Cold
winter mornings are perfect for a warm cup of coffee and a smile at your local
Starbucks. However Howard
Schultz goal of making Starbucks the ‘third place’ warm your
hearts and minds is all day as they and
everywhere is one step closer to reality as three of the TV show Simpsons'
Writers are now developing an animated series for Starbucks. This is just another reason that the team at
Foodservice Solutions named Schultz
the 2016 Food Merchant of
the year.
John Frink, Joel H.
Cohen and Rob LaZebnik each writes for the TV show Simpson’s and they frequently
work from a Starbucks store on Pico Boulevard in Los Angeles before heading to
their day jobs as writers for the pop-culture animated comedy. Now that store,
its customers and baristas are the inspiration for Starbucks first-ever
animated series.
LaZebnik stated “As
much as we are supposed to be working, we are even better at
procrastinating,"… Looking around, you can’t help but see the vibe in
there—the partners [employees], the regular customers, the flow of morning
traffic. We thought we could bring that to life in a really fun way.”
Branding life as they
see it trio of writers and Starbucks have come together to co-create “1st &
Main,” a series of animated shorts highlighting warm and familiar everyday
moments that happen in Starbucks stores across the country. The seven-episode
series is set in Starbucks and stars a cast of animated animal characters. The
series debuts December 16.
When “Starbucks talks
about the ‘third place’ between work and home,”.. “That’s ultimately the theme
of the series: every person at every table has a story. At our table, we are
the three weird guys watching the other table’s that is according to Cohen.
Here is more from Starbucks about the series:
Each episode runs
approximately 90 seconds, about the length of time it takes to place a
Starbucks order. The brevity of “1st & Main” provides a “fun challenge” for
the writers, who have their own production company called Tolerable
Entertainment.
The series' cast of
characters will seem familiar to those who've spent time in Starbucks. There’s
Julie, “1st & Main’s” store manager and matriarch who fittingly, is a bear;
Chet, a beagle, is a contractor who seems to know everyone in his store
community and has a kind word for everyone; and Diego, a barista cat with a man
bun, takes pride in creating the perfect beverage for his customers. These
characters, and others, make up a community that’s tight-knit and innately
relatable.
“Telling a story in that amount of time is
tricky, because it’s so brief, and you still want a beginning, a middle and an
end. We tried it without an end, but that didn't feel satisfying,” says
LaZebnik.
“Obviously, we want
something that will be funny and resonate with viewers,” Frink says. “So we
tried to come up with simple, small stories that pay off quickly with the right
amount of humor and emotion in them. Also, writing longer stuff takes more
effort, so we went shorter.”
This is Starbucks
second original content series. In September, Starbucks released “Upstanders,"
a 10-part series about ordinary people doing extraordinary things to create
positive change in their communities. The company's second series, “1st &
Main,” celebrates the connections that happen every day in Starbucks stores in
an unexpected way.
Consumers are dynamic not static and brands must be as well. Foodservice
Solutions® team is here to help you drive top line sales and bottom line
profits. Are you Looking A Customer Ahead? Visit www.FoodserviceSolutions.us or Contact Steve@FoodserviceSolutions.us for more information. Remember
Success does leave clue and we just may have the right clue for you.
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