As Goes Starbucks, So Goes Obama

VIA Chicago Tribune

Not to be an Eeyore, but the American economy is in serious trouble. There are warning signs that we are hurtling towards a second Great Depression, on a global scale. One of the most recent is Starbuck's decision to close 600 stores. That means people aren't throwing their money away on fancy coffees anymore, because they don't have that extra cash to spend. They are also trying to drive less, to save money on gas, and are eating less while buying more store-brand, cheaper products. Things will be really bad when home electronics sales start to tank as well. So far that hasn't happened, but the very last warning sign before the bottom falls out will be Best Buy store closings. We're just saying. There's a lot more going on than anyone is talking about -- and now certainly isn't the time to put someone in office with no experience, who surrounds himself with incredibly poor choices in advisors.

Not to be redundant, but we need Hillary Clinton now more than ever.

But, we digress.

And we also think the Starbucks store closings bode poorly for Obama's chances in the fall. Obama IS the Starbucks candidate in this race: the people who pay $4.00 for coffee are the ones most likely to vote for him. What happens to these people as more and more of them can't afford to patronize Starbucks anymore? When they lose their jobs, how many of them will afford to keep their devotion to Obama as well? There's a reason Obama's demographic skews towards these upper-income professional types -- they can afford to take chances, and a good deal of them don't remember what it's like to struggle to pay rent or afford the basics in life. If you have to sneak into your apartment to avoid the landlord, you're not the sort of person who's going to miss that Starbucks that used to be on the corner, or the person who's anxious to line up to vote for Obama in the fall. The more people who skip their frappachinos, the more people who will skip voting for Obama.

A tanking economy means more people will take a good, long look at what the next president can do for them -- and cartoon versions of the presidential seal, coupled with vague promises of Hope and Change aren't going to cut it.

It's also interesting that just a few months ago the media was still talking about how revolutionary and cutting edge Starbucks' expansion was, and how they were so good at using new medium marketing methods to reach new demographics and expand their sales, opening hundreds of new stores, dominanting the market, ruling the world, etc. The media LOVED Starbucks, because the media elite drank two or three mocha-half soy-skim-peppermint-frappa-lattes, or whatever, a day. The media LOVE Obama because he's the candidate their journalism professors always wanted to cover, and these media elite all went to the same schools, had the same professors, and all had the same fantasy of what their absolute most favorite election of all time would be -- frankly, they wanted to see a young black candidate run, and they manipulated the primaries to get their wish. Just like the media manipulated its coverage of Starbucks to paint its branding and marketing strategy as genius, because those Starbucks cups were always in front of them, at deadline, when they were filing their stories.

They missed the story of Starbucks' implosion...and they failed to see how foolish its expansion stragy was, because they were too busy praising it.

They will miss Obama's fall implosion completely as well, because they have been too busy praising him to do their job and vet him as a candidate.

It's sad to see all this coming - like the economic troubles ahead -- but never get anyone to listen, and possibly stop it.