. As has been shown widely in recent years, the vast number of people living in the U.S. who are either unbanked or underbanked primarily use cash to pay for goods and services. Retailers who choose to go cashless are effectively shunning anyone who does not have access to a bank or credit card. Since there are typically Starbucks stores around every corner in America, it’s reassuring to know that they plan to allow customers to continue to pay for their $4 coffee in cash.
